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The Underworld
In The Underworld, Kevin Canty tells a story inspired by the facts of a disastrous fire that took place in an isolated silver mining town in Idaho in the 1970s, in which almost everyone in town lost a friend, a lover, a brother, or a husband. The Underworld imagines the fates of a handful of fictional survivors and their loved ones—Jordan, a young widow with twin children; David, a college student trying to make a life for himself in another town; Lionel, a lifelong hard-rock miner—as they struggle to come to terms with the loss. It’s a tough, hard-working, hard-drinking town, a town of whores and priests and bar fights, but nobody’s tough enough to get through this undamaged. A powerful and unforgettable tale about small-town lives and the healing power of love in the midst of suffering.
256 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 7, 2017
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1025 people want to read
About the author
Kevin Canty
26 books107 followersKevin Canty writes novels and short stories. He is a faculty member in the English department at the University of Montana at Missoula, where he currently resides. He received his Masters degree in English from the University of Florida in 1990, and M.F.A. in creative writing from the University of Arizona in 1993.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 88 reviews
February 7, 2017
Silverton, Idaho, a small hard drinking, hardworking town. Main employee, the silver mines, everyone know someone who is employed there, sometimes generations work together down in the dark. Life involves around the bars and the mine. Until a disastrous fire breaks out in the mine, and more than ninety men are killed. Now it is a town defined by grief, many have lost a husband, a son, a brother, a father and there is nowhere to go to escape this communal and personal grief.
O
Although the book centers on three characters, one who got away but returns after the tragedy, one man, who though he has enough money in the bank and collects social security, continues to work in the mines and Anne, a young women married to a miner, who wants only a child she cannot seem to have. How these people navigate through their grief is the story and it is an interesting one. How does one move forward when every thought, action, place and thing is now defined by tragedy. Go or stay? Try for a new life in another place? Drink your sorrows away? Make the life you have better somehow? Real life problems with difficult solutions.
Sparsely written, a quiet character oriented story it was fascinating to see how these people all handled this tragedy differently, some tragically. A wonderful story that is based on a real life disaster that happened in the 1970's,
ARC from goodreads.
Releases on March 7th by W. W. Norton.
O
Although the book centers on three characters, one who got away but returns after the tragedy, one man, who though he has enough money in the bank and collects social security, continues to work in the mines and Anne, a young women married to a miner, who wants only a child she cannot seem to have. How these people navigate through their grief is the story and it is an interesting one. How does one move forward when every thought, action, place and thing is now defined by tragedy. Go or stay? Try for a new life in another place? Drink your sorrows away? Make the life you have better somehow? Real life problems with difficult solutions.
Sparsely written, a quiet character oriented story it was fascinating to see how these people all handled this tragedy differently, some tragically. A wonderful story that is based on a real life disaster that happened in the 1970's,
ARC from goodreads.
Releases on March 7th by W. W. Norton.
March 10, 2017
The underworld in Kevin Canty’s new novel, set in an isolated mining town in Silverton, Idaho, is a world largely inhabited by hard-drinking, hard rock miners and the families that surround them. It’s the kind of drive-through town that most people pay little attention to, filled with those who hope to escape and those who have settled for a full day’s work in the mine, followed by getting totally smashed later on in a nearby bar.
And then something happens: an out-of-control fire kills more than half of the miners and everyone is affected. The book, inspired by a true story, focuses on three of the survivors: David, a college student who has actually escaped from the town’s gravitational pull and now feels lured back…Ann, a young wife who is already learning the implausibility of breaking free…and Lyle, an older miner who has messed up his chances and is now trapped underground.
Written in spare but shining prose, Kevin Canty uses each word judiciously and as a result, Silverton and its inhabitants come fully alive. There are dreams here, yes, but only a glimmer of hope that they can be achieved. “Any direction you set out in,” says one of the characters, “it always comes back to the same place. It’s like some gravitational cortex or something.”
This pitch-perfect elegy to grief and the way it is experienced confirms the old wisdom that adversity tests us and that some can rise up while others can be weighed down. Kevin Canty writes, “Sleepwalkers…David saw it everywhere, the blank, distracted look on the sidewalks downtown when he went to fetch a prescription for his mother, the face of the boy in his blue uniform who checks David’s oil and cleans his windshield…”
Yet in this town that is literally stunned with the weight of its loss and sorrow, David, Ann, Lyle and the secondary characters are tested and their lives are transformed, each in its own way. Ultimately, the novel is really about hope, and how the beginning seeds of it are capable of sprouting into the light, even in the darkest and most airless of places. 4.5, rounded up.
And then something happens: an out-of-control fire kills more than half of the miners and everyone is affected. The book, inspired by a true story, focuses on three of the survivors: David, a college student who has actually escaped from the town’s gravitational pull and now feels lured back…Ann, a young wife who is already learning the implausibility of breaking free…and Lyle, an older miner who has messed up his chances and is now trapped underground.
Written in spare but shining prose, Kevin Canty uses each word judiciously and as a result, Silverton and its inhabitants come fully alive. There are dreams here, yes, but only a glimmer of hope that they can be achieved. “Any direction you set out in,” says one of the characters, “it always comes back to the same place. It’s like some gravitational cortex or something.”
This pitch-perfect elegy to grief and the way it is experienced confirms the old wisdom that adversity tests us and that some can rise up while others can be weighed down. Kevin Canty writes, “Sleepwalkers…David saw it everywhere, the blank, distracted look on the sidewalks downtown when he went to fetch a prescription for his mother, the face of the boy in his blue uniform who checks David’s oil and cleans his windshield…”
Yet in this town that is literally stunned with the weight of its loss and sorrow, David, Ann, Lyle and the secondary characters are tested and their lives are transformed, each in its own way. Ultimately, the novel is really about hope, and how the beginning seeds of it are capable of sprouting into the light, even in the darkest and most airless of places. 4.5, rounded up.
April 5, 2017
This story in which 91 rock miners die in a silver mine fire in the tightly-knit town of Silverton, Idaho is inspired by a 1970’s real catastrophe.
