Icefields

Thomas Wharton

ISBN 10: 0920897878 / ISBN 13: 9780920897874

Published by NeWest Press, 1996

About this Item

A near fine copy of the first Canadian edition, inscribed by the author to the previous owner. Book has been carefully read, shows some rubbing to edges, handsome ex libris sticker inside front flap, some dusting to bottom of block. Octavo, perfect bound, printed wraps, 276 pages. Satisfaction guaranteed. Additional photos always available on request. Shipped in a fitted, padded box.

Seller Inventory # ABE-1760303514674

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Icefields
• Publisher: NeWest Press
• Publication Date: 1996
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0920897878
• ISBN 13: 9780920897874
• Binding: Soft cover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Near Fine
• Signed: Inscribed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • Canadian
  • Signed
  • Fiction

About this title

Synopsis

Icefields is a story of adventure and discovery that unfolds amidst the stunning beauty of the Canadian Rockies. Presented within the frame of a tourist guidebook, this novel records life in the mountains, as time and the coming of the railroad slowly transform the settlement of Jasper from a place of myth and legend to a modern tourist town. Exhaustively researched, this novel blends geology and poetry, fact and fiction, history and imagination.

Review

This first novel begins with an imaginative and ingenious premise: a physician trekking across the Arcturus Glacier in the Canadian Rockies in 1898 slips and tumbles into a crevasse, where he beholds a winged human figure. The rest of the book tells of Dr. Edward Byrne's efforts to get to the bottom of the mystery in the ice. Along the way, he encounters a series of eccentrics, each involved in their own quest: the explorer Freya; the industrialist Trask; the poet Hal; and the slightly mad Elspeth, Byrne's lover. Told through scientific notes, journal entries, letters, and dialogue, this historical tale of the incalculable encountered in the mountains marks a promising debut.