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Icefields
Winner of:
The Banff Grand National Prize for Literature
The Writers Guild of Alberta Best First Book Award
The Commonwealth Best First Novel Prize (Caribbean and Canada Region)
The Banff Grand National Prize for Literature
The Writers Guild of Alberta Best First Book Award
The Commonwealth Best First Novel Prize (Caribbean and Canada Region)
At a quarter past three in the afternoon, on August 17, 1898, Doctor Edward Byrne slipped on the ice of Acturus glacier in the Canadian Rockies and slid into a crevasse . . .
Nearly sixty feet below the surface, Byrne is wedged upside down between the narrowing walls of a chasm, fighting his desire to sleep. The ice in front of him is lit with a pale blue-green radiance. There, embedded in he pure, antediluvian glacier, Byrne sees something that will inextricably link him to the vast bed of ice, and the people who inhabit this strange corner of the world. In this moment, his life becomes a quest to uncover the mystery of the icefield that almost became his tomb.
Within the deceptively simple framework of a tourist guidebook, Icefields takes a breathtaking, imaginative look at the human spirit, loss, myth, and elusive truths. Here is an impressive literary landscape, and an expedition unlike any you have ever experienced.
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
71 people are currently reading
6348 people want to read
About the author
Thomas Wharton
34 books167 followersI live near Edmonton, Alberta, Canada and write for grown-ups and children. My newest novel, The Book of Rain, will be published by Random House Canada in 2023.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 197 reviews
December 31, 2022
I read this book in grade 10 English Honors (yeah, that's right).
I remember the author came to our classroom and we asked him about some of the 'metaphors' our teacher told us about. He told us that they weren't intended to be metaphors. That's when I realized that writers write and readers find the meaning. Especially if you're teaching an Honors class.
3/5 stars because that's my only memory of it. Neither good nor bad.
I remember the author came to our classroom and we asked him about some of the 'metaphors' our teacher told us about. He told us that they weren't intended to be metaphors. That's when I realized that writers write and readers find the meaning. Especially if you're teaching an Honors class.
3/5 stars because that's my only memory of it. Neither good nor bad.
December 21, 2014
I don't read outdoorsy books. I'm much more of a fantasy/historical fiction kind of girl. That said, I loved Icefields! Loved it! Wharton did an amazing job. It was historical, geological and unsettling.
August 29, 2012
Read this book for a university English course and must say, it was magic. I absolutely loved and so has everyone I recommended it to.
January 3, 2025
Who would’ve thought I’d find love at the very start of 2025?«Icefields» took my breath away.
To think that this humble, little book can contain such a vastness. It explores the lonely walk along a path to find oneself, the extremities of natural landscapes, the intruding force of colonialism and industrialization, the healing yet isolating effect of stillness and connection with nature, the co-existence of rationalism/science and intuition/spirituality, the immaterial inheritance from our parents, the terrors of war, the pain of a broken heart. The glacier looms in the background as a constant in the ever-changing world; it observes, remembers and reminds.
The writing is utterly gorgeous and full of imagery; a gold mine for literary analysis:
«Everywhere the ice bristles up with glittering frost needles as the melted and now refreezing surface water dilatates. A garden of tiny ice flowers seems to be growing all around me.»
«She can hear, rolling underneath the cold technical language, a turbulence of desires and emotions. She cannot interpret them. This is a voice out of the dark.»
This book offered so much interesting to reflect on along the way, and I can’t wait to return to my pencil-covered pages in the future for a re-embarkment. I adore how the story manages to be so simple yet so layered, almost feeling like a geological structure itself. As the back of my paperback says, «this novel rears up a shining ice-cathedral of a story, lovely, mysterious, and awe-inspiring.»
I’m hoping that this phenomenal start means that my renovated reading strategies are proving successful, and if so, I can’t wait to see what the rest of the year has to offer:)
(Bonus) Another favorite passage of mine:
«She is somehow childlike. This older woman who has lived in some of the world’s great cities and written about their dangers, their seductions. She travels like the meandering heroine of a novel for children, shrugging off the entanglements of one chapter and moving on to the next, never stopping long enough in one place for its habits of defeat and cynicism to cling to her. Always asking what’s over the next hill, around the next curve of the river? But never asking how will I get home?»
To think that this humble, little book can contain such a vastness. It explores the lonely walk along a path to find oneself, the extremities of natural landscapes, the intruding force of colonialism and industrialization, the healing yet isolating effect of stillness and connection with nature, the co-existence of rationalism/science and intuition/spirituality, the immaterial inheritance from our parents, the terrors of war, the pain of a broken heart. The glacier looms in the background as a constant in the ever-changing world; it observes, remembers and reminds.
The writing is utterly gorgeous and full of imagery; a gold mine for literary analysis:
«Everywhere the ice bristles up with glittering frost needles as the melted and now refreezing surface water dilatates. A garden of tiny ice flowers seems to be growing all around me.»
«She can hear, rolling underneath the cold technical language, a turbulence of desires and emotions. She cannot interpret them. This is a voice out of the dark.»
