Submitted to the Castlegar News
Leading up to the third anniversary of the tragic 2012 landslides in Johnsons Landing, author Amanda Bath is touring with her new memoir, Disaster in Paradise: The Landslides in Johnsons Landing.
She will be giving talks and presentations throughout the Kootenays to commemorate what the community lost and to help all British Columbians learn how to read the signs of an oncoming natural disaster.
Join her for a book signing at Castlegar and District Public Library on Monday, June 22 at 6 p.m. Admission is free.
Disaster in Paradise looks at the landslides that devastated the picturesque Kootenay Lake community. Bath’s house was flattened by the first slide only an hour after she left the area, and when she returned less than 24 hours later to try to rescue her cat, she had less than a minute of warning before a second landslide completely buried what remained of her home.
Her escape from the second landslide was caught on video by a news crew who left the same beach minutes earlier and the footage went viral on YouTube. The process of writing Disaster in Paradise was like therapy for Bath, carrying her through the painful months that followed.
Disaster in Paradise is the story of Bath’s trauma and healing, but it is also the story of a community as it joined together to mourn and gradually rebuild in the wake of tragedy. In total, the landslides destroyed six homes and killed four people.