Everyone in This Room Will Someday be Dead

Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead is a 2021 novel by Emily Austin. It follows Gilda, a 27-year-old lesbian atheist who seeks mental health support at an unknown place after being in a car accident and losing her job at a bookstore. This place of support turns out to be a Catholic church, and the priest mistakes Gilda for an applicant for the church’s secretary position. Gilda takes the job and must balance her fragile mental health, her double life posing as a heterosexual Catholic woman, and a murder investigation into the previous secretary’s death.

Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead is narrated through Gilda’s present-tense stream of consciousness. Themes discussed in the novel include The Human Condition, Living Authentically, and Mental Health and Financial Precarity. Gilda’s story is told in five parts, corresponding to the Catholic liturgical calendar.

This guide is based on the 2021 ePub version of the Atria Books publication.

Content Warning: Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead includes alcohol addiction, anti-gay bias and slurs, eating disorders, suicidal ideation, and a death by suicide.

Plot Summary

Part 1 (“Advent”) begins with protagonist Gilda getting into a car accident and breaking her arm. She doesn’t want to inconvenience paramedics, so she drives herself to the hospital. Gilda is a frequent visitor of the emergency room for her panic attacks, and all the employees know her by name. Gilda’s anxiety prevents her from filing an insurance claim on her vehicle. She stops showing up to her job at a local bookstore and loses her job. With no money to her name, bills piling up, and her being unable to wash her dishes, Gilda looks for mental health support. A flier leads her to Saint Rigobert’s Catholic church, without mentioning that the mental health services being offered are religious in nature: Since Gilda is an atheist and a lesbian, she wants nothing to do with the church. The priest of the church, Jeff, believes Gilda is there for a job interview, as the church’s secretary, Grace Moppet, recently passed away. Gilda feels awkward but needs the money, so she pretends she was there for the interview all along. She pretends to be a heterosexual Catholic woman and is hired almost immediately. The house across from Gilda burns down, and the family is unable to find their cat, Mittens, so they leave fliers throughout the neighborhood. Gilda becomes obsessed with finding the cat and pets in general. She spends most evenings after work searching for the cat, which worries her nosy neighbor.

In Part 2 (“Twelvetide”), Gilda learns about the previous secretary, Grace, as she settles into her job. Grace died under strange and sudden circumstances. Gilda and Jeff later learn that Grace overdosed and died by suicide because she felt she had lived long enough. But as of Part 2, Gilda and the other members of the church believe Grace was possibly killed by Laurie Damon, a nurse who showed up in the news for illegally assisting people with suicide. Grace’s death is suspicious to the police in light of Laurie’s actions, so they begin investigating and frequent the church. Gilda begins exchanging emails with Grace’s friend, Rosemary. She pretends to be Grace as she can’t bring herself to tell Rosemary that her friend died. Gilda is roped into pretending to date a young man named Giuseppe, since she is an eligible bachelorette at the Catholic church. She doesn’t turn him down for fear the church will learn she is a lesbian. Meanwhile, Gilda’s family becomes strained as her closeted transgender sibling, Eli, becomes more self-destructive; he abuses substances, but his parents refuse to acknowledge his problems. Gilda can’t turn to her parents to discuss her problems, as they believe discussing mental health will embarrass the family in public.

In Part 3 (“Ordinary Time”), Gilda begins to suspect that Jeff murdered Grace. She also suspects Barney, another member of the congregation, and becomes increasingly paranoid. Gilda’s mental health continues to decline as her apartment becomes more broken and dirty, and the prospect of fixing her life becomes more daunting. Gilda’s girlfriend of a few months, Eleanor, becomes increasingly worried about Gilda’s health and shutting people out. Gilda continues to fake-date Giuseppe, despite her best efforts to be as off-putting as possible to force him to end their one-sided relationship. Unable to tolerate Giuseppe’s advances, Gilda blows up on him mid-date. She lives in fear that Giuseppe will out her to the congregation and get her fired. Gilda celebrates her birthday with her childhood best friend, Ingrid, whom she has grown distant from. Her brother Eli’s mental health worsens as he begins stealing painkillers and money from his family. Part 3 ends with Gilda snooping through Jeff’s home to find evidence of him murdering Grace, only to eavesdrop on his prayers and realize he couldn’t have possibly done the deed.

In Part 4 (“Lent”), Gilda’s mental health worsens as her charade at the church slips. She follows Barney home, suspecting he must be Grace’s killer if not Jeff. She learns Barney has been unwell since his wife died and can barely feed himself. Gilda concludes that he can’t be the murderer since he’s “bumbling” and struggles to complete daily tasks. The police look through Grace’s old computer at the church, now Gilda’s, and find the email exchanges between Gilda and Rosemary. The police bring Gilda in for questioning. They don’t understand how to deal with suspects with mental health conditions and interpret Gilda’s mental state as evidence of her guilt. Gilda begins skipping work as her dishes pile up and she runs out of money. She resorts to eating stolen wafers and drinking stolen communion wine, as she can’t afford food. Eleanor finds out about Giuseppe during Gilda’s interrogation at the police station, and believes Gilda had a boyfriend behind her back throughout their relationship. Gilda shuts out those who try to text her and physically check on her. When the police bring Gilda in for questioning again and reveal that they’ve brought Rosemary as well, the former breaks down into tears and the police lock her up, believing her reaction is a sign of guilt. Gilda calls every person she’s interacted with in the novel from prison and explains her behavior, coming to terms with her poor treatment of some of them. The police let Gilda go after finding a suicide note left by Grace.

In Part 5 (“Easter”), Gilda finds meaning and wonder in existence as she repairs her life. She talks to Rosemary, who finds their ordeal hilarious. Rosemary assures Gilda that Grace would have loved her antics. Gilda establishes a morning routine of grooming and eating, and finally contacts her landlord to fix her apartment. She explains the entire situation to Eleanor, and the two mend their relationship. As Gilda and Eleanor sit on the steps of Gilda’s apartment while the repairmen work, the former finds her neighbors’ missing cat, Mittens, underneath her steps.