I’m going to Alaska next week because my best friend is getting married. A couple of friends are coming with me, along with their son and The Kid. Somehow or other, I got conned in to agreeing to go camping in Denali during this trip. And not even in a cabin, but outside. In a tent. With a sleeping bag. On the ground. With, you know, bears and moose. I’ve gone nearly 40 years without peeing outside; I have a real fear that streak may […]
Triple Cannonball on a sad read
I would normally do a happy dance for a triple cannonball (which was my goal for the whole year, so I’m pretty amazed that I hit it in August!), but my 156th book, Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild, hardly lends itself for happy dancing. While the book contained some pretty depressing material, Krakauer also filled it with beautiful scenery, touching interviews and his own little glimpse into the life of a difficult, passionate young man. “I’d like to repeat the advice that I gave you before, in that I […]
Religion makes some people kinda cray cray.
I had wanted to read Under the Banner of Heaven for quite a long time, and finally found a copy at my local used book store this year. I started and stopped reading several times, to pick up lighter, less gruesome novels, but I kept coming back to read this intense, true-crime novel, that is less about the horrible murder of a 24 year old mother and her 15 month old daughter (and it was violently and insanely horrible), as it is about a fundamentalist […]
Missoula is America
I’m a fan of Jon Krakauer’s other work, but when I heard he was coming out with a comprehensive look at the Missoula rape scandals in the last few years, I was hesitant. I had followed along with much of the reporting on those cases and am pretty tuned-in to the larger issues of rape culture in this country. Did I really want to read what a white dude (who may or may not be sympathetic to rape survivors) had to say about it? But […]