THE MOUTAIN THROWS SHADOWS

From an innovator of autofiction comes a meditation on grief, care, Buddhism, and artmaking.

This is a story. It is a story about someone accompanying another to the last gate.

Kristjana Gunnars has taken her husband back to his home in Oslo to die. Through the dark, cold days, she tends to his needs as she feels her own self disintegrating. Years later, as she looks back to this slow departure of the man she loved, she weaves together threads from her own life, reflections on the thoughts of Gautama Buddha, discussions of Renaissance art, and anecdotes about the lives of contemporary artists.

Engaging with thinkers as varied as Ingmar Bergman and Jacques Derrida, Henry David Thoreau and Ursula Le Guin, Gunnars one of
the earliest practitioners of 'autofiction' crafts a new kind of hybrid text, with elements of memoir, lyrical essay, Buddhist teachings, poetics, art theory, and meditation.

Diamond Snow is a deep dive into grief, the way we circle around it, dipping in and out of the pain, finding comfort in art and philosophy and religion where we can. It's an intellectual cabaret, a Buddhist primer, and a pointillist portrait of grief above all,
it's the consoling and invigorating reflection we need in this moment.

KRISTJANA GUNNARS was born in Iceland and has lived in Canada since 1969. She served as Professor of English and Film Studies at the University of Alberta, and as Guest Professor at the University of Trier in Germany and the University of Iceland. She lived on the Sunshine Coast of B.C. for twenty years while pursuing a career in the arts (painting), as well as writing. She is the author of several
books including The Scent of Light (Coach House, 2022), and her work has appeared in numerous anthologies and journals in Canada, the U.S., and Europe.