The disaster affects everyone in this small blue collar community but focuses on three characters, David, Ann and Lyle. They are rich characters who come to life. I got caught up in the dynamics, sympathized with their struggles. I felt the devastating loss of loved ones, friends and neighbors and the rhythm of a community. Canty writes of the human condition in a stunning, sparse and realistic way and I was engrossed from cover to cover.
The disaster affects everyone in this small blue collar community but focuses on three characters, David, Ann and Lyle. They are rich characters who come to life. I got caught up in the dynamics, sympathized with their struggles. I felt the devastating loss of loved ones, friends and neighbors and the rhythm of a community. Canty writes of the human condition in a stunning, sparse and realistic way and I was engrossed from cover to cover.
March 10, 2017
THE UNDERWORLD (2017)
By Kevin Canty
W. W. Norton, 256 pages
★★★★
One of the autopsy findings from the election of 2016 is that Democrats largely ignored the white working class. That's rather amazing when we have so many fine novelists in America who write of that life. Even a cursory reading of Richard Russo might have reminded party leaders there was a part of America they needed to investigate more thoroughly. So too would readings of recent titles such as Mark Slouka's Brewster or Phillip Meyer's American Rust. So now that your attention has been refocused, check out Kevin Canty's The Underworld, a novel whose tone is reminiscent of Slouka and Meyer.
The title, in my view, isn't wisely chosen. First, Don DeLillo used the same title—sans the article—in his sprawling 2003 novel. Second, most people associate the term with organized crime. Canty, however, means it literally: the underworld as the realm of miners working more than a half-mile beneath the surface. His is a fictional reimaging of the 1972 Sunshine Mine fire in Idaho in which 91 miners lost their lives. His setting of Silverton, Idaho is a thinly veiled pastiche of Kellogg and Wallace, located in the heart of the silver mining Coeur d'Alene region. Ninety-one people also perish in Canty's novel. So why write a novel at all? Wouldn't a collection of news clippings accomplish the same task?
Nope! That's because, in many ways, the major character of the book is Silverton, located in the thin thumb of Idaho that pokes up between Montana and Washington. It's a place that's hard to love, yet locals talk more about getting out of town than actually doing so. And when they do leave, they seldom venture much further than Missoula to the east or Spokane to the west. I instantly related to Canty's book, though I'm an Easterner—my own postindustrial Pennsylvania hometown has the same ensnaring qualities. I did not fall prey to them and left in the 1970s, the same period under Canty's microscope. To leave or to stay is the dilemma facing David, the book's central character.
Canty also uses Underworld metaphorically–those mental, often non-verbalized, excavations of people trapped by circumstance, depression, and indecision. David's one of the latter. He's a student at the University of Montana Missoula, which is just 120 miles from Silverton as the crow flies—though its network of culture, restaurants, upscale bars, intellectual life, and veneer of bourgeois respectability are light years away. He also knows–and his landlord reminds him–that Silverton can't objectively compare. It's a town of dangers: toxic air, seedy bars where a misinterpreted glance can mean being smashed with a cue stick, rampant alcoholism, and unhealthy diets. Silverton is a town of weathered whores that have no trouble staying busy; it has dozens of bars, but just two TV channels that most view in glorious black and white. Above all it's a place where death in the mines can come without warning and wears a man down fast even if he isn't killed outright. David knows of mining: his father and his beloved brother Ray are miners.
Why on earth wouldn't David flee and not look back? If you have to ask that question, you need to learn more about blue-collar life. David goes to Missoula, but he is not of that world. His is the classic college first generation dilemma. Put simply, David feels like an outsider—a poseur, not a scholar. He's right; the university crowd doesn't have a clue about what he thinks, what his life has been like, or how he feels. As bad as it is, Silverton is where people understand him–though they don't exactly. Man! I know that feeling! You become the walking definition of liminality—trapped between the working and middle classes and uncertain whether to step backward or more forward. So when someone tells you there's a job opening up that pays over $10 an hour (about $57 in today's coin), do you pursue a life of materialism and danger, or stay on the middle class track? Ray has stayed; maybe David should too: get a new truck, keep up with a longtime affair with his former piano teacher he thinks is a big secret, but isn't, and eventually get married a have a few kids like Ray and his wife Jordan.
Then the mine blows up when David is at school. Ray was in there. Did he make it out? What about Malloy, another guy from town? He and Ray are a lot alike–tough, funny, hard drinking, bombastic, and easier to love in the abstract than in person. What about Terry and Lyle and all the others? What about the women who will be widowed if their husbands come out under a sheet? Jordan? Ann Malloy? Let's just say that, in 1972, feminism hadn't yet had a big impact in this part of the world.
The sections of Canty's book chronicling the fate of two men trapped in an air seam 3,500 feet underground are gripping and harrowing. It would behoove all middle class readers to contemplate what manual labor means. Do not think of this event as a museum piece either. Think upon West Virginia's Upper Big Branch disaster that killed 29 miners in 2010, the Deepwater Horizon explosion that killed 11 that same year, or the 14 who died at a Waco, Texas fertilizer plant in 2013.
Yeah—maybe it's time to think about this kind of stuff. Canty–the author of five previous novels and an English professor at the University of Montana–has written a novel filled with action, pathos, despair, and glimmers of hope. His writing is direct, vivid, and so crisply paced that The Underworld feels like a short book. Is it ultimately a work of literature, or sociological commentary? Yes.
Rob Weir
By Kevin Canty
W. W. Norton, 256 pages
★★★★
One of the autopsy findings from the election of 2016 is that Democrats largely ignored the white working class. That's rather amazing when we have so many fine novelists in America who write of that life. Even a cursory reading of Richard Russo might have reminded party leaders there was a part of America they needed to investigate more thoroughly. So too would readings of recent titles such as Mark Slouka's Brewster or Phillip Meyer's American Rust. So now that your attention has been refocused, check out Kevin Canty's The Underworld, a novel whose tone is reminiscent of Slouka and Meyer.
The title, in my view, isn't wisely chosen. First, Don DeLillo used the same title—sans the article—in his sprawling 2003 novel. Second, most people associate the term with organized crime. Canty, however, means it literally: the underworld as the realm of miners working more than a half-mile beneath the surface. His is a fictional reimaging of the 1972 Sunshine Mine fire in Idaho in which 91 miners lost their lives. His setting of Silverton, Idaho is a thinly veiled pastiche of Kellogg and Wallace, located in the heart of the silver mining Coeur d'Alene region. Ninety-one people also perish in Canty's novel. So why write a novel at all? Wouldn't a collection of news clippings accomplish the same task?
