The Distant Dead, a novel by Heather Young, was named one of the best books of summer 2020 by People Magazine, and for good reason. It’s a solemn, patient tale that details its characters and settings with such clarity that it feels like a true story.
Nora Wheaton is a middle school social studies teacher in her hometown of Lovelock, Nevada, a small mining city where no one ever leaves. Nora did leave, once, chasing dreams of becoming an anthropologist in faraway places — but tragedy dragged her back home to care for her aging father, toward whom she feels too much guilt to abandon, but too much bitterness to forgive for the disaster that broke her family years ago.
If there’s anything left in Lovelock that interests her, it’s her new coworker Adam Merkel, a math professor who gave up his position at the University of Nevada to teach bored preteens. Nora thinks she senses a kindred spirit in Adam, and can’t fathom why he would come to Lovelock willingly…unless he has a past to escape.
Before she can uncover any answers, the professor turns up dead, burnt alive on the outskirts of town. The body is discovered by Sal Prentiss, a shy, orphaned sixth-grader who built a close friendship with Adam. But Nora suspects that Sal knows more about the murder than he lets on, and her search for answers intertwines with Sal’s internal struggle over right and wrong.
The story is told through alternating timelines, guiding us through Nora’s point of view in the aftermath of Adam’s death and Sal’s in the months leading up to it. Although it’s been marketed as a thriller, this novel doesn’t have much in the way of breakneck twists and heart-thumping chase scenes. Its strength lies in the patience with which events are revealed and backstories are unfolded; although it’s not fast-paced, every chapter holds your attention and gives you a new puzzle piece to think over.
The pacing is so well-constructed that it must have required very careful outlining, but the story still feels sincere and organic, as if everything could have really happened. The Distant Dead may not be flashy, but it is realistic, containing just enough horror to keep the stakes high without ever veering off into fantasyland. Every character is touched and connected by a patchwork of losses that one might find in any crumbling small town in America.
Grief may make up the novel’s emotional core, but by the end of the story, you’ll see a spark of hope, too. The Distant Dead is full of deep connections between unlikely people, and we see how those connections can provide healing even after the darkest tragedies. Shocking, poignant, and heartbreakingly relevant to some of America’s most pressing issues, this book is one worth adding to your reading list.