This book offered so much interesting to reflect on along the way, and I can’t wait to return to my pencil-covered pages in the future for a re-embarkment. I adore how the story manages to be so simple yet so layered, almost feeling like a geological structure itself. As the back of my paperback says, «this novel rears up a shining ice-cathedral of a story, lovely, mysterious, and awe-inspiring.»
I’m hoping that this phenomenal start means that my renovated reading strategies are proving successful, and if so, I can’t wait to see what the rest of the year has to offer:)
(Bonus) Another favorite passage of mine:
«She is somehow childlike. This older woman who has lived in some of the world’s great cities and written about their dangers, their seductions. She travels like the meandering heroine of a novel for children, shrugging off the entanglements of one chapter and moving on to the next, never stopping long enough in one place for its habits of defeat and cynicism to cling to her. Always asking what’s over the next hill, around the next curve of the river? But never asking how will I get home?»
September 13, 2018
Rating: 3.3 / 5
In the end, there isn't really much substance here. The premise is boring, and all in all this isn't ordinarily a book that I would even look twice at, but, for Canadian Lit, which I'm taking as a mandatory course, I've had to read it.
To its credit, the writing style is tolerable, even though it's written in the post-modernist style, which involves a lot of fragmentation in both the sentences and the narrative; but, honestly, I don't know how the writer could have made a whole book out of this. Word count-wise, it probably isn't worth the 270+ pages it fills up, and, if shortened on the repetitive and "I don't give a shit" details about the icefields themselves, it would make a better short story. Some things like romance and WWI and character development is thrown in, but most of it feels like an aside, or like a last-minute thought, rather than the whole point of the story. Because of its connection to Native American narratives--which I liked--I can understand why we're studying it for this class, but that doesn't mean I like it overall. Literally, just the Native American parts are what I liked, but those are over within the first third or so of the book, with the rest focusing on the white-man-adventurer protagonist and how obsessed he is with ice.
I don't know, maybe some people are into it and like this sort of thing, but for me, I don't even plan on picking it, or anything like it, up ever again--unless, of course...*sighs* I have to for school or something.
In the end, there isn't really much substance here. The premise is boring, and all in all this isn't ordinarily a book that I would even look twice at, but, for Canadian Lit, which I'm taking as a mandatory course, I've had to read it.
To its credit, the writing style is tolerable, even though it's written in the post-modernist style, which involves a lot of fragmentation in both the sentences and the narrative; but, honestly, I don't know how the writer could have made a whole book out of this. Word count-wise, it probably isn't worth the 270+ pages it fills up, and, if shortened on the repetitive and "I don't give a shit" details about the icefields themselves, it would make a better short story. Some things like romance and WWI and character development is thrown in, but most of it feels like an aside, or like a last-minute thought, rather than the whole point of the story. Because of its connection to Native American narratives--which I liked--I can understand why we're studying it for this class, but that doesn't mean I like it overall. Literally, just the Native American parts are what I liked, but those are over within the first third or so of the book, with the rest focusing on the white-man-adventurer protagonist and how obsessed he is with ice.
I don't know, maybe some people are into it and like this sort of thing, but for me, I don't even plan on picking it, or anything like it, up ever again--unless, of course...*sighs* I have to for school or something.
December 22, 2025
3.5 ⭐️
loved all the ice and glacier imagery, rich with similes and metaphor and personification. very atmospheric, almost reminded me of ‘our wives under the sea’ in its approach to super natural elements and in how it does not reveal much to the reader, but rather leaves the events up to interpretation. It was, however, a little slow. Im sure that’s because of the mood/reading slump I’m currently in. I intend to write a full review (when I am caught up with the other 3048474 reviews I have on my backlog)
loved all the ice and glacier imagery, rich with similes and metaphor and personification. very atmospheric, almost reminded me of ‘our wives under the sea’ in its approach to super natural elements and in how it does not reveal much to the reader, but rather leaves the events up to interpretation. It was, however, a little slow. Im sure that’s because of the mood/reading slump I’m currently in. I intend to write a full review (when I am caught up with the other 3048474 reviews I have on my backlog)
August 26, 2025
I really enjoyed living in this world... until I didn't. I found it ... boring? And ugh, I hate to use that word for books, but that's the genuine truth. As much as I adore cold climates and glaciology, I found the characters and relationships quite lackluster and dry, sticking out like sore thumbs within Wharton's beautiful descriptions of the icy landscape. The vast majority of this book felt like menial rambling. The jumps in subject matter and progression of the novel just felt jarring, as well.
I found myself most captivated near the end of the book, where Wharton almost made an interesting commentary on tourism in delicate ecosystems. Almost.
This book just wasn't for me :(((
I found myself most captivated near the end of the book, where Wharton almost made an interesting commentary on tourism in delicate ecosystems. Almost.
This book just wasn't for me :(((
August 5, 2018
I read Icefields a couple of years ago and can't honestly remember more than a few basic details about the characters and plot. But Wharton's writing perfectly matched the sparse, beautiful setting in the Canadian Rockies to take me to another place. Reading the book was a meditative, spiritual experience.
