In his latest novel, if not in life, Scott Heim returns to his native Kansas, edging down the trail of a mother's splintered memory while there's still time.

Without public transportation, rural Americans with disabilities face a difficult choice: move to the city to get the services they need, or stay in their hometowns and try to get by. Even in Kansas, where nine out of ten counties have some form of rural transit, Dorothy Russell can't get 15 miles up the road for dialysis.