#jon billman

[ademella]

currently reading

[alienas]

Books Read in 2022 ⤵ The Cold Vanish: Seeking the Missing in North America's Wildlands by Jon Billman

[flyicarus]

The Cold Vanish - REVIEW

★★★★

Note: I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in return for an honest review.

The Cold Vanish was such an engrossing and eye-opening read. I was expecting something else from the book, though I don’t know what - perhaps something more like reading an episode of Unsolved Mysteries, something more sensationalized, but I am so glad the book was different than my expectations for it. Billman crafts a compassionate but fact based narrative, focusing heavily on missing person Jacob Gray but interspersing the chapters with other missing people from public lands and national parks. It was at turns hopeful and heartbreaking, but overall terrific. I was also very impressed with Billman for not just writing the story but actually doing the work of searching for missing people himself. I had never thought too closely about missing people and search and rescue protocols, thankfully I suppose, so it was fascinating as well as frustrating to read about where these procedures fall short and leave the families of missing people behind. My heart goes out to these families and I’m immeasurably grateful for the people that help, and even those like the author for writing about this issue.

The Cold Vanish was released on July 7, 2020.

[durinsbride]

I’m currently reading:

As a true crime reader, and with a life long interest in forensics, this book caught my eye because of the title.

Nothing is more horrible to contemplate than the sudden disappearance of a loved one, especially when that person or child vanishes into the last vestiages of America’s wilderness with no trace, no clear evidence left behind to help begin or focus the search. The totally agony of not knowing.

One of the most heart breaking experiences that Billman touches upon in the book is how the family left behind often struggles with simply speaking about their loved one, commonly using a mixture of past and present tense in speech, i.e. “he was so funny” or “she’s such a creative person” but never settling on one tense, even decades later. As if, Billman says, “they forever inhabit two worlds” of the living and the dead.

A wonderful, sad and compelling book.