Nope! That's because, in many ways, the major character of the book is Silverton, located in the thin thumb of Idaho that pokes up between Montana and Washington. It's a place that's hard to love, yet locals talk more about getting out of town than actually doing so. And when they do leave, they seldom venture much further than Missoula to the east or Spokane to the west. I instantly related to Canty's book, though I'm an Easterner—my own postindustrial Pennsylvania hometown has the same ensnaring qualities. I did not fall prey to them and left in the 1970s, the same period under Canty's microscope. To leave or to stay is the dilemma facing David, the book's central character.
Canty also uses Underworld metaphorically–those mental, often non-verbalized, excavations of people trapped by circumstance, depression, and indecision. David's one of the latter. He's a student at the University of Montana Missoula, which is just 120 miles from Silverton as the crow flies—though its network of culture, restaurants, upscale bars, intellectual life, and veneer of bourgeois respectability are light years away. He also knows–and his landlord reminds him–that Silverton can't objectively compare. It's a town of dangers: toxic air, seedy bars where a misinterpreted glance can mean being smashed with a cue stick, rampant alcoholism, and unhealthy diets. Silverton is a town of weathered whores that have no trouble staying busy; it has dozens of bars, but just two TV channels that most view in glorious black and white. Above all it's a place where death in the mines can come without warning and wears a man down fast even if he isn't killed outright. David knows of mining: his father and his beloved brother Ray are miners.
Why on earth wouldn't David flee and not look back? If you have to ask that question, you need to learn more about blue-collar life. David goes to Missoula, but he is not of that world. His is the classic college first generation dilemma. Put simply, David feels like an outsider—a poseur, not a scholar. He's right; the university crowd doesn't have a clue about what he thinks, what his life has been like, or how he feels. As bad as it is, Silverton is where people understand him–though they don't exactly. Man! I know that feeling! You become the walking definition of liminality—trapped between the working and middle classes and uncertain whether to step backward or more forward. So when someone tells you there's a job opening up that pays over $10 an hour (about $57 in today's coin), do you pursue a life of materialism and danger, or stay on the middle class track? Ray has stayed; maybe David should too: get a new truck, keep up with a longtime affair with his former piano teacher he thinks is a big secret, but isn't, and eventually get married a have a few kids like Ray and his wife Jordan.
Then the mine blows up when David is at school. Ray was in there. Did he make it out? What about Malloy, another guy from town? He and Ray are a lot alike–tough, funny, hard drinking, bombastic, and easier to love in the abstract than in person. What about Terry and Lyle and all the others? What about the women who will be widowed if their husbands come out under a sheet? Jordan? Ann Malloy? Let's just say that, in 1972, feminism hadn't yet had a big impact in this part of the world.
The sections of Canty's book chronicling the fate of two men trapped in an air seam 3,500 feet underground are gripping and harrowing. It would behoove all middle class readers to contemplate what manual labor means. Do not think of this event as a museum piece either. Think upon West Virginia's Upper Big Branch disaster that killed 29 miners in 2010, the Deepwater Horizon explosion that killed 11 that same year, or the 14 who died at a Waco, Texas fertilizer plant in 2013.
Yeah—maybe it's time to think about this kind of stuff. Canty–the author of five previous novels and an English professor at the University of Montana–has written a novel filled with action, pathos, despair, and glimmers of hope. His writing is direct, vivid, and so crisply paced that The Underworld feels like a short book. Is it ultimately a work of literature, or sociological commentary? Yes.
Rob Weir
September 10, 2017
Based on a true life story, tells of the sad aftermath of a horrific mining accident.
March 19, 2017
As a lifelong resident of the Rocky Mountains, I have some familiarity with hard rock miners and their communities. The immediacy with which Kevin Canty brings that world to life in “The Underworld” is remarkable. Based on an actual fatal underground mine fire in Silverton, Idaho in the 1970’s, Canty recreates in a fictionalized manner how all the residents of this hard drinking and hard living community are impacted in some way. By focusing on three specific characters and the effects of the devastating fire and loss on them, Canty gives the reader an intimate look into their suffering. He also touches on the effects of the tragedy on other members of the community and the community itself. All of these characters are brilliantly brought to life and their pain is palpable. Although this a story of grief and loss, there are also powerful moments of redemption, transformation, love, and hope in this impressive and memorable novel.
Thank you to W.W. Norton and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book.
Thank you to W.W. Norton and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book.
June 28, 2017
Another great gut-punch from Kevin Canty. Focusing on people from a small Idaho town in the aftermath of a mining accident that kills ninety-one people, Canty shows deep empathy for his surviving characters and how people cope after such an event. Canty knows how to build a moving novel with authentic dialogue and that specific kind of small-town depression and loneliness. He's one of my favorite writers.
March 17, 2017
Why is it so hard to escape the town of our birth? What keeps us from growing into a new life? Are we trapped in brutal, short lives?
In 1972, Silverton, Idaho is in the middle of nowhere, it's only reason for being the silver mine that needs workers. Men are paid well, trading long lives and their health for good money. They work hard, then play hard, frequenting the bar to drink and brawl. They are proud of their toughness.
Silverton is infused with toxins that ruin skin and health.
"There was arsenic in the smoke, chromium, cadmium, lead. Part of what it cost to live here...people died here after a while, lung cancer, liver cancer, for a few months the other year everybody seemed to have leukemia."
The women think about leaving their men, and do leave men who can't leave the only life they know. And when someone does break out, like David who is in college, they feel alienated and conflicted, resenting the pampered life of green shady lawns and uncalloused soft hands.
"This was never going to be his life, anyways, these leafy maples that meet overhead, a canopy over the street. Shingled houses with white trim, green lawns, third stories, turrets and arches. In a way, it feels good to let go, stop pretending. This place has its membership and he isn't part of it."
The third year of college is ending when David hears there has been a disaster at the mine. He drives his VW home. His father and his brother work in the mines.
