Undiscovered Cpuntry by Lin Enger

This is an adult book with teen appeal. A Young Man, Jesse, is writing a memoir of all that happened one horrible year when he was in high school some 10 years ago and sharing it with a younger brother who was too young to remember that time. The time when their father apparently shot himself while out hunting with Jesse and Jesse found the disfigured body and his life changed forever. That was the medical examiner's call. But. his father appears to Jesse with a different story of what happened. The story involves his uncle Clay who once dated his mother and once shot a cat with a shot gun, not unlike that which killed Jesse's father, Clay's brother. Though no one believes him, except maybe one slow witted young man, Jesse pursues his beliefs all the way to their anticipated conclusion. All the while, I hoped it would not end that way. And an abused young woman, perhaps Jesse's first love tries to talk him out of his trajectory even as she deals with nasty abuse by her father. The impact a parent's death from apparent suicide can have on a child is profoundly presented. And, suicide is a very current hot topic.