July 28, 2022
2.5 stars. Some lovely descriptions and a sweet ending but overall just kind of boring (I don’t really want to read ANOTHER romanticized story about colonizing and capitalizing)
March 19, 2023
Tutto un altro livello di ecocritica
Vi dico subito che non è per tutti. Se siete dei lettori che cercano la trama avvincente, resterete delusi. E se cercate personaggi a cui legarvi, resterete delusi un po' di meno, ma comunque qui non troverete niente di straordinario.
Qui si parla di ghiaccio e di un ghiacciaio in particolare, Arcturus Glacier nelle Canadian Rockies. Il ghiacciaio è il centro di tutto e la sua forma diventa la struttura stessa del romanzo che, sezione dopo sezione, tocca alcuni tra i punti fondamentali dell'esistenza e dell'esperienza umana nel mondo.
Innanzitutto, il grande tema dell'origine. Origine di un ghiacciaio, della storia di un territorio e della sua successiva colonizzazione, della vicenda del romanzo e di tutte le storie che raccontano l'origine, la natura e che da sempre cercano di assumere una forma che possa descrivere il nostro rapporto con l'ambiente in tutte le sue diversissime sfaccettature.
Poi, la comparsa di una varietà di personaggi dalla psicologia ben delineata ma anche piuttosto tipizzati a rappresentare diversi modelli ricorrenti nella relazione con la natura dell'umanità moderna: il capitalista, l'avventuriera, il poeta, il colonizzatore, la giardiniera. E ancora, sempre, il dubbio sull'accuratezza e sull'efficacia delle parole nell'esprimere il mondo naturale così come noi lo percepiamo, lo comprendiamo e lo interpretiamo.
E ancora, saliamo verso le zone più in alto, quelle più inaccessibili, "luoghi degli spiriti", inadatti alla vita, privi di qualsiasi scopo pratico. Per alcuni, una delusione. Per altri, un simbolo della propria mente, luoghi che si cerca di comprendere con un approccio scientifico e uno spirituale, cercando una sintesi tra i due punti di vista. Come nella mente umana, anche nel ghiacciaio è conservato un mistero, un ricordo, un'impressione, qualcosa che sfugge all'analisi scientifica e alle parole, qualcosa che, alla fine, il ghiacciaio stesso restituirà al protagonista muovendosi inesorabilmente attraverso tutte le sue fasi fino a quella finale, Terminus.
Prima, però, la zona di confine tra ciò che ancora è ghiaccio inviolato e il punto di rottura. Ed è qui che i nostri personaggi iniziano a cedere, come il ghiacciaio, rispetto alla propria vicenda personale: i traumi del lutto e della Guerra, i ricordi persi durante l'infanzia. O meglio, i ricordi conservati in una zona della mente che, come il ghiacciaio stesso, si comporta come una macchina del tempo, tenendoli al sicuro finché non arriverà il momento di rilasciarli e scioglierne il significato.
La fine è la soluzione degli enigmi della psiche, il recupero di ricordi, l'elaborazione dei traumi, lo sciogliersi dei nodi, ma anche la fine del processo di capitalizzazione del territorio, l'arrivo del turismo di massa e la mercificazione di quel mistero naturale, fisico e spirituale, che tanto ci assomiglia. E la sensazione, di fronte ad un'opera perfetta, che la letteratura, le storie, i miti, le favole e i romanzi in fondo siano davvero dei mezzi efficaci per esprimere il rapporto con la Natura, per quanto complesso, sfaccettato, antico, tecnico o spirituale possa essere.
Vi dico subito che non è per tutti. Se siete dei lettori che cercano la trama avvincente, resterete delusi. E se cercate personaggi a cui legarvi, resterete delusi un po' di meno, ma comunque qui non troverete niente di straordinario.
Qui si parla di ghiaccio e di un ghiacciaio in particolare, Arcturus Glacier nelle Canadian Rockies. Il ghiacciaio è il centro di tutto e la sua forma diventa la struttura stessa del romanzo che, sezione dopo sezione, tocca alcuni tra i punti fondamentali dell'esistenza e dell'esperienza umana nel mondo.
Innanzitutto, il grande tema dell'origine. Origine di un ghiacciaio, della storia di un territorio e della sua successiva colonizzazione, della vicenda del romanzo e di tutte le storie che raccontano l'origine, la natura e che da sempre cercano di assumere una forma che possa descrivere il nostro rapporto con l'ambiente in tutte le sue diversissime sfaccettature.
Poi, la comparsa di una varietà di personaggi dalla psicologia ben delineata ma anche piuttosto tipizzati a rappresentare diversi modelli ricorrenti nella relazione con la natura dell'umanità moderna: il capitalista, l'avventuriera, il poeta, il colonizzatore, la giardiniera. E ancora, sempre, il dubbio sull'accuratezza e sull'efficacia delle parole nell'esprimere il mondo naturale così come noi lo percepiamo, lo comprendiamo e lo interpretiamo.
