GIFTS OF A DARK GOD

The final volume in a trilogy of adventure stories set in a near-future Antarctica.

The first of Westhoff's Erebus Tales, Stone Fever (2020), introduced Keltyn SparrowHawk, a Canadian geologist in the climate change–ravaged 24th century whose mission to a snow-free Antarctica in search of precious iridium takes an unexpected turn when her plane crashes and she’s taken in by the migratory Onwei people. The story continued in The Color of Greed (2021) in which scheming industrialist Sir Oscar Bailey mounts another mission to exploit the Onwei for the iridium in their lands. As this third volume opens, SparrowHawk is in jail, and Bailey is set to send another mission to Antarctica’s forbidding Mount Erebus; his goal is to use the iridium buried there to build transport ships for Canadian colonists, much to the dismay of SparrowHawk, who, once free, again seeks to thwart the oligarch’s plans. She’s joined in this quest by her Onwei friends Luz Hogarth and Joaquin Beltran, and, although she doesn’t immediately know it, by anthropologist Fay Del Campo, who’s long been opposed to Bailey’s plans. These and other characters converge in a cross-cultural annual event called the Rendezvous, where their final fates will be determined, for good or ill. Early on in this installment, Westhoff makes skillful use of an initial scene in which SparrowHawk is interviewed about her story (“Please fill us in on the past year and a half of your life”), which will effectively bring new readers up to speed on the events of past novels. Although this final entry feels overlong, its brisk pace seldom slackens. The author’s talent for shaping his characters was evident in the first two volumes, and it remains strong here; the stories of Luz and Fay are particularly involving. Throughout the novel, the tension builds on its way to a gripping climax.

A heartfelt conclusion to an intriguing climate-change trilogy.