Adventure & Exploration
Author's Autograph Edition, no. 663/1000; signed by author; introduction by Myron T. Herrick; illustrated with etchings and photographs; brown boards, white vellum spine, title in gilt on spine and front cover. Lacking glassine cover and clamshell case; printed on linen with uncut edges; illustrated endpapers. Includes publishers note about the publication of the book, dated August 27, 1927.
This early work by Charles Lindbergh was an account of his historic transatlantic flight in 1927, but he was never happy with the publication. To correct this, he published The Spirit of St. Louis in 1953, which he felt accurately described the flight. Spirit of St. Louis went on to win the Pulitzer Prize for Autobiography in 1954. It was ghost written by his wife, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, and its success is widely attributed to her writing skills.
Beautiful copy showing little to no wear. VG+
Tenzing Norgay (1914-1986) was the Tibetan mountaineer who led Sir Edmund Hilary to the top of Mount Everest in 1953. The two men became the first people to set foot on the summit of the world's highest peak. After Everest is Norgay's autobiography, as told to Malcom Barnes.
Vikas Publishing, New Delhi, India, 1977 first printing. Dust jacket in protective cover; head of spine torn and missing; bottom of spine chipped; top edges and corners creased and chipped; dark green cloth with yellow lettering on spine; area of fading at head of spine and top front cover; endpapers tanned; autographed signed letter laid in; inscribed on half-title; binding good; text clean. G+/G-
In August 1914, polar explorer Ernest Shackleton boarded the Endurance and set sail for Antarctica, where he planned to cross the last uncharted continent on foot. In January 1915, after battling its way through a thousand miles of pack ice and only a day's sail short of its destination, the Endurance became locked in an island of ice.
Thus began the legendary ordeal of Shackleton and his crew of twenty-seven men. When their ship was finally crushed between two ice floes, they attempted a near-impossible journey over 850 miles of the South Atlantic's heaviest seas to the closest outpost of civilization.
In Endurance, the definitive account of Ernest Shackleton's fateful trip, Alfred Lansing brilliantly narrates the harrowing and miraculous voyage that has defined heroism for the modern age.
The Endurance : Shackelton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing
This is one of my favorite Non-Fiction books of all time. In August 1914 The Endurance, lead by Ernest Shackelton and his twenty-eight crew members, set out to be the first explorers to cross the continent by way of the South Pole, taking scientific measurements and mapping a new territory. But the ship got trapped in ice. The crew abandoned ship, removing all they could before it sank, including their sled dogs, a few small boats and sledges, food and water, medical supplies and scientific equipment. The explorers had to survive and find their way back to civilization by crossing on ice flows and open water, all the while freezing cold and existing through unbearable hardships. The book captures the personalities of all the men who made this astonishing trip, as well as the descriptive icy landscape of the Antarctica. Time and time again they were faced with a new crisis, and the story builds in tension to a point where I, on my couch, thought it couldn’t get worse—and then it did. But Shackelton leads them home, eventually, every last one of them. A sobering and inspiring book.
Sarah Willis
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"Stylishly written, whimsical yet sophisticated, quirkily detailed and full of empathy . . . The Orchid Thief shows [Orlean's] gifts in full bloom."--The New York Times Book Review "Fascinating . . . an engrossing journey [full] of theft, hatred, greed, jealousy, madness, and backstabbing."--Los Angeles Times
"Orlean's snapshot-vivid, pitch-perfect prose . . . is fast becoming one of our national treasures."--The Washington Post Book World
"Orlean's gifts [are] her ear for the self-skewing dialogue, her eye for the incongruous, convincing detail, and her Didion-like deftness in description."--Boston Sunday Globe "A swashbuckling piece of reporting that celebrates some virtues that made America great."--The Wall Street Journal
The River of Doubt : Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey, by Candice Millard
Did you know that Theodore Roosevelt ran for a third term, this time with the Progressive Party, a new, independent third party? That when he lost, he decided to join an expedition of The River of Doubt, a tributary of the Amazon River? He did, along with the Brazilian explorer Candido Rondon and Roosevelt’s son, Kermit. Of the nineteen men who attempted to map The River of Doubt, only sixteen survived.
Everything that could go wrong did. The explores contracted serious diseases, lost canoes and built new ones, encountered white water rapids and portaged around them, and faced starvation and rebellion. One man drowned, one was murdered, and one (the murderer) was left behind. Roosevelt himself, suffering from Malaria, was wounded in his leg and developed an almost fatal infection. He even considered suicide before they were found by native “rubber-trappers” who helped them traverse the river back to civilization.
The descriptions of these events and of the dense, dangerous Amazon forest are absolutely riveting. Written by Candice Millard, this book is a must for anyone interested in the tragedy and triumphs of historical exploration.
Sarah Willis
For its twenty-fifth anniversary, a new edition of Bruce Chatwin's classic work with a new introduction by Rory Stewart
Part adventure, part novel of ideas, part spiritual autobiography, The Songlines is one of Bruce Chatwin's most famous books. Set in the desolate lands of the Australian Outback, it tells the story of Chatwin's search for the source and meaning of the ancient "dreaming tracks" of the Aborigines--the labyrinth of invisible pathways by which their ancestors "sang" the world into existence. This singular book, which was a New York Times bestseller when it was published in 1987, engages all of Chatwin's lifelong passions, including his obsession with travel, his interest in the nomadic way of life, and his hunger to understand man's origins and nature.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
In 2009, after a crippling divorce that left her heartbroken and directionless, Kristin decided to accept an offer to live at a friend's cabin outside of Denali National Park in Alaska for a few months. In exchange for housing, she would take care of her friend's eight sled dogs.
That winter, she learned that she was tougher than she ever knew. She learned how to survive in one of the most remote places on earth and she learned she was strong enough to be alone. She fell in love twice: first with running sled dogs, and then with Andy, a gentle man who had himself moved to Alaska to heal a broken heart. Kristin and Andy married and started a sled dog kennel. While this work was enormously satisfying, Kristin became determined to complete the Iditarod -- the 1,000-mile dogsled race from Anchorage, in south central Alaska, to Nome on the western Bering Sea coast. THIS MUCH COUNTRY is the story of renewal and transformation. It's about journeying across a wild and unpredictable landscape and finding inner peace, courage and a true home. It's about pushing boundaries and overcoming paralyzing fears.
"THIS MUCH COUNTRY is the next best thing to stepping on the runners of your own dogsled. A gorgeous, intimate story of wildness and belonging."--Blair Braverman, author of Welcome to the Goddamn Ice Cube
#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER
At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother's death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon destroyed. Four years later, with nothing more to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life. With no experience or training, driven only by blind will, she would hike more than a thousand miles of the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State--and she would do it alone. Told with suspense and style, sparkling with warmth and humor, Wild powerfully captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddened, strengthened, and ultimately healed her.