95 books like My Life of High Adventure

This fascinating history about hiking the Appalachian Trail spotlights a woman who demonstrated that age and gender aren't barriers to remarkable physical feats. Or should I say "feet"?

Grandma Gatewood was a pioneer, not only for women trekking alone, but for people of any age who set out on a journey others say isn’t possible for them. I was inspired by her story to take on a journey I thought would be marvelous, but beyond my capabilities. And I made it happen!

Into Thin Air was the first book that I ever had a physical reaction to. I can still remember reading the book, and my jaw dropped as I read about Beck Weathers walking into camp after he was left to die.

No book has ever evoked such a physical reaction from me. I literally could not put this book down. I first read Into Thin Air over twenty years ago and have read it several more times since. Out of the hundreds of books I’ve read in my lifetime, this is one of the few that have stayed with me for decades. I cannot fathom being in a situation where I would have to make the decision of whether or not to leave someone to die.   

This historical novel is about a Viet Name vet with PTSD who moves his wife and daughter to a wilderness area of Alaska in the 1970s.

It’s hard enough to survive during the light of summer, but when the dark winter days fall on them, the father’s mental health deteriorates. He becomes embroiled in conspiracy theories. The family fears for their safety. The characters are unique and perfectly written.

The storyline is imaginative and captivating. You know it can’t end well. The last pages left me bawling uncontrollably.

A classic American story following Lewis and Clark and the Corps of Discovery from Virginia to the Pacific Coast and back again in the very early 1800s.

This book needs to be read not only by those interested in history but by all who would understand the origins of our nation. The complex personalities of Lewis, Clark, and Thomas Jefferson, who envisioned the journey come through in living color. 

Dirt Work: An Education in the Woods is a memoir about Byl’s experience as a trail builder in Glacier National Park and Cordova and Denali, Alaska. All too often, books about physical labor highlight a male perspective. It is wonderful to have Byl’s perspective on her life as a trail builder. Byl so stunningly weaves vignettes about a life working in the woods. Her stories teach us about physical and intellectual labor and do so beautifully.

This controversial book was a Rorschach Test for the security community.

Some read it as a critique of the United States; others saw it as a call for pacifism; others saw it as an attack on Franklin Roosevelt or Winston Churchill. In fact, it was none of those things and all of them. Baker is a novelist who purchased a newspaper archive from the 1930s and 1940s and simply reprinted some of the stories contained therein. He offers little additional comments or interpretation.

The book is an anecdote to the idea that the Second World War was somehow the “good war.”  Like all others, it was barbarism; unlike all others, it was barbarism on a scale never seen before or since. And like all wars, it was, at its root, the story of common people victimized by their governments.

I did my best to put together a list of alternate history books that didn’t feature either the American Civil War or World War 2, but this book was too interesting to leave out (and also, it doesn’t involve the Nazis winning the war in yet another veiled attempt at white supremacism fanfic). It does fit within my list in how Tregillis also flips many of the tropes of the genres explored here, especially regarding the main character’s role within the plot. And lest you think all alternate history stories with a healthy dose of fantasy must feature a romantic element, Tregillis’ unflinching take on the horrors of war (but add magic and make it equally horrifying) should more than make up for it.

Another master, Alan Furst’s 1st novel (of 15 so far) is a great place to start. His stories are so well researched you might think you were reading a travel guide.

Filled with intricate details of the conflict between Russia and Germany as World War II begins, Khristo Stoianev is a young man recruited to work for the Russian secret service, the NKVD. From his recruitment in Bulgaria through training and successive secret missions, Khristo must survive not only the Nazis, but his own employers, who decide he too must be killed.

Furst builds both the pace and tension as Khristo fights his way across Europe trying to escape. Relentless.  

As the first in his series of novels on the 1930s in Europe, Alan Furst's Night Soldier tends to earn the most critical praise, but Dark Star remains my personal favorite. Furst masters the noir ambiance and moral ambiguity of Europe as war approaches, where everyday people are drawn into the world of espionage and intrigue. His settings often lie outside the main urban centers of Paris and Berlin in the remote reaches of Eastern Europe. Furst's novels are impeccably researched for accurate detail-one of my must-haves in historical fiction-and each book will draw you to read the next in his series.

People in the West tend to celebrate 1945 as a year of liberation; but, of course, in Eastern Europe, the defeat of Germany merely heralded the beginning of four more decades of repression. In this book, Anne Applebaum describes the Communist takeover of three European countries – East Germany, Poland, and Hungary. It’s a masterpiece both of research and of analysis. Communism, just like capitalism, had many faces: this book shows brilliantly just how varied repression can be. In 2013 it won the lucrative Cundill Prize, and deservedly so.