Icefields: Landmark Edition

by Thomas Wharton

A new edition of an award-winning Western Canadian classic.

In 1898, Doctor Edward Byrne slips on the ice of the Arcturus glacier in the Canadian Rockies and slides into a crevasse, wedged upside down nearly sixty feet below the surface. As he fights losing consciousness, a stray beam of sunlight illuminates the ice in front of him and Byrne sees something in the blue-green radiance that will forever link him to the ancient glacier. In this moment, his life’s purpose becomes uncovering the mystery of the icefield that almost was his tomb. Along the way, he encounters similarly fixated individuals, each immersed in their own quest: the healer and storyteller Sara; the bohemian travel writer Freya Becker; the entrepreneur Trask; the poet Hal Rowan; and Elspeth, greenhouse keeper and Byrne’s lover. First published in 1995, Wharton’s Icefields is an astonishing historical novel set in a mesmerizing literary landscape, one that is constantly being altered by the surging and retreating glacier and unpredictable weather. Here—where characters are pulled into deep chasms of ice as well as the stories and histories they tell one another—is a vivid, daring, and crisply written book that reveals the human spirit, loss, myth, and elusive truths. This updated Landmark Edition includes an author interview with Smaro Kamboureli and an Afterword by award-winning writer Suzette Mayr.

Trade Paperback / October 15, 2021 ISBN 10: 1-77439-036-1

ISBN 13: 978-177439-036-8

BISAC 1: FIC014000 BISAC 2: FIC077000 BISAC 3: FIC019000 248 pp / 5.5 x 8.5 / $23.95 cdn $19.95 usd

“Ice, when it is touched, can sear the flesh: in Icefields it fires the imagination.”

~ Emily Mitchell, People

About The Author

Thomas Wharton’s novels, stories, and nonfiction have been published in Canada, the US, the UK, Italy, and other countries. His first novel, Icefields, received the 1996 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book in Canada and the Caribbean. His first collection of fantastical stories, The Logogryph, was shortlisted the International Dublin Literary Award. He has also published a YA fantasy trilogy, The Perilous Realm, and an eco-fiction, Every Blade of Grass. Wharton lives near Edmonton, Alberta and teaches creative writing.

ADDITIONAL SALES POINTS

• Originally a part of the Nunatak First Fiction Series, the longest running debut-fiction series in Canada. • His work has been published in the US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and other countries. • Book will appeal to those who enjoy historical fiction with multiple well-written characters, and for fans of the book looking for further insight and background information.

MARKETING PLAN

• International press release mailout. • Announcement of book’s release by email newsletter and on the NeWest Press Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter pages. • Podcast reading/interview posted on Apple Podcasts, RSS feed, Facebook, and NeWest website. • Press releases and review mailouts to various CBC outlets across the nation, both radio and television. • Online Zoom launch, and eventual in-person launches in Edmonton, and Calgary. • Submit to all eligible awards. • Ads in Glass Buffalo, Prairie Books NOW, Prairie Fire, PRISM international, Read Alberta Books (Alberta Views), subTerrain, and the ULS Super Forthcoming Catalogue.

MARKETS

• National trade: literary/historical fiction • US and UK trade: literary/historical fiction • Jasper, AB.

COMPARISON TITLES

• The Black Grizzly of Whiskey Creek by Sid Marty (978-0-771056-98-7, McClelland & Stewart, 2008) • Places Far from Ellesmere by Aritha Van Herk (978-0-889950-60-3, Red Deer Press, 2003) • The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival by John Vaillant (978-0-307397-15-7, Knopf Canada, 2011)