HomeGroupsTalkMoreZeitgeist
Search Site
This site uses cookies to deliver our services, improve performance, for analytics, and (if not signed in) for advertising. By using LibraryThing you acknowledge that you have read and understand our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Your use of the site and services is subject to these policies and terms.

Results from Google Books

Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.

The Wildfire Season: A Novel by Andrew Pyper
Loading...

The Wildfire Season: A Novel (original 2005; edition 2008)

by Andrew Pyper

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
1517179,639 (3.64)22
A powerful thriller and love story from the best-selling author of Lost GirlsOf all the end-of-the-world places he could have run to after he was burned, Miles McEwan chose Ross River. Buried deep in the vast wilderness of the Yukon, it seemed the perfect place to escape the past. Best of all, he could carry on doing the job he loved - fighting fire.But five years on, Miles is still troubled by phantoms of his previous life: the young man whose agonizing death preys on his conscience, and the woman he abandoned as a consequence. And in the dark forest around Ross River violence is brewing. A small party, out to track bear, is about to encounter nature in its wildest and most ferocious guise. Elsewhere a killer is going about his work, quietly and ruthlessly.As the survivors of the hunting party are picked off one by one and fire rages through the mountains, Miles embarks on a desperate rescue mission, driven by love for a daughter who, until this dangerous summer, had been a perfect stranger.The Wildfire Season is a remarkable tour de force - an edgy psychological thriller, a supernatural chiller, a terrifying tale of untamed nature, a poignant love story and a riveting follow-up to Andrew Pyper's bestselling Lost Girls.… (more)
Member:mattgalletta
Title:The Wildfire Season: A Novel
Authors:Andrew Pyper
Info:Picador (2008), Paperback, 336 pages
Collections:Your library
Rating:
Tags:fiction

Work Information

The Wildfire Season by Andrew Pyper (2005)

None
Loading...

Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book.

No current Talk conversations about this book.

» See also 22 mentions

Showing 1-5 of 7 (next | show all)
In this book, Pyper invites us to the Yukon so that we can witness a face-off between nature, man and his own conscience. A mix of psychological thriller and adventure, the book can be read literally or as an allegory for destructive rage, like the fire, or redemption, like the grizzly sow.
Even though these are not typically stories that interest me, the description of the wildfire, the bear and the mounting tension is so well done that I read it straight through connecting with all the characters and their diverse personalities.
A unique plot, beautifully delivered. ( )
  Cecilturtle | Mar 22, 2023 |
This was a tense thriller set in a remote community in Northern Canada with a firefighter as the main character. I've always enjoyed Andrew Pyper's stories. ( )
  mathgirl40 | Dec 31, 2021 |
On the front cover of this book is a quote by Guy Vanderhaeghe, a writer I really admire:
A literary page-turner that possesses all the attributes of the wildfire it describes--headlong momentum and harrowing surprises. It is a rarity, a bracing mix of physical adventure and astute psychological portraiture.
Vanderhaeghe has captured what I felt about this book perfectly with language that I only wish I could write.

Miles McEwan is the chief of a fire fighting crew in Ross River, Yukon. It's been a hot dry summer but the crew hasn't had any fires to fight. Unless something starts soon they won't have any money to keep them going over the winter. Someone, we don't know whom, is taking care of that by starting a fire. By the time this fire is out lives will have been changed and some will have been snuffed out.

Into the small village of Ross River come four strangers. Two come to Ross River to hunt a grizzly. The Baders are from the southern US. Mr. Bader retired recently and his dream has always been to kill a "Boone and Crockett Kodiak". Margot Lemontagne will guide them up into the mountains around Ross River to find that grizzly. The other two strangers come to find Miles. Alex and Miles were once lovers. Then Miles, while heading a fire crew in B.C., lost a crew member and was badly scarred himself in a horrific fire. Alex stood by him during his recovery and subsequent depression but Miles couldn't forgive himself. When Alex told Miles that she was pregnant Miles took off, echoing the abandonment by his own father. Alex, with her daughter Rachel, have spent every summer since looking for Miles and now she has found him.

