Icefields - Softcover

Wharton, Thomas

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0224044958 ISBN 13: 9780224044950

Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd, 1997

Synopsis

On an expedition in the Canadian Rockies at the end of the nineteenth century, Dr Edward Byrne slips and falls almost 60 feet into a crevasse on the Arcturus Glacier. While trapped, hanging upside down, wary that the slightest movement could send him plunging deeper into the abyss, Byrne notices a mysterious winged figure embedded in the ice wall. The vision shakes his sanity, and after his recovery continues to haunt him until he abandons his fiancee and his medical practice in England and returns to a lonely vigil in a shack near the spot on the ice where he almost lost his life. His spirit trapped, he seeks the truth by questioning closely the strange characters that cross his path and meticulously recording the advance and decline of the glacier. Piece by piece, a defining history of the region emerges as the town of Jasper grows out of the myths and legends of an early settlement and is transformed by the coming of the railroad into a thriving tourist centre - with an impact as far away as the battlefields of the First World War.

About this title

Review:

Peter Simpson

Telegraph-Journal

"Crosses Michael Ondaatje's "The English Patient" with Peter Hoeg's "Smilla's Sense of Snow," . . . Ironic, brilliant, and unforgettable . . ."

R. W. Sandford

The Jasper Booster Community

"Spare and simple, like the glaciers and frozen peaks he describes, Wharton's writing mirror the beauty of the high alpine landscape. . . . It is not often that you come across a locally written classic."

Larry Watson

Author of "Montana 1948" and "Justice"

""Icefields" is a wonderful novel. Thomas Wharton writes prose that feels simultaneously stripped-down yet lush. He takes an ordinary, realistic place -- that plain, icy mountain -- and makes it exotic, magical, extraordinary."

Joy Gugeler

The Ottawa Citizen

"A stunning debut. . . . Wharton's poetic passages betray a slow flame beneath the cool prose, a raw intense curiosity which fascinates and lays everything bare. His characters are memorably distinct and his portrait of the Rockies is at once exhaustive and engaging."

Susan Taylor Chehak

Author of "Smithereens"

"What an accomplishment. . . . A magical story, told with such cool reserve -- the deceptive simplicity of its language and the multifaceted complexity of time, character, and plot, so much like the ice cathedral that it describes, held me completely in its thrall. . . . I'm haunted by those people and that place."

Mark Glles

The Calgary Herald

"Wharton writes with a prose style as clear as glacial waters, tempered with brilliant imagery and lucid dialogue. . . . If at times the style betrays Wharton's influences -- there are glimpses of Michael Ondaatje, Rudy Wiebe, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez and Kristjana Gunnars -- it is never imitative; Wharton is an original writer and "Icefields" is an original novel."

Peter SimpsonTelegraph-Journal"Crosses Michael Ondaatje's "The English Patient" with Peter Hoeg's "Smilla's Sense of Snow," . . . Ironic, brilliant, and unforgettable . . ."

R. W. SandfordThe Jasper Booster Community"Spare and simple, like the glaciers and frozen peaks he describes, Wharton's writing mirror the beauty of the high alpine landscape. . . . It is not often that you come across a locally written classic."

Larry WatsonAuthor of "Montana 1948" and "Justice"""Icefields" is a wonderful novel. Thomas Wharton writes prose that feels simultaneously stripped-down yet lush. He takes an ordinary, realistic place -- that plain, icy mountain -- and makes it exotic, magical, extraordinary."

Joy GugelerThe Ottawa Citizen"A stunning debut. . . . Wharton's poetic passages betray a slow flame beneath the cool prose, a raw intense curiosity which fascinates and lays everything bare. His characters are memorably distinct and his portrait of the Rockies is at once exhaustive and engaging."

Synopsis:

Trapped in a crevasse on the Arcturus Glacier whilst on an expedition, Edward Byrne notices a mysterious winged figure embedded in the ice wall. The vision shakes his sanity, and after his recovery he returns to a lonely vigil which brings him closer to a defining history of the region.

About this edition

• Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0224044958
• ISBN 13: 9780224044950
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224