Heather Young – The Distant Dead

The Distant Dead by Heather Young is another debut novel that is a fantastic read! The amount of debut books that I have read in the last six months that I have found to be brilliant reads are ever-increasing and this is yet another.

It’s a psychological thriller. A burned body is discovered by a young boy, Sal Prentiss. The body turns out to be Adam Merkel, a maths teacher at Sal’s school who was helping Sal. There are questions to be answered and they aren’t easy ones. Did Sal just ‘happen’ to find Adam? Did he have a part to play?

Nora Wheaton, another teacher at the school thought she had found a kindred spirit in Adam and decides to find out the truth. She begins to dig into his past to find clues to who killed him, instead she finds a dark history that she knows only too well. She thinks it may lie closer to home with Sal not just grieving but also afraid. On her quest to earn Sal’s trust she realises he may hold the key to Adams murder and her chance to have the life she wanted.

A dark and tense story that has a slow burn but that doesn’t detract from the story. It gives us detailed backstories that highlight the problems such as drug issues, abuse and even difficult family relationships. These are not always comfortable reading but at least it is real and gritty…just like normal people’s lives are. This makes the book such a real-life read. I admire Heather Young for bringing these issues in her book.

The characters have been so well developed to a point that they create a greater depth to the story and that makes it an even better book just for that little reason too.

This book had me stuck to it without wanting to let it go for any length of time. The writing was mesmerising and although it isn’t always an easy read I do think it powerful too.

Thanks to Random Things Tours and Verve Books for my copy of the book.