FINALIST FOR THE PULITZER PRIZE
FINALIST FOR THE PEN/FAULKNER AWARD
WINNER OF THE WHITING AWARD
WINNER OF THE SAROYAN INTERNATIONAL PRIZE FOR WRITING
WINNTER OF THE VCU CABELL FIRST NOVELIST AWARD
WINNER OF THE NEW AMERICAN VOICES AWARD
A PUBLISHERS WEEKLY TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR
The first novel by the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Trust, an exquisite and blisteringly intelligent story of a young Swedish boy, separated from his brother, who becomes a legend and an outlaw
A young Swedish immigrant finds himself penniless and alone in California. The boy travels east in search of his brother, moving on foot against the great current of emigrants pushing west. Driven back again and again, he meets criminals, naturalists, religious fanatics, swindlers, American Indians, and lawmen, and his exploits turn him into a legend. Diaz defies the conventions of historical fiction and genre, offering a probing look at the stereotypes that populate our past and a portrait of radical foreignness.
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"[In the Distance] excels in creating a sense of disorientating foreignness. The result is richly drawn and something like Huckleberry Finn written by Cormac McCarthy: an adventure story as well as a meditation on the meaning of home."
— The Sunday Times
A gorgeously written novel that charts one man’s growth from boyhood to mythic status as he journeys between continents and the extremes of the human condition.
— Pulitzer Prize finalist citationStrange and transporting . . . In the Distance [is] an uncanny achievement.
— The New York TimesThe prose is as unbroken as the horizon. . . . It’s as if Herman Melville had navigated the American West, instead of the ocean.
— The NationThis suspenseful novel is a potent depiction of loneliness, a memorable immigration narrative, and a canny reinvention of the old-school western.
— Publishers WeeklyPlainspoken and wildly, even cosmically, evocative . . . In the end the reader understands the country’s twin potential for horror and hope.
— Whiting Award citationA singular and deeply affecting portrait of one man’s life in a rapidly changing world.
— The GuardianAn ambitious and thoroughly realized work of revisionist historical fiction.
— Kirkus ReviewsIn the Distance did something new . . . raising important questions about cultural attitudes made evident by assumptions we make about art, particularly toward guns and immigrants. It’s also just a great story.
— The Paris ReviewStitched through with humor, this often-unpredictable novel will keep readers running along with every step of Håkan’s odd escapades.
— BooklistDiaz is bound to join ranks with Borges on the literary scene with this mythical personality, still at large in our consciousness long after we’ve put down the book.
— BookPageWhile set in the American West, this is no conventional Western, as it turns the genre’s stereotypes upside down, taking place on a frontier as much mythic as real with a main character traveling east.
— Library Journal (starred review)[An] extraordinary epic tale of a lone man’s journey into the heart of the American frontier.
— Financial TimesBe the first to write a review about this audiobook!
Hernan Diaz is the author of In the Distance, a finalist for the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, as well as Borges, between History and Eternity. He is associate director of the Hispanic Institute at Columbia University.