Fire Weather: The Making of a Beast

Denman is lucky to have John Vaillant back with us for this year’s Readers and Writers Festival (July 18-20). A superb writer of non-fiction and fiction, John was last with us in 2016. This time he’ll talk about his latest book, Fire Weather – The Making of a Beast.

“Fire Weather” is a compelling page turner though its story is not easy to digest. For most of us, reading “Fire Weather” is akin to being a heavy smoker in 1958 and reading warnings from exasperated medical professionals. Doctors were pulling their hair out, giving people ever greater detail about the disastrous health effects of smoking. But they couldn’t complete with the endless slick ads about the charms of smoking. Big tobacco also worked hard to impede government efforts to interfere with their lucrative industry. The profits rolled in for decades more. Yet this astute rearguard action by the North American tobacco industry look quaint, artisanal, in comparison with the campaign waged by hydrocarbon producers to keep the good times rolling, despite overwhelming evidence of the devastating climate change their industry is driving. Evidence the industry itself has been aware of for a very long time. But Vaillant doesn’t get to this part of the story until the second half of his book. The first half is a gripping moment by moment account of the unstoppable wildfire that gutted much of Fort McMurray in May 2016. 

Notwithstanding his account of the damage being wrought by the hydrocarbon industry, Vaillant ensures we sympathize with the citizens of Fort McMurray. Working at the epicenter of Canada’s heavy oil industry and one of the world’s most prolific sources of CO2, Fort Mac’s people waxed rich on the proceeds of the destructive, CO2-intensive tarsands operations. But in May 2016, they were caught in a nightmare, just more names on the rapidly growing list of climate change victims and refugees. Unlike many such victims and refugees though, they were eventually well taken care of. 

It’s the juxtaposition of Fort Mac, victim of accelerating climate change, with Fort Mac, heart of the tarsands, that makes this book extraordinary. This and Vaillant’s skill as a writer and researcher. Both explain the acclaim the book has received.