The disaster claims 91 lives. David's brother is one of the dead. The stunned town struggles. Widows drown their sorrows in booze but find there is no haven from regret and grief. Two men are trapped for 14 days, and coming above ground reevaluate their lives. David reconsiders his choice to leave for another life.
This is a story about grief.
"Everything in life can be taken from you in an instant. Any minute. She had known this before. But now she understands it."
"Her friend is dead. But she could only forget it or else think about nothing else, and there is nothing to think, nothing to say. It cannot be undone. It cannot be fixed. It cannot be tolerated...Something breaks inside her, a little thing like a Popsicle stick."
One widow, Ann, who at twenty-two was already weary of her life and childlessness before the accident, now regrets not cherishing her husband more. Ann realizes she had closed the door on so many possibilities when she decided to stay in Silverton and marry. Now she is 'free' to choose again, but the choices seem limited.
Ann goes to a bar seeking a bartender who once seemed interested in her; now he doesn't recognize her and she thinks, "all this just seems so corrupt. A stimulus, a response, a line, a body. People just want to fuck...They see a woman, alone, vulnerable, they move in for the kill. That's how it is. A lonely woman is the devil's playground."
Ann had sung as a schoolgirl and now joins the church choir. She experiences the sense of greater community found in choral singing.
"The third time through the 'Ave Maria' she feels it, that lovely moment in which everything else drops away and she becomes this column of air, supported by the hips, her jaw dropping into the high notes, this physical thing becomes musical, becomes music, and all around her the same thing is happening and they are singing together, almost beautifully."
Ann becomes friends with David's brother's widow Jordan, whose grief plays out in angry and self-destructive behavior. David is drawn to Ann.
Some don't survive the death of their loved one, some try to leave. Ann and David turn to each other in their grief and in their need reach, again, for love. They have been to hell and back. Perhaps they will yet find some comfort in the world.
The Underworld is fiction based on an actual mine disaster. I loved the writing and Canty's moving characters. I look forward to reading more of Canty's work.
I received a free book from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
In 1972, Silverton, Idaho is in the middle of nowhere, it's only reason for being the silver mine that needs workers. Men are paid well, trading long lives and their health for good money. They work hard, then play hard, frequenting the bar to drink and brawl. They are proud of their toughness.
Silverton is infused with toxins that ruin skin and health.
"There was arsenic in the smoke, chromium, cadmium, lead. Part of what it cost to live here...people died here after a while, lung cancer, liver cancer, for a few months the other year everybody seemed to have leukemia."
The women think about leaving their men, and do leave men who can't leave the only life they know. And when someone does break out, like David who is in college, they feel alienated and conflicted, resenting the pampered life of green shady lawns and uncalloused soft hands.
"This was never going to be his life, anyways, these leafy maples that meet overhead, a canopy over the street. Shingled houses with white trim, green lawns, third stories, turrets and arches. In a way, it feels good to let go, stop pretending. This place has its membership and he isn't part of it."
The third year of college is ending when David hears there has been a disaster at the mine. He drives his VW home. His father and his brother work in the mines.
The disaster claims 91 lives. David's brother is one of the dead. The stunned town struggles. Widows drown their sorrows in booze but find there is no haven from regret and grief. Two men are trapped for 14 days, and coming above ground reevaluate their lives. David reconsiders his choice to leave for another life.
This is a story about grief.
"Everything in life can be taken from you in an instant. Any minute. She had known this before. But now she understands it."
"Her friend is dead. But she could only forget it or else think about nothing else, and there is nothing to think, nothing to say. It cannot be undone. It cannot be fixed. It cannot be tolerated...Something breaks inside her, a little thing like a Popsicle stick."
One widow, Ann, who at twenty-two was already weary of her life and childlessness before the accident, now regrets not cherishing her husband more. Ann realizes she had closed the door on so many possibilities when she decided to stay in Silverton and marry. Now she is 'free' to choose again, but the choices seem limited.
Ann goes to a bar seeking a bartender who once seemed interested in her; now he doesn't recognize her and she thinks, "all this just seems so corrupt. A stimulus, a response, a line, a body. People just want to fuck...They see a woman, alone, vulnerable, they move in for the kill. That's how it is. A lonely woman is the devil's playground."
Ann had sung as a schoolgirl and now joins the church choir. She experiences the sense of greater community found in choral singing.
"The third time through the 'Ave Maria' she feels it, that lovely moment in which everything else drops away and she becomes this column of air, supported by the hips, her jaw dropping into the high notes, this physical thing becomes musical, becomes music, and all around her the same thing is happening and they are singing together, almost beautifully."
Ann becomes friends with David's brother's widow Jordan, whose grief plays out in angry and self-destructive behavior. David is drawn to Ann.
Some don't survive the death of their loved one, some try to leave. Ann and David turn to each other in their grief and in their need reach, again, for love. They have been to hell and back. Perhaps they will yet find some comfort in the world.
The Underworld is fiction based on an actual mine disaster. I loved the writing and Canty's moving characters. I look forward to reading more of Canty's work.
I received a free book from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
June 5, 2017
Maybe the best book I will read this year.
September 13, 2017
Inspired by an actual incident, Canty tells the story of how a small Idaho community deals with a mining accident in the 1970s. The subject matter is therefore dark, as is the atmosphere in the Idaho town. More than half of the men in the town are killed, and everyone has a relative amongst the dead. The majority of the novel concentrates on how the characters deal with the tragedy, with just the first couple of chapters dedicated to the accident itself. That balance doesn't quite work, as there is only so much that can be told about the weeks following. In effect, the most gripping part of the novel is cut short at a stage when it has gathered genuine tension, and much of what follows, to generalise, is in a drunken haze.
November 16, 2017
Geboeid zitten lezen over een westerse maar toch heel andere wereld. Ingetogen geschreven, mooi!
June 6, 2017
Captivating story of the people of a small Idaho town impacted by the tragedy of a silver-mine fire in the 1970s. Great characters, wonderful setting, deft writing. Great in the way all Canty's work is great. I actually think it's a little too short; there's a certain amount of space the narrative could've spread to fill. A relationship or two, a subplot that could unfolded a bit more slowly. Though maybe that just my wanting more of the great writing to read. It's a very enjoyable book.
