ugh ( )

Story of the residents of Coalton who live to ski, snowboard, snowshoe and otherwise celebrate the event of snow in the mountains surrounding their town. There are three groups who ascend the mountain in April, party at the hut, and then go out to enjoy a day on the slopes. An avalanche of the century buries them all. The characters are unusual and so is the premise of the story. An enjoyable read. ( )

I am sadly not familiar with Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, so I cannot comment on Angie Adbou's adherence or deviations to the original plot. What I can say is that Adbou is a first-class writer who captures the fluidity and exertions of the human body like few others. While her debut novel The Bone Cage was far more centered around a sports theme, Trail shows that Adbou really knows her stuff when it comes to the white powder and those who live to frolic in it. Adbou understands that sex, drugs, and alcohol are key components of the lifestyle, but she never lets the stereotypes become, well, stereotypical. These ski bums, mountain men, snow bunnies, and extreme snowboarders may be the equivalent of Canadian archetypes, but Adbou cannily subverts our expectations at every turn, finding unexpected pockets of humanity beneath the layers of Gore-Tex. This is not an A-to-Z type of plot; it meanders down back roads and hidden paths, and not every trek is a winner. But the whole is definitely greater than the sum, and for those with a taste for the offbeat and a fearlessness when it comes to a challenge, The Canterbury Trail offers up a plethora of pleasures.

Read the rest of the review here. ( )