"The Last Thing He Told Me" is a novel by Laura Dave that has been adapted into a thriller miniseries on Apple TV+.
The show stars Jennifer Garner as Hannah and Angourie Rice as Bailey, and is co-created and executive produced by Dave and her husband, screenwriter Josh Singer.
The story is about the disappearance of Owen Michaels, who leaves behind a duffel bag filled with $60,000 for his 16-year-old daughter, Bailey, and a note for Hannah reading: "Protect her."
The novel and the show explore the themes of motherhood and the unconventional ways that family can form, as Hannah and Bailey are familiar with loss even before Owen's disappearance.
Bailey is a typical teenager, with purple-pink streaks in her hair and a love of musical theater, and initially resists any relationship with her stepmother.
Dave writes in a Q&A included in the back of the book that no version of motherhood is more honorable or more important than another, and that we define home and love in ways that may be more generous and fulfilling than our younger selves could have imagined.
The show depicts the importance of friendship and how it can count as motherhood, as Hannah's best friend from childhood, Jules, and Jules' partner, Max, are a second family for Hannah and Bailey.