The Dim Light

Mary Agnes Bran is a fifth grade teacher in the tiny Midwestern farm town of Keller. Her strict upbringing and a troubling incident from childhood have shaped a cloistered character with a long practiced teaching manner steeped in her ideology. Little has changed for Mary in her years at Truman Middle School, until she meets Amon Marsden, a student suffering torment and ostracism at the hands of his peers for reasons beyond his control. Mary’s inclination to safeguard Amon, as well as the discovery that his circumstances outside of school bear resemblance to her childhood, inspire a bond between the two. As Mary inserts herself into his life, and her maternal instinct grows, she soon finds herself walking a delicate line between teacher, protector and something else entirely.

A taut, cerebral debut, The Dim Light unwraps the accessories of solitude, cruelty and secrecy, finding the shadows that lurk in the spaces between.