Blue Mountain Explosion

Blue Mountain Explosion is a 2024 Hollywood Book Festival first-place, genre category winner. Set in a rural mining community with the backdrop of the Appalachian Mountains, Blue Mountain Explosion's chilling premise involves a terrorist plot targeting an underground shaft mine in southwest Virginia.

Protagonist Mark Morgan is a compelling and layered mine foreman who understands the physical mine environment and the intricate human dynamics within it. Mark expresses disbelief when he is approached by authorities to investigate the mysterious threat against his coal mine, and the men and women for whom he carries the weight of responsibility to protect from harm while working underground. As the story unfolds, Mark's unraveling trust of those closest to him causes him to question miner loyalty, close friendships, and the fragile bonds of family ties between husbands, wives, and their children. Facing not only external threats, but his own accountability from the menace because of past decisions, he wages a psychological battle with himself as he races to solve the mystery, Mark decides he can trust and confide in no one except Jack Bonney. The problem, Jack is the ghost of a miner dead for many years.

The year is 2013, a date that will not be forgotten because of the exploits of Mark Morgan and the story of Blue Mountain Explosion.

Editorial review: "Mark Morgan confronts a chilling terrorist plot against his coal mine, uncovering deep betrayals and testing the fragile bonds of loyalty and love in a gripping mystery." NewInBooks.com

Author Don V. Hylton writes this story based on his experiences working 33 years as an underground coal miner, and his four years of study acquiring a B.S. degree in mining engineering technology from Bluefield State College (University).