Black Canyon

Discontented adolescent Brian, the narrator of this short, sharp shocker, admits to parricide in the opening paragraphs, and he has a few more startling surprises to spring before he’s through recalling his family’s ill-fated Colorado camping trip in the fall of 1990. Things are already tense between Brian and his bickering parents when Brian’s showboating dad stumbles off a cliff and seriously injures himself. While Brian’s mom runs for help, Brian watches over his dad, until the delirious man tells Brian a secret that makes the boy less inclined to save him. The stage is set for other revelations that put Brian’s behavior in grim context. Bates (The Taste of Fear) writes persuasively from Brian’s adolescent point of view, making the horror of his youthful reminiscences that much more intense. A coda shifting from the past to the present comes across as something of a storytelling cheat, but it doesn’t diminish the power of this first-person tale. [em](BookLife) [/em]