Hazard

At the start of journalist Harris’s top-notch fiction debut, coal miner Amos Blevins scrambles to rescue co-workers from a sudden, unexpected flood deep in the Blue Gem mine in Hazard, Ky. Despite Blevins’s efforts, nine men perish before help can arrive from above. Will Murphy, a federal Mine Safety and Health Administration inspector, looks into what everyone assumes is a tragic, if not unusual, accident. No one expects any complications, particularly since the man who runs the mine is Will’s older brother, Paul. But with bad blood between the brothers, Will decides for a variety of reasons to do a real investigation, which turns up anomalies pointing to malfeasance that goes far beyond simple negligence. The reader comes to care about a wide cast of characters, mostly hardscrabble Appalachian men and women, as Harris carefully unspools the many plot threads. Pitch-perfect dialogue and an authentic view of the nuts and bolts of mining help make this an engrossing mystery thriller. (Mar.)