The smallest details add to the narrative. Miles has a dog, Stump, that Rachel latches onto. This relationship between the girl and the dog makes a crucial difference in the story but at the beginning it seems like just a throwaway piece of description. I never felt that anything was extraneous or wasted.

Once the wildfire starts raging out of control I couldn't put the book down. I felt like I was right there with Miles and the hunters and the grizzly as they all contend with nature run amok.

I can't say enough good about this book. Read it yourself. ( )
  gypsysmom | Mar 16, 2013 |
Easy reading but not a page turner. I found the writing to be a little disjointed in places - some sections over descriptive some lacking description. I was confused between the relationship with Miles and Alex, well actually I was confused by all of the characters.

I did consider stopping reading it after about 40 pages as I was a little bored but as it was for a book group I tried again. I was pleased I did as I would have missed out on the survival story of the bears. As usual the blurb misrepresents the book, as I certainly wouldn't call it 'hugely impressive and utterly compelling'. The middle section moves with pace but out of 439 pages if only 80 race along then it becomes a bit of a slog.

A good plot, just maybe needs a different perspective. Mile's fights fires and the story then centres around a 'bush' fire and I felt this became the focus of the novel - which according to the blurb it isn't.

Give it a go and see what you think but I know I won't be reading it again. ( )
  SmithSJ01 | Mar 23, 2008 |
Firefighter Miles McEwan lives in a small town in the wilderness of the Canadian North. After being badly burnt in a fire he ran away from his life and pregnant girlfriend. Now she has turned up in his life and he has to face up to the past that he's been running from for years. On top of that there's a firebug in town.

Tries to be literary but fails this is fairly ho-hum. ( )
  wyvernfriend | Jun 17, 2007 |
Showing 1-5 of 7 (next | show all)
no reviews | add a review
You must log in to edit Common Knowledge data.
For more help see the Common Knowledge help page.
Canonical title
Original title
Alternative titles
Original publication date
People/Characters
Important places
Important events
Related movies
Epigraph
Dedication
First words
He must go far, but not too far.
Quotations
Last words
Disambiguation notice
Publisher's editors
Blurbers
Original language
Canonical DDC/MDS
Canonical LCC

References to this work on external resources.

Wikipedia in English (1)

A powerful thriller and love story from the best-selling author of Lost GirlsOf all the end-of-the-world places he could have run to after he was burned, Miles McEwan chose Ross River. Buried deep in the vast wilderness of the Yukon, it seemed the perfect place to escape the past. Best of all, he could carry on doing the job he loved - fighting fire.But five years on, Miles is still troubled by phantoms of his previous life: the young man whose agonizing death preys on his conscience, and the woman he abandoned as a consequence. And in the dark forest around Ross River violence is brewing. A small party, out to track bear, is about to encounter nature in its wildest and most ferocious guise. Elsewhere a killer is going about his work, quietly and ruthlessly.As the survivors of the hunting party are picked off one by one and fire rages through the mountains, Miles embarks on a desperate rescue mission, driven by love for a daughter who, until this dangerous summer, had been a perfect stranger.The Wildfire Season is a remarkable tour de force - an edgy psychological thriller, a supernatural chiller, a terrifying tale of untamed nature, a poignant love story and a riveting follow-up to Andrew Pyper's bestselling Lost Girls.

No library descriptions found.

Book description
Haiku summary

Current Discussions

None

Popular covers

Quick Links

Rating

Average: (3.64)
0.5
1 2
1.5 1
2
2.5
3 11
3.5 2
4 12
4.5 1
5 7

Is this you?

Become a LibraryThing Author.

 

About | Contact | Privacy/Terms | Help/FAQs | Blog | Store | APIs | TinyCat | Legacy Libraries | Early Reviewers | Common Knowledge | 203,224,895 books! | Top bar: Always visible