May 28, 2017
Ever since I met a Kentucky coal miner, a relative of my first husband, I have been drawn to stories about mining disasters, working conditions, and what miners think.
For me this was a fast read and it kept me interested in the lives of the miners and their relatives. The Underworld starts off before a terrible fire and was inspired by a real mine fire. The Underworld by Kevin Canty is set in Idaho and puts you directly in the different cultures of the miner's family versus the city dwellers.
Lyle is the character that I was most drawn to and he is also the most developed character The development of the other main characters are the only thing that I was missing. There is a theme running through the miners' lives, mining is very risky, on any day, you could lose your life but the money is so much better than the other job opportunities in the area. As the miners say "It comes with the job".
Another interesting observation is made by the wife and mother to miners. No matter, how hard they scrub, it is impossible to get the dirt, oil and darkness of the mine off. But the part of her husband's body that were not exposed to the mine were still young and pure, that belonged to her. That is a loose paraphrase from the book.
So in summary, I really enjoyed this book and understand more about mining families but some of the characters were good enough to flesh out some more.
I received this Advance Reading Copy of The Underworld from the publisher by a win from FirstReads. My thoughts and feelings in this review are totally my own.
For me this was a fast read and it kept me interested in the lives of the miners and their relatives. The Underworld starts off before a terrible fire and was inspired by a real mine fire. The Underworld by Kevin Canty is set in Idaho and puts you directly in the different cultures of the miner's family versus the city dwellers.
Lyle is the character that I was most drawn to and he is also the most developed character The development of the other main characters are the only thing that I was missing. There is a theme running through the miners' lives, mining is very risky, on any day, you could lose your life but the money is so much better than the other job opportunities in the area. As the miners say "It comes with the job".
Another interesting observation is made by the wife and mother to miners. No matter, how hard they scrub, it is impossible to get the dirt, oil and darkness of the mine off. But the part of her husband's body that were not exposed to the mine were still young and pure, that belonged to her. That is a loose paraphrase from the book.
So in summary, I really enjoyed this book and understand more about mining families but some of the characters were good enough to flesh out some more.
I received this Advance Reading Copy of The Underworld from the publisher by a win from FirstReads. My thoughts and feelings in this review are totally my own.
May 7, 2018
This is a fictional story about an Idaho mining town where there is a disastrous fire in the mine, killing over 90 miners. The story begins before the fire. Generally, the characters are depressed, unhappy, unhopeful living their lives through drugs and alcohol and, for them men, trips to the bordello. And then major tragedy is inserted. So, on top of everything else, Canty adds grief.
The main characters attempt to face their despondent lives, and some may or may not have an answer.
The End
Canty has pretty well-developed characters within the boundaries of their sad lives and the story is well told. I just didn’t get into the general tone of the story, but that’s just me.
Started Apr 19, 2018 – finished Apr 25, 2018
The main characters attempt to face their despondent lives, and some may or may not have an answer.
The End
Canty has pretty well-developed characters within the boundaries of their sad lives and the story is well told. I just didn’t get into the general tone of the story, but that’s just me.
Started Apr 19, 2018 – finished Apr 25, 2018
June 11, 2017
This is a work of fiction inspired by a true event that happened in the early 1970's in a small town in Idaho when a silver mine fire killed a large number of miners, leaving the town devastated. The descriptions of small town life are so vivid and realistic that I felt like I knew the town, knew the people. Since the mine was the town's main source of employment almost everyone in the town was affected by the tragedy whether directly or indirectly. And of course, the tragedy didn't end with the fire itself but continued on in the daily struggles the survivors suffered trying to put their lives back together. This isn't the kind of book you could call suspenseful per se, but it's a short book and I couldn't put it down till I finished it.
August 12, 2017
I liked this book up to a point. I did learn a lot about the real mine disaster because I looked it up online. I have also seen the memorial in Kellog. The book fell apart at the end, which is too bad. I don't think the author had a clear end in mind when he started and it shows.
March 22, 2022
I read this book in one sitting. It is not an overly long book and I was interested in the characters and wanted to know what happened to them. Set in a part of the US that I am familiar with, I liked being able to 'see' where they lived and traveled. It was a story about a community and what happened to some of them after a mine fire. I was quite captivated by it.
July 28, 2017
The lead-up to the mining accident was pretty good. Subsequently, it largely turned into a mediocre exposition of interior monologues.
June 3, 2020
Likely my favorite author.
May 4, 2017
Kevin Canty has been on my radar since I read 'Winslow in Love', and I've since read all of his fiction. 'The Underworld' is one of his very best. This novel is about a tragedy that takes place in a rural Idaho mining town when the mine collapses and about 92 people are killed. The trauma of the tragedy evokes various feelings and actions on those left behind and those who survived.
David is a young man who is attending college in Missoula, Montana. After his brother Ray dies in the mining disaster, David's life starts spinning. He loses focus and questions what he intends for the future. He comes from a family of miners. His father survives the mine's collapse but becomes distant from the rest of the family, spending his time in the garage drinking beer. Jordan, Ray's wife and the mother of their twins, is lost and turns to Ann, another widow for friendship and support. Ann is bereft and is trying to make a life for herself and her younger, deaf sister. Lyle, a miner who survived for over a week underground, becomes a changed man.
I was fascinated by the way each person grieved or celebrated in their own personal way, each so very different and also much the same. I watched with curiosity as people drifted together and made connections that would never have happened had the tragedy not occurred.
Silverton, Idaho, where the story primarily takes place, is a hard drinking miner's town. Going to the bar, drinking at home, or watching television in your spare time seem to be the activities of choice. How Canty excavates the inner lives of Silverton's residents is poignant, powerful, and arresting. There were many times I had to catch my breath because the characterizations hit me so hard. The rich inner lives of those affected by loss provided a vision of resilience, damage, and hope. I feel privileged to have read this book.
