Publisher's Synopsis
Chad has wanted to be a firefighter since he was a kid, but with another near-miss on the qualification test, it looks like he won't ever make it. At 23, his dream feels like it is slipping away from him. All he ever wanted to do was to help people, to save lives, to make a difference. When Mt. Hood erupts in spectacular billows of ash, not forty miles from his home town, he gets that chance. Wading into the swirling, debris-filled mudflows, he risks his life to save others. Even though the eruption is a horrible thing, he sees that here is his one chance to live his dream. Elsewhere on the mountain, ash fouls the engine of a helicopter carrying volcanologists, sending it plummeting into tall trees. A furnace-hot cloud of ash tumbles toward two hikers on their third date. A family camping on the mountain can't get out either, and one of them is struggling to draw a breath. Lives are at risk, and the mountain keeps pouring out its deadly ash. Who will survive? Whose life will the mountain claim?
