Sixteen-year-old Odile Ozanne earns the position to make the arduous trek to descend into the next valley over. It's the same valley, the same town. But to the east, the town is twenty years ahead in time. To the west, it's twenty years behind. The only border crossings permitted by the Conseil are mourning tours: furtive viewings of the dead in towns where the dead are still alive. When Odile recognizes two mourners she wasn't supposed to see, she is sworn to secrecy by the Conseil so as not to disrupt the course of nature.
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