Quintana Roo Dunne: What Happened to Joan Didion Daughter? Death Cause an Alcoholism

Quintana Roo Dunne, Joan Didion’s adopted daughter, had frequent nightmares about “The Broken Man,” an evil repairman in a blue shirt with a Los Angeles Dodgers cap and “gleaming shoes” who told her in a deep voice, “I’m going to lock you here in the garage.”

Quintana died of acute pancreatitis at the age of 39 in 2005, only two years after the death of her adoptive father, writer John Gregory Dunne, the subject of “A Year of Magical Thinking.”

Didion is distraught over her parenting, Quintana’s recurring fear of abandonment, and a failed reunion with her biological family.