Icy Clutches

Anthropology professor Gideon Oliver thought that accompanying his wife, Julie, to a forest rangers? conference in Alaska?s scenic Glacier Bay would make for a restful vacation. Realistic enough, however, to know that vacations aren?t always restful, Gideon did think he was far enough away from civilization to avoid university politics and the hefty egos that go along with them. But he hadn?t counted on the presence of M. Audley Tremaine, TV?s most popular science personality. The unctuous Tremaine has just completed his memoirs of a geologic expedition of thirty years earlier, when three people were killed in an avalanche?and Tremaine himself barely escaped with his life. Now he and the other survivors?as well as their late colleagues? heirs?have gathered to review the manuscript and memorialize the victims.