E ancora, saliamo verso le zone più in alto, quelle più inaccessibili, "luoghi degli spiriti", inadatti alla vita, privi di qualsiasi scopo pratico. Per alcuni, una delusione. Per altri, un simbolo della propria mente, luoghi che si cerca di comprendere con un approccio scientifico e uno spirituale, cercando una sintesi tra i due punti di vista. Come nella mente umana, anche nel ghiacciaio è conservato un mistero, un ricordo, un'impressione, qualcosa che sfugge all'analisi scientifica e alle parole, qualcosa che, alla fine, il ghiacciaio stesso restituirà al protagonista muovendosi inesorabilmente attraverso tutte le sue fasi fino a quella finale, Terminus.
Prima, però, la zona di confine tra ciò che ancora è ghiaccio inviolato e il punto di rottura. Ed è qui che i nostri personaggi iniziano a cedere, come il ghiacciaio, rispetto alla propria vicenda personale: i traumi del lutto e della Guerra, i ricordi persi durante l'infanzia. O meglio, i ricordi conservati in una zona della mente che, come il ghiacciaio stesso, si comporta come una macchina del tempo, tenendoli al sicuro finché non arriverà il momento di rilasciarli e scioglierne il significato.
La fine è la soluzione degli enigmi della psiche, il recupero di ricordi, l'elaborazione dei traumi, lo sciogliersi dei nodi, ma anche la fine del processo di capitalizzazione del territorio, l'arrivo del turismo di massa e la mercificazione di quel mistero naturale, fisico e spirituale, che tanto ci assomiglia. E la sensazione, di fronte ad un'opera perfetta, che la letteratura, le storie, i miti, le favole e i romanzi in fondo siano davvero dei mezzi efficaci per esprimere il rapporto con la Natura, per quanto complesso, sfaccettato, antico, tecnico o spirituale possa essere.
February 8, 2025
4.75 final rating. Review to come!
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July 18, 2025Around the world: Canada
December 31, 2024
"He stared straight ahead and realized he could see quite far into the ice. It was almost free of impurities, like a wall of furrowed tinted glass. He squinted. There was something in the ice, a shape, it's outlined sharpening as the light grew. A fused mass of trapped air bubbles, or a vein of snow, had formed the chance design, a white form embedded within the darker ice and revealed by the light of the sun." It all starts with an accident: a botanist falls head first into a crevasse and glimpses a shape that could very well be an angel. What follows is a beautiful lyrical novel about memory, the slow erosion of nature and obsession magnified by time.
Icefields is a fantastic work of Canadian literature that I wish more people talked about. It uses the fictitious "Arcturus Glacier" (likely inspired by the real Athabasca glacier from my understanding) as a versatile symbol. The slow moving mass of ice, capable of creating ephemeral structures, swallowing objects, damaging and fracturing them, only to spit them out at its terminus transformed is beautifully paralleled with the character's own fallible memories.
“Byrne watches for three days as an architectural wonder is created. The glacier groans, cracks, thunders, and rears up a cathedral. (...) When the sun breaks through cloud, the cathedral fills with light. The warmer air hollows it into a more baroque, flamboyant shape. Spires, archways, gargoyles come on begin to flow. Waterfalls set festive ice bells ringing. Then slowly, the delicate balance that kept it aloft is undermined. Even as the light glorifies it, the cathedral is diminished, begins almost imperceptibly to collapse. Sepulchral booms and crashes attest to hidden vaults and hollows, the shifting instability of the foundation. (...) The next morning Byrne climbs to the icefall’s base to find that the cathedral is gone, swallowed up in its demesne. Vanished, he writes in his notebook. It must have fallen quickly in the night. But it made no sound.”
Similarly, we watch stories transform, disappear and re-emerge at the same slow unpredictable pace as the glacier. But as modern-day spoils and profit-driven philosophies (including the first incarnations of ecotourism) encroach upon the valley, they damage the ice as well as the characters' sense of identity. "It seems ironic to him, another joke at the expense in the country of illusion. That the ice should be disappearing at the same time that someone had finally found a use for it." To a certain degree however nature fights back: "The rail workers kept bonfires burning for two weeks, to speed up the melting of the glacier. At last the buried stretch of line was exposed. They shoveled away heaps of slush and found a section of track torn up from its gravel bed, the two steel rails twisted around each other like twining snakes." The ice will not go quietly into the night.
Still the unbreakable pace of "progress" slowly consumes the glacier and its magic, until even Byrne's ice-trapped angel escapes. It's a blink-and-you'll miss it moment and it's heartbreaking to know the full story--just like the full glacier--will not survive in the logic-dominated 20th century. We lose the magic at the same pace we lose nature.
As such, "Icefields" manages to be a versatile novel, composed of interlocked yet ever shifting flash-scenes. It's part eco-fiction, love story and a meditation on human memory. It's impeccably readable, meditative and melancholic. And I highly recommend you approach it with the same patience and care you would approach an unstable field of melting ice.
