Those Who Favor Fire

January 4, 1999
In picturesque, present-day Pennsylvania, the former coal-mining town of Belle Haven harbors a hidden danger: lethal fires, ignited by a burning dump, simmer below ground. Despite this hazard, residents refuse to abandon their homes, relying instead on pet canaries to detect the noxious fumes that signal impending eruptions. Enter an unpopular government agent named Mendelson, who offers to buy them out. The protagonists are young lovers: bright, resourceful Rachel Hearn, whose parents' sudden death prompts her return home from college, and Joe, a mysterious drifter who seeks solace among the town's hapless inhabitants. He's really Christopher "Kit" Barrows, Yale dropout and reluctant heir, fleeing a nasty, duplicitous father who has been abusing Kit's twin sister since she was a preadolescent. As the peril escalates--steam hisses through potholes; wells heat to boiling; animals, houses and people are sucked into an underground inferno--the stubborn townspeople, led by Rachel, still deny that Belle Haven is beyond salvation. Will Rachel relent and move to safety in the nearby community that Joe has built for her and the others? Suspense mounts as the story moves to its dramatic conclusion. First-time novelist Wolk has conceived an engrossing plot and peopled it with appealing characters. In this cautionary tale, folk elements and environmental caveats combine with a subtle yet unrelenting sense of horror to produce a fiction reminiscent of the best of Shirley Jackson. (Feb.) FYI: Wolk, formerly senior editor for Nelson Canada, was a contributing editor for Owl, an award-winning children's magazine.