David is a young man who is attending college in Missoula, Montana. After his brother Ray dies in the mining disaster, David's life starts spinning. He loses focus and questions what he intends for the future. He comes from a family of miners. His father survives the mine's collapse but becomes distant from the rest of the family, spending his time in the garage drinking beer. Jordan, Ray's wife and the mother of their twins, is lost and turns to Ann, another widow for friendship and support. Ann is bereft and is trying to make a life for herself and her younger, deaf sister. Lyle, a miner who survived for over a week underground, becomes a changed man.
I was fascinated by the way each person grieved or celebrated in their own personal way, each so very different and also much the same. I watched with curiosity as people drifted together and made connections that would never have happened had the tragedy not occurred.
Silverton, Idaho, where the story primarily takes place, is a hard drinking miner's town. Going to the bar, drinking at home, or watching television in your spare time seem to be the activities of choice. How Canty excavates the inner lives of Silverton's residents is poignant, powerful, and arresting. There were many times I had to catch my breath because the characterizations hit me so hard. The rich inner lives of those affected by loss provided a vision of resilience, damage, and hope. I feel privileged to have read this book.
January 30, 2017
This book is slow moving, but delicious like honey. When I first started the novel I assumed that the mine disaster would have already occurred but the first 60 pages are about establishing the characters before the accident. At first I wasn't sure why it was being done like that, but the more I read, the more I liked the setup, as it allowed you to see just how much the characters changed.
As with all books I had a favorite character. I could have read so much more about Lyle, the miner who survived several days in the mine shaft after the accident. His life, which seemed so small, paid bills, savings, a house, and a routine, is really what most people are looking for. His desire to be loved was somewhat heartbreaking. The character I thought I'd like the most based on the synopsis, Jordan, the widowed mother of twins, seemed to be the least fleshed out character as the book wore on, and her story is the only one I didn't think veered from what I imagined it be once I started reading.
All in all a very powerful, non flashy novel that I enjoyed reading.
I won this book from goodreads in exchange for an honest review.
As with all books I had a favorite character. I could have read so much more about Lyle, the miner who survived several days in the mine shaft after the accident. His life, which seemed so small, paid bills, savings, a house, and a routine, is really what most people are looking for. His desire to be loved was somewhat heartbreaking. The character I thought I'd like the most based on the synopsis, Jordan, the widowed mother of twins, seemed to be the least fleshed out character as the book wore on, and her story is the only one I didn't think veered from what I imagined it be once I started reading.
All in all a very powerful, non flashy novel that I enjoyed reading.
I won this book from goodreads in exchange for an honest review.
January 11, 2022
I’m not sure if this is the mark of good writing, but I felt like I had a hangover from beginning to end—that’s how depressing the lives of these characters, and the life in this town, seemed to be. The accident around which the novel is centered could almost be an afterthought. The depression, the alcoholism, the lack of brightness and hope—it all just made me feel extremely sad.
I didn’t *like* any of the characters. I felt for them, sure. But I didn’t find myself particularly caring what would happen with them. Lyle may be the one exception. He reminded me of so many blue collar men I’ve known who have a battle-worn toughness on the outside that hides a tenderness that they’re not sure how to experience or express. I felt that he was the most genuine character with the most depth, although none of the characters were developed beyond the surface.
I’d quick better go find something brighter to cheer me up a little bit after that!
I will seek out more of Canty’s work. This was a library find when I had two minutes to pick something, and the cover art really drew me in. I’m glad I read it.
I didn’t *like* any of the characters. I felt for them, sure. But I didn’t find myself particularly caring what would happen with them. Lyle may be the one exception. He reminded me of so many blue collar men I’ve known who have a battle-worn toughness on the outside that hides a tenderness that they’re not sure how to experience or express. I felt that he was the most genuine character with the most depth, although none of the characters were developed beyond the surface.
I’d quick better go find something brighter to cheer me up a little bit after that!
I will seek out more of Canty’s work. This was a library find when I had two minutes to pick something, and the cover art really drew me in. I’m glad I read it.
May 15, 2017
A difficult book to review because it is literally about my hometown, which I left 50+ years ago upon high school graduation. Canty captures the grim life of a mining town and the beauty of the surrounding mountains. I found the pacing of the novel bizarre, the most gripping part of the story abruptly cut off, and numerous beer product placements rather weird. I am sorry that he limited the book to character studies and did not also examine the causes of the disaster, the failure of the survivors to sue the mining company, and examine any possible OSHA violations which could have contributed to the cause of the disaster. All in all it called me home, and initiated endless ruminations about the bitter life of the miners' families and their limited resources to deal with grief.
February 9, 2017
Was lucky to pick up an arc of this one at work. Suffice to say, if you're looking forward to this and likely to buy anything Canty writes, then you won't be disappointed. And if you're picking up a Canty novel for the first time, this is a good entry point into his later work. There's a kind of understated melodrama at work here that's right up my alley, Canty's sentences are as beautiful as ever, and the book overflows with memorable characters.
August 3, 2017
Really happened…In 1972, a fire broke out underground at the Sunshine Mine in Kellogg, Idaho; 91 men died of carbon monoxide poisoning. The disaster had a devastating effect on Kellogg and the nearby communities in Idaho’s Silver Valley. People who were there still vividly remember the events of that day. Source: NPR
Tom Wilkerson and Ron Flory were found 8 days after the fire and were the only survivors. Their story inspired this work of fiction.
When I first saw the title, The Underworld, and read the publisher’s blurb I made a wrong assessment that the book was a fantasy or science fiction. Somehow my brain latched on to the words – “none of the characters that populate the Underworld ever lived. . .” and made the leap to subterranean creatures never before seen.
In reality, the novel, inspired by true events, describes a hardscrabble life in a Colorado company-owned silver mining town in 1972. The cast of characters is small, mainly the Wright family and a few others. All residents are trapped; landlocked geographically, handcuffed by poverty and controlled by tradition. The company owns everything from the homes to the homeowners.
The story opens with David Wright, a college freshman, traveling from Missoula, Montana back to his hometown of Silverton, Colorado to attend a friend’s wedding. David’s easy drive from Missoula on the multi-lane highway ends when it bumps up against the mighty Camel’s Hump. Symbolically, and literally in David’s case, he puts chains on himself and the car’s tires before heading up the narrow mountain road toward home. Toward a place that the unimaginable has happened.