Icefields is a fantastic work of Canadian literature that I wish more people talked about. It uses the fictitious "Arcturus Glacier" (likely inspired by the real Athabasca glacier from my understanding) as a versatile symbol. The slow moving mass of ice, capable of creating ephemeral structures, swallowing objects, damaging and fracturing them, only to spit them out at its terminus transformed is beautifully paralleled with the character's own fallible memories.
“Byrne watches for three days as an architectural wonder is created. The glacier groans, cracks, thunders, and rears up a cathedral. (...) When the sun breaks through cloud, the cathedral fills with light. The warmer air hollows it into a more baroque, flamboyant shape. Spires, archways, gargoyles come on begin to flow. Waterfalls set festive ice bells ringing. Then slowly, the delicate balance that kept it aloft is undermined. Even as the light glorifies it, the cathedral is diminished, begins almost imperceptibly to collapse. Sepulchral booms and crashes attest to hidden vaults and hollows, the shifting instability of the foundation. (...) The next morning Byrne climbs to the icefall’s base to find that the cathedral is gone, swallowed up in its demesne. Vanished, he writes in his notebook. It must have fallen quickly in the night. But it made no sound.”
Similarly, we watch stories transform, disappear and re-emerge at the same slow unpredictable pace as the glacier. But as modern-day spoils and profit-driven philosophies (including the first incarnations of ecotourism) encroach upon the valley, they damage the ice as well as the characters' sense of identity. "It seems ironic to him, another joke at the expense in the country of illusion. That the ice should be disappearing at the same time that someone had finally found a use for it." To a certain degree however nature fights back: "The rail workers kept bonfires burning for two weeks, to speed up the melting of the glacier. At last the buried stretch of line was exposed. They shoveled away heaps of slush and found a section of track torn up from its gravel bed, the two steel rails twisted around each other like twining snakes." The ice will not go quietly into the night.
Still the unbreakable pace of "progress" slowly consumes the glacier and its magic, until even Byrne's ice-trapped angel escapes. It's a blink-and-you'll miss it moment and it's heartbreaking to know the full story--just like the full glacier--will not survive in the logic-dominated 20th century. We lose the magic at the same pace we lose nature.
As such, "Icefields" manages to be a versatile novel, composed of interlocked yet ever shifting flash-scenes. It's part eco-fiction, love story and a meditation on human memory. It's impeccably readable, meditative and melancholic. And I highly recommend you approach it with the same patience and care you would approach an unstable field of melting ice.
May 27, 2022
I got about half way through this one before I realized this book just isn't for me. The first few pages were great. A man falls through a crevice and is stuck in the ice, in the middle of a mountain. What isn't to enjoy about reading about his rescue and recovery? He meets a local woman who nurses him back to health and then returns home to England.
I thought the story was going to be about him returning and finding this woman and maybe finding himself but I have no idea what the plot was when he returned back to Jasper. There were a whole bunch of additional characters that I didn't care about introduced and the main character was only around sometime. When I realized this book was going to be about nothing I decided to give up.
I thought the story was going to be about him returning and finding this woman and maybe finding himself but I have no idea what the plot was when he returned back to Jasper. There were a whole bunch of additional characters that I didn't care about introduced and the main character was only around sometime. When I realized this book was going to be about nothing I decided to give up.
April 22, 2018
I loved having this to read as we journeyed through the Canadian Rockies and the Columbia Icefield. The idea for this book and the plot that resulted are fascinating. Unfortunately, the writing is below par and the changes in characters and time periods is confusing.
I really like to read about an area that I'm visiting, preferably something fictional, as I feel I get the passion of the setting more clearly. I did love that actual historical figures are woven into this story, and it was pretty thrilling to be visiting locales that play such an important part in this novel.
I really like to read about an area that I'm visiting, preferably something fictional, as I feel I get the passion of the setting more clearly. I did love that actual historical figures are woven into this story, and it was pretty thrilling to be visiting locales that play such an important part in this novel.
March 27, 2008
Thomas Wharton was the writer in residence my second year of university and he was such a cool and inspirational guy. I loved Icefields - vivid Canadiana wrapped up in a fantastic story.
July 2, 2023
This guy is CONSTANTLY falling over
May 14, 2022
Thomas Wharton’s CanLit classic ICEFIELDS recently came back to print with a new edition, leading to me discovering it for the first time. It’s quite beautiful, though more a story of a glacier located in Alberta and the park that forms around it than the thin, unrealized plot it presents. Overall, I enjoyed it, but this book is not for everyone.
In the story, the year is 1898, and Dr. Byrne is on an expedition on the Arcturus Glacier in the Canadian Rockies when he slips and falls into a crevasse. Hanging upside down, slowly freezing to death, a stray shaft of sunlight reveals a vision of horrible beauty suspended in the ice. After his rescue, he bounces back and forth between the site and England, spending more and more time alone on the ice, which he studies to determine at what year the thing in the ice will finally be exposed by its primordial flow. Whether it was real or an illusion becomes a lifelong quest and a relationship between a man and an icefield that trumps everything else.
