Drowning in Darkness : A Novel

Dunvegan, ON, Canada: Cormorant Books, 1993. Second Printing. Pictorial Cover. Very Good +/No Jacket. 179 p.; VG+, very nice copy. The author's great-grandfather, grandfater and father were all coalminers in Alberta's Crowsnest Pass and he draws on this for his novel. "Set in a coal-mining community in southern Alberta's Crowsnest Pass, this novel evokes elements of the fantastic which exist in the land itself, particularly in the gassy, bituminous coal-mines found in the Pass. While one might expect a mine's roof to fall, it is in fact the floor that continually heaves up under a miner's boots, The methane that seeps from the rock and circulates throughout a coal-mine creates this magic, able to soften coal or induce sleep and incite dreams. The mine's gas-marbled darkness and a story about a woman from southern Italy longing to escape the Pass bring about a fantastic/mythological suggestion that washes the reader of her tale right back to its beginning." 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.