Interesting work of non-fiction, though I think he could have made a 10% cut to wordage. The description, anthropomorphism, and allegory were great at times but overused. My favourite parts were the outsider's description of Fort Mac and remembering growing up with (mostly boys) living that dolla dolla billz life.
I'd recommend it further if it was a bit more concise.

not for me. There were a lot of pages spent on the background and history around bitumen mining before getting to the fire.

Currently my #1 for non-fiction in 2023.

I learned so much from this book. Vaillant uses the 2016-2017 Fort McMurray fire in Alberta as the lens to look at everything—how we got to the Petrocene era and where we may go from here.

Geography, geology, philosophy, history, meteorology—everything pertains, and in the summer of 2023, I understand so much more now.

A must-read for anyone who wants to enjoy an incredibly crafted non-fictional account of a terrifying experience with wildfire in a small Canadian town. Valliant does an incredible job integrating impactful climate and fire science data with this heartbreaking story. I couldn't stop turning the pages on this one.