Along the way, we are introduced to other people who live near the glacier: Trask, who after Jasper Park is formed builds a chalet there; Elspeth, who manages the chalet for him; Hal, a shy poet who works as a guide; Sara, a storyteller who nurses Byrne back to health after his fall; and Freya, a free-spirited travel writer and adventuress.
Writing style is always a matter of taste. For me, Wharton’s spare but powerful prose–with its short fragments and jumps in time–worked for me. I quite liked it. Having lived near the Rockies for nearly 20 years, I can’t put my finger on why exactly, but the CanLit style of authors like Wharton and Fred Stenson really taps into the feeling the vastness and wildness of this country can produce. The characters are all compelling and interesting, and I felt invested in Byrne’s exploration of the glacier and his lifelong quest to solve a personal mystery.
Otherwise, there isn’t much a plot, so to enjoy the read, you have to love the people and the fragmentary glimpses into their lives that follow the history of the province of Alberta from the turn of the century past the Great War, with the sprawling glacier brooding through it all. There’s a story about a British explorer told early on that seemingly promises a clue to Byrne about what he saw, but it fizzles out. Similarly, the central conflict and story kind of fizzle out as well. Which is too bad, because it really could have paid off. Instead, it left me feeling somewhat dissatisfied and a little frustrated.
Overall, though, I enjoyed ICEFIELDS and recommend it for its interesting scenery, characters, writing, and love of nature, for those readers interested in something literary that’s enjoyable in the moment but doesn’t necessarily go anywhere.
In the story, the year is 1898, and Dr. Byrne is on an expedition on the Arcturus Glacier in the Canadian Rockies when he slips and falls into a crevasse. Hanging upside down, slowly freezing to death, a stray shaft of sunlight reveals a vision of horrible beauty suspended in the ice. After his rescue, he bounces back and forth between the site and England, spending more and more time alone on the ice, which he studies to determine at what year the thing in the ice will finally be exposed by its primordial flow. Whether it was real or an illusion becomes a lifelong quest and a relationship between a man and an icefield that trumps everything else.
Along the way, we are introduced to other people who live near the glacier: Trask, who after Jasper Park is formed builds a chalet there; Elspeth, who manages the chalet for him; Hal, a shy poet who works as a guide; Sara, a storyteller who nurses Byrne back to health after his fall; and Freya, a free-spirited travel writer and adventuress.
Writing style is always a matter of taste. For me, Wharton’s spare but powerful prose–with its short fragments and jumps in time–worked for me. I quite liked it. Having lived near the Rockies for nearly 20 years, I can’t put my finger on why exactly, but the CanLit style of authors like Wharton and Fred Stenson really taps into the feeling the vastness and wildness of this country can produce. The characters are all compelling and interesting, and I felt invested in Byrne’s exploration of the glacier and his lifelong quest to solve a personal mystery.
Otherwise, there isn’t much a plot, so to enjoy the read, you have to love the people and the fragmentary glimpses into their lives that follow the history of the province of Alberta from the turn of the century past the Great War, with the sprawling glacier brooding through it all. There’s a story about a British explorer told early on that seemingly promises a clue to Byrne about what he saw, but it fizzles out. Similarly, the central conflict and story kind of fizzle out as well. Which is too bad, because it really could have paid off. Instead, it left me feeling somewhat dissatisfied and a little frustrated.
Overall, though, I enjoyed ICEFIELDS and recommend it for its interesting scenery, characters, writing, and love of nature, for those readers interested in something literary that’s enjoyable in the moment but doesn’t necessarily go anywhere.
January 22, 2025
"Time was the one constant. It did not change or freeze into immobility. Time would go on and so would he."
what an absolute experience this novel was and now i both so want to go to Jasper and see a glacier while also wanting to leave it all alone.
the beginning of this novel was perfect. living in a big city has made me yearn so badly for such isolation. the themes of change, displayed through colonization and the rapid urbanization were a bit heartbreaking as the glacier began to lose its magic. through all these changes, and the flow of the glacier, there was also a sort of haunting presence of memory. given enough time, things that are trapped in the ice will eventually resurface at the terminus.
this was a perfect winter read, especially with the -20 degrees we've been dealing with lately. i read a good chunk of this while the power was out, holding a flashlight and piled under blankets so the immersion was really there.
4.5
what an absolute experience this novel was and now i both so want to go to Jasper and see a glacier while also wanting to leave it all alone.
the beginning of this novel was perfect. living in a big city has made me yearn so badly for such isolation. the themes of change, displayed through colonization and the rapid urbanization were a bit heartbreaking as the glacier began to lose its magic. through all these changes, and the flow of the glacier, there was also a sort of haunting presence of memory. given enough time, things that are trapped in the ice will eventually resurface at the terminus.
this was a perfect winter read, especially with the -20 degrees we've been dealing with lately. i read a good chunk of this while the power was out, holding a flashlight and piled under blankets so the immersion was really there.