The day expires on the two-lane. . . the chains make a jingly sound that reminds David of Christmas and he sighs remembering all that was lost, everything slipping into the past. He is driving into the past. . .He moves through a whirling tunnel of snow, back and back and back.
From the moment you are born your life is predetermined here. If you are a woman, you will become a miner’s wife. If you are a miner, your son will be a miner and together you will descend daily into hell praying the mountain will spit you back out at the end of your shift.
There are few secrets in a mining town; much like Cheers, everyone knows your name. You develop deep bonds and friendships as everyone knows that one day, something is going to happen that will forever change things. The underworld. That cramped, damp, hot darkness of the mine fills all their lives; young and old alike.
Fear, the frayed high tension wire that connects everyone above ground as well as those a mile below hums in their consciousness day and night. It colors everything they think and do. Could today’s kiss good-bye in the morning be the last kiss? They drown their fear in alcohol and bravado. Most try to live loudly but there are those who withdraw into themselves creating a blank space where they smother feeling and emotion. They love, they hate, they fight, they pray…always aware they live on borrowed time.
It is no surprise that many dream of leaving but few have the courage to climb that mountain; it’s too scary to leave the devil you know for the one you don’t. Those that do leave are often pulled back by the bonds of family and the inability to understand and function in an uncontrolled outside world.
Then one day, it happens. . . 171 miners kissed their loved ones good-bye and headed to their underworld jobs. Life above ground followed normal routines. The instant the alarm was heard throughout the town, time stopped. The town’s worst nightmare had become a reality. Family and friends gather silently at the entrance of the mine and the long vigil begins. From that moment on, life will never be the same again in Silverton.
The fire will kill 91.
Whatever anyone thought they knew about themselves and how they would react to a mine disaster would prove to be wrong, Some will find the strength to start over, others will remain fixed in grief unable to restart a new life. This unfortunate town lost more than 91 souls, it lost its identity, its future. Somewhere, however, seeds of hope sprout for those willing to look for them.
In the difficult struggle to rise up, love will bloom and new friendships will be forged. Those finding the will to change have a bright new future ahead. Others, will remain focused on the loss and become alienated, bitter and unable to rise from the ashes.
I found this book a fast read. I guess I was drawn into the story by virtue of hearing about the local mine disaster near my home as a child. The story itself was told in simple terms, nothing floral or poetic, just told things in a manner that conveyed things as they probably would happen in real life.
Tom Wilkerson and Ron Flory were found 8 days after the fire and were the only survivors. Their story inspired this work of fiction.
When I first saw the title, The Underworld, and read the publisher’s blurb I made a wrong assessment that the book was a fantasy or science fiction. Somehow my brain latched on to the words – “none of the characters that populate the Underworld ever lived. . .” and made the leap to subterranean creatures never before seen.
In reality, the novel, inspired by true events, describes a hardscrabble life in a Colorado company-owned silver mining town in 1972. The cast of characters is small, mainly the Wright family and a few others. All residents are trapped; landlocked geographically, handcuffed by poverty and controlled by tradition. The company owns everything from the homes to the homeowners.
The story opens with David Wright, a college freshman, traveling from Missoula, Montana back to his hometown of Silverton, Colorado to attend a friend’s wedding. David’s easy drive from Missoula on the multi-lane highway ends when it bumps up against the mighty Camel’s Hump. Symbolically, and literally in David’s case, he puts chains on himself and the car’s tires before heading up the narrow mountain road toward home. Toward a place that the unimaginable has happened.
The day expires on the two-lane. . . the chains make a jingly sound that reminds David of Christmas and he sighs remembering all that was lost, everything slipping into the past. He is driving into the past. . .He moves through a whirling tunnel of snow, back and back and back.
From the moment you are born your life is predetermined here. If you are a woman, you will become a miner’s wife. If you are a miner, your son will be a miner and together you will descend daily into hell praying the mountain will spit you back out at the end of your shift.
There are few secrets in a mining town; much like Cheers, everyone knows your name. You develop deep bonds and friendships as everyone knows that one day, something is going to happen that will forever change things. The underworld. That cramped, damp, hot darkness of the mine fills all their lives; young and old alike.
Fear, the frayed high tension wire that connects everyone above ground as well as those a mile below hums in their consciousness day and night. It colors everything they think and do. Could today’s kiss good-bye in the morning be the last kiss? They drown their fear in alcohol and bravado. Most try to live loudly but there are those who withdraw into themselves creating a blank space where they smother feeling and emotion. They love, they hate, they fight, they pray…always aware they live on borrowed time.
It is no surprise that many dream of leaving but few have the courage to climb that mountain; it’s too scary to leave the devil you know for the one you don’t. Those that do leave are often pulled back by the bonds of family and the inability to understand and function in an uncontrolled outside world.
Then one day, it happens. . . 171 miners kissed their loved ones good-bye and headed to their underworld jobs. Life above ground followed normal routines. The instant the alarm was heard throughout the town, time stopped. The town’s worst nightmare had become a reality. Family and friends gather silently at the entrance of the mine and the long vigil begins. From that moment on, life will never be the same again in Silverton.
The fire will kill 91.
Whatever anyone thought they knew about themselves and how they would react to a mine disaster would prove to be wrong, Some will find the strength to start over, others will remain fixed in grief unable to restart a new life. This unfortunate town lost more than 91 souls, it lost its identity, its future. Somewhere, however, seeds of hope sprout for those willing to look for them.
In the difficult struggle to rise up, love will bloom and new friendships will be forged. Those finding the will to change have a bright new future ahead. Others, will remain focused on the loss and become alienated, bitter and unable to rise from the ashes.
I found this book a fast read. I guess I was drawn into the story by virtue of hearing about the local mine disaster near my home as a child. The story itself was told in simple terms, nothing floral or poetic, just told things in a manner that conveyed things as they probably would happen in real life.