4.5
February 4, 2022
This is an historical novel which takes place in Jasper Alberta in the early 1900s and through to the First World War. It is a story that at times confounded me, wrapped in its lyrical prose, looking for a plot, searching for the provenance of some its dialogue and intrigued by the original idea of its story. It won several local awards which led me to believe I did not get out of it as much as I should have and it deserves a second read.
The first pages include a number of items: an epigraph from Michael Ondaatje, a note clarifying that what follows is a work of fiction filled with historical and geographical inaccuracies and then two maps of Jasper and the surrounding areas which are not to scale. An interesting way to begin.
In 1898 Dr. Edward Byrne heads from London to Canada on a geographical expedition. Crossing the Arcturus glacier in Jasper, he slips and falls, plunging sixty feet into a crevasse and ends upside down wedged between its narrow walls. Knowing this may become his tomb, he stares at the ice and hopes to be rescued. It is during that time while he fights off sleep, that he sees a shape caught in the ice that looks like “a pale human figure with wings”. It seems so large that if it stirred to life and moved toward him, he believed it could enfold him in its wings. Puzzled, he closes his eyes, but when he looks again, the image has disappeared.
What follows is a meditative exploration of what Byrne experienced during the time he was imprisoned in the ice. His believes that what he thought happened is absurd and impossible, but also magnificent.
Byrne is rescued by a man named Frank Trask and while waiting for transport to Edmonton, is cared for in a simple log cabin by a woman named Sara. She tells him stories about the glacier and the icefields, stories which add to his fascination with the area and what he has just experienced in the tomb-like walls of the glacier.
Byrne returns to London and resumes his life there. But he becomes obsessed by his experience and the vision of what he comes to believe was an angel. He is determined to return and find out what actually happened to him. He is a scientist, a cool, reserved, rational man who does not believe in ghosts, mystics or spiritual experiences and that makes his story all the more interesting.
Byrne builds a shelter on the glacier and returns each summer, obsessively studying its movement, hearing it crack and moan and reflect the sun when it comes out from under the clouds. He is touched by the haunting landscape and watches as the glacier gradually melts and recedes, revealing objects from the past in its wake, some of which are now unrecognizable. Byrne thinks that sooner or later, if an angel was ever there, that figure will also be revealed.
Parallel to this narrative, other characters who have visited the glacier are introduced and we hear their stories. None of those tales is explored in any depth but each person shares an obsession with the glacier, connected to it by their desire for hope, money, adventure, knowledge or soul-searching wonder. They include Trask, the man who rescued Byrne, an entrepreneur who sees the potential of Jasper as a profitable tourist destination in the future. He leads walking tours on the ice and has even bigger plans to take visitors to the top of the glacier.
A number of people visit Trask’s cabin including a woman named Elspeth, Freya an adventurer and travel writer and Hal who looks after the horses. To begin his tours up the mountain Trask tells Byrne he must cut down trees, something that makes Byrne angry but which Trask believes is simply the cost of progress. It is through the character of Trask that Wharton prophecies an ominous road ahead with concerns about global warming and the effect of tourism on the environment.
The book covers a span of twenty-five years during which there is a huge growth in the tourist industry that drops off during the war, but then picks up again. In these stories, which include figures such as Arthur Conan Doyle, it is never quite clear what is real and what is fiction.
The novel has a fascinating premise with a no-nonsense man of science so haunted by a mystical experience he becomes obsessed with learning more. That obsession continues over many years and shapes his life as he tries to understand what really happened to him that day years ago.
This was Wharton’s first novel which was published in 1995 and won the Banff Mountain Book Grand Prize, The Writer’s Guide of Alberta Best First Book Award and the Commonwealth Best First Novel prize. Although it didn’t really work for me, I think I was just not in the right space to appreciate it. However, I did enjoy his writing and the way he described the landscape that so fascinated his character. But there was no strong narrative thread to pull the reader along and often I, like others, was never certain in the dialogue sections exactly who was speaking. I believe Wharton chose to place his emphasis on the images rather than the characters, ultimately creating a dream-like quality to the narrative as he followed Byrne’s obsessive visits to the glacier, waiting for the angel’s release from its cold icy clutches.
I have been to Jasper and visited the Athabasca glacier which helped me appreciate the setting. The Rockies are such a huge magnificent landscape, such an incredible fact of nature, it is easy to see how they would fascinate a visitor. But this is more about a singular haunting experience than the sweeping majesty of the Rockies, a small book that appears to start as an adventure story, but turns into a tale of obsession with an angel at its center.
The first pages include a number of items: an epigraph from Michael Ondaatje, a note clarifying that what follows is a work of fiction filled with historical and geographical inaccuracies and then two maps of Jasper and the surrounding areas which are not to scale. An interesting way to begin.
In 1898 Dr. Edward Byrne heads from London to Canada on a geographical expedition. Crossing the Arcturus glacier in Jasper, he slips and falls, plunging sixty feet into a crevasse and ends upside down wedged between its narrow walls. Knowing this may become his tomb, he stares at the ice and hopes to be rescued. It is during that time while he fights off sleep, that he sees a shape caught in the ice that looks like “a pale human figure with wings”. It seems so large that if it stirred to life and moved toward him, he believed it could enfold him in its wings. Puzzled, he closes his eyes, but when he looks again, the image has disappeared.
What follows is a meditative exploration of what Byrne experienced during the time he was imprisoned in the ice. His believes that what he thought happened is absurd and impossible, but also magnificent.
Byrne is rescued by a man named Frank Trask and while waiting for transport to Edmonton, is cared for in a simple log cabin by a woman named Sara. She tells him stories about the glacier and the icefields, stories which add to his fascination with the area and what he has just experienced in the tomb-like walls of the glacier.
Byrne returns to London and resumes his life there. But he becomes obsessed by his experience and the vision of what he comes to believe was an angel. He is determined to return and find out what actually happened to him. He is a scientist, a cool, reserved, rational man who does not believe in ghosts, mystics or spiritual experiences and that makes his story all the more interesting.
Byrne builds a shelter on the glacier and returns each summer, obsessively studying its movement, hearing it crack and moan and reflect the sun when it comes out from under the clouds. He is touched by the haunting landscape and watches as the glacier gradually melts and recedes, revealing objects from the past in its wake, some of which are now unrecognizable. Byrne thinks that sooner or later, if an angel was ever there, that figure will also be revealed.
Parallel to this narrative, other characters who have visited the glacier are introduced and we hear their stories. None of those tales is explored in any depth but each person shares an obsession with the glacier, connected to it by their desire for hope, money, adventure, knowledge or soul-searching wonder. They include Trask, the man who rescued Byrne, an entrepreneur who sees the potential of Jasper as a profitable tourist destination in the future. He leads walking tours on the ice and has even bigger plans to take visitors to the top of the glacier.
A number of people visit Trask’s cabin including a woman named Elspeth, Freya an adventurer and travel writer and Hal who looks after the horses. To begin his tours up the mountain Trask tells Byrne he must cut down trees, something that makes Byrne angry but which Trask believes is simply the cost of progress. It is through the character of Trask that Wharton prophecies an ominous road ahead with concerns about global warming and the effect of tourism on the environment.
The book covers a span of twenty-five years during which there is a huge growth in the tourist industry that drops off during the war, but then picks up again. In these stories, which include figures such as Arthur Conan Doyle, it is never quite clear what is real and what is fiction.
The novel has a fascinating premise with a no-nonsense man of science so haunted by a mystical experience he becomes obsessed with learning more. That obsession continues over many years and shapes his life as he tries to understand what really happened to him that day years ago.
This was Wharton’s first novel which was published in 1995 and won the Banff Mountain Book Grand Prize, The Writer’s Guide of Alberta Best First Book Award and the Commonwealth Best First Novel prize. Although it didn’t really work for me, I think I was just not in the right space to appreciate it. However, I did enjoy his writing and the way he described the landscape that so fascinated his character. But there was no strong narrative thread to pull the reader along and often I, like others, was never certain in the dialogue sections exactly who was speaking. I believe Wharton chose to place his emphasis on the images rather than the characters, ultimately creating a dream-like quality to the narrative as he followed Byrne’s obsessive visits to the glacier, waiting for the angel’s release from its cold icy clutches.
I have been to Jasper and visited the Athabasca glacier which helped me appreciate the setting. The Rockies are such a huge magnificent landscape, such an incredible fact of nature, it is easy to see how they would fascinate a visitor. But this is more about a singular haunting experience than the sweeping majesty of the Rockies, a small book that appears to start as an adventure story, but turns into a tale of obsession with an angel at its center.
September 5, 2022
Perfect. Beautiful. I want to be in Jasper right now. Warrants a reread
August 23, 2025
Bookclub choice
Originally grabbed my attention because it takes place in what is now Jasper. But, it goes on and on. Canadian author..I really tried.
Quit at 48%
Originally grabbed my attention because it takes place in what is now Jasper. But, it goes on and on. Canadian author..I really tried.
Quit at 48%
January 3, 2026
A great read for cold days. The following video is perfect to watch after finishing Icefields: https://youtu.be/y7G-bvKiSZ8?si=TVOxF....
January 5, 2026
May my heart be forever dragged along the residue of the Athabasca Glacier...
January 8, 2026
3.75/5
The descriptions and imagery in this were simply stunning but I did not care about any of the characters, although I don't think the character growth was the point.
The descriptions and imagery in this were simply stunning but I did not care about any of the characters, although I don't think the character growth was the point.
April 22, 2017
A pleasant surprise. A quiet, thoughtful book that is driven by its mystery. I wish it were longer.
December 24, 2025
Warmed my soul and froze my body. How much can we make a commodity? How much can become art? There is a stretch in the middle that was worrisome, but it not only earns it, this wandering becomes integral to the later story.
Fuck do I hate that the author is from Edmonton
Fuck do I hate that the author is from Edmonton
February 5, 2023
No plot. Just conversations that are all subtext and some iceberg descriptions. Abandoned.
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