August 17, 2017
This book snuck up on me. I can't remember how or why I picked it up, but nearly as soon as it began, I was sucked into Canty's characters and prose, pulled along through every passage and every heartbreak, every wondering. The patchwork effect he creates by weaving together the short chapters focused on characters who are so different, and yet so alike, is brilliant, and through simple prose that sifts through the tragedy of a mining disaster, the outcome is masterful. As fiction, it reads almost as something which is too real and too close, in his focus on the most irreverent details right alongside the most poignant emotions that manages to make it feel as if you're watching a video back through time, to something which happened--from living room, to church, to tunnel, to bar, to the driver's seat of a car where the reader seems to be riding shotgun with a confused driver, just like they're so often riding shotgun for intimate moments that feel too real, too close.
All told, I'm left wondering why I've never heard of Canty in the past, and anxious to pick up more of his work. In fact, I'm thinking about re-reading this one already.
Absolutely recommended.
All told, I'm left wondering why I've never heard of Canty in the past, and anxious to pick up more of his work. In fact, I'm thinking about re-reading this one already.
Absolutely recommended.
March 14, 2018
En 1972, dans une petite ville des Etats-Unis, la mine est le principal emploi des hommes. La vie n’est pas facile, et certains ne pensent qu’à partir. Quand une catastrophe se produit à la mine, toute la communauté est concernée, sous le choc et pleine de chagrin.
C’est un livre dont je me souviens avoir repéré la couverture, elle me semblait assez triste et désolée mais m’attirait. J’ai eu la chance que Babelio m’offre la possibilité de lire ce livre dans le cadre d’une Masse Critique Privilégiée, je les remercie donc, ainsi que les édition Albin Michel, pour cette lecture que j’ai beaucoup appréciée.
J’ai beaucoup aimé découvrir ces tranches de vies, pas faciles et ces gens qui font face à des situations difficiles et luttent pour faire de leur mieux et s’en sortir comme ils peuvent.
J’ai aimé :
– le style de l’auteur, sa plume toute en sensibilité, qui a su m’emporter dans cette histoire et me présenter des personnages cabossés par la vie, que j’ai eu envie de suivre et de découvrir au fil de son récit.
Pour mon avis complet: https://chronicroqueusedelivres.wordp...
C’est un livre dont je me souviens avoir repéré la couverture, elle me semblait assez triste et désolée mais m’attirait. J’ai eu la chance que Babelio m’offre la possibilité de lire ce livre dans le cadre d’une Masse Critique Privilégiée, je les remercie donc, ainsi que les édition Albin Michel, pour cette lecture que j’ai beaucoup appréciée.
J’ai beaucoup aimé découvrir ces tranches de vies, pas faciles et ces gens qui font face à des situations difficiles et luttent pour faire de leur mieux et s’en sortir comme ils peuvent.
J’ai aimé :
– le style de l’auteur, sa plume toute en sensibilité, qui a su m’emporter dans cette histoire et me présenter des personnages cabossés par la vie, que j’ai eu envie de suivre et de découvrir au fil de son récit.
Pour mon avis complet: https://chronicroqueusedelivres.wordp...
May 23, 2020
. A tough, terse novel set in a hardscrabble silver mining town in Idaho, where life in 1972 mostly consists of work, screwing, lots and lots of drinking, and the occasional bar fight. Tragedy hits the town in the form of a disastrous fire in the silver mine that kills 91 miners; in a small town like Canty’s fictional Silverton almost everyone is impacted. (Although this book is fiction, its central event is based on the real Sunshine Mine Disaster, which occurred in a similar Idaho town.). The book’s central characters include David, a college student with plans to escape Silverton; Ann, whose husband died in the mine; and Lyle, a middle-aged miner who got rescued after 16 days trapped in the dark tunnels
Despite its limitations, Canty’s creations find it hard to escape Silverton. Friends, family and familiarity keep drawing them back, and much of the book’s tensions come from the desperate desire to leave versus a powerful need to stay. Canty does a good job at depicting the conflicting emotions of his characters, and the people around them. He goes beyond that to make the town itself, and the danger that lies beneath it, into a character in its own right.
Despite its limitations, Canty’s creations find it hard to escape Silverton. Friends, family and familiarity keep drawing them back, and much of the book’s tensions come from the desperate desire to leave versus a powerful need to stay. Canty does a good job at depicting the conflicting emotions of his characters, and the people around them. He goes beyond that to make the town itself, and the danger that lies beneath it, into a character in its own right.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 7, 2017
This book introduces the reader to a world lived literally underground (in the silver mine) and figuratively underground in the ways in which small towns can keep one from experiencing a bigger life and world.
David struggles with the decision to stay or go from the place where he was raised. His brother, Ray, never left, and has built a life around silver mining. He's enjoying his friends in a "good old days" fashion, and his carelessness will ultimately cost him. Ann, dreams of a better life, but will she be brave enough to walk away from her job at the grocery story and her marriage? Terry is defined by his work as a miner. Can he make another life for himself? These are all questions the novel attempts to address, but, in my opinion, the central question anchoring this novel is this: how much control do we have over our lives, and are we willing to exercise that control or be swept along by everyday life?
David struggles with the decision to stay or go from the place where he was raised. His brother, Ray, never left, and has built a life around silver mining. He's enjoying his friends in a "good old days" fashion, and his carelessness will ultimately cost him. Ann, dreams of a better life, but will she be brave enough to walk away from her job at the grocery story and her marriage? Terry is defined by his work as a miner. Can he make another life for himself? These are all questions the novel attempts to address, but, in my opinion, the central question anchoring this novel is this: how much control do we have over our lives, and are we willing to exercise that control or be swept along by everyday life?
March 30, 2022
Wonderful prose here, and very real characters. Those two things go a long way for me. But after awhile it wasn't the sadness that brought me down (the dust jacket let's you know what you're in for), but the hopelessness. Before the plot-driving catastrophy even takes place, the characters start out with lives and relationships built upon survival, fear, fetishes, and dysfunctional forms of intimacy. Add a mass casualty event, and what little they have is taken away. There is no "all we need is love" here. There is no real testing of relational bonds because there were no real bonds to begin with, just prisons of circumstance.
The final straw for me was when one of the characters, realizing her husband is probably dead, reminisces not about her husband's personality, but about the softness of his scrotum in her hand while he slept.
No thanks.
The final straw for me was when one of the characters, realizing her husband is probably dead, reminisces not about her husband's personality, but about the softness of his scrotum in her hand while he slept.
No thanks.
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