Recommendations based on "Fire"

Streetlamps, neon signs – an ever-present glow that has changed the natural world and adversely affected our health; Paul Bogard illuminates the problems caused by a lack of darkness.We live awash in artificial light. But night’s natural darkness has always been invaluable for our spiritual health and the health of the natural world, and every living creature suffers from its loss.Paul Bogard investigates what we mean when we talk about darkness. He travels between the intensely lit cities – from glittering Las Vegas to the gas-lit streets of Westminster – and the sites where real darkness still remains, such as the Brecon Beacons and the island of Sark. Encountering scientists, physicians, activists and writers, Bogard discusses how light is negatively affecting the natural world; how our well-being is significantly influenced by darkness or its lack; and how it’s not a matter of using light at night or not, but rather when and where, how and how much.A beautiful invocation of our constant companion, the night, which returns every day of our lives, this book reminds us of the power and mystery of the dark.

The uplifting true tale of the couple who lost everything and embarked on a journey of salvation across the windswept South West coastline. Now a Top Ten Sunday Times Bestseller 'The landscape is magical: shape-shifting seas and smugglers' coves; myriads of sea birds and mauve skies. Raynor writes exquisitely . . . It's a tale of triumph: of hope over despair; of love over everything . . . home was no longer about bricks and mortar. It was a state of mind' The Sunday Times Just days after Raynor learns that Moth, her husband of 32 years, is terminally ill, their home is taken away and they lose their livelihood. With nothing left and little time, they make the brave and impulsive decision to walk the 630 miles of the sea-swept South West Coast Path, from Somerset to Dorset, via Devon and Cornwall. Carrying only the essentials for survival on their backs, they live wild in the ancient, weathered landscape of cliffs, sea and sky. Yet through every step, every encounter and every test along the way, their walk becomes a remarkable journey. The Salt Path is an honest and life-affirming true story of coming to terms with grief and the healing power of the natural world. Ultimately, it is a portrayal of home, and how it can be lost, rebuilt and rediscovered in the most unexpected ways. 'The Salt Path is a life-affirming tale of enduring love that smells of the sea and tastes of a rich life. With beautiful, immersive writing, it is a story heart-achingly and beautifully told.' Jackie Morris 'What an absolute glorious and moving book. It deserves all its praise!' Vybarr Cregan-Reid, author of Footnotes and Primate Change

This is the story of how Thor Heyderdahl and five other men crossed the Pacific Ocean on a balsa-wood raft in an extraordinary bid to prove Heyderdahl's theory that the Polynesians undertook the same feat on such a craft over 1000 years ago.

Winner of the National Book AwardThis bestselling, groundbreaking exploration of the Far North is a classic of natural history, anthropology, and travel writing.The Arctic is a perilous place. Only a few species of wild animals can survive its harsh climate. In this modern classic, Barry Lopez explores the many-faceted wonders of the Far North: its strangely stunted forest, its mesmerizing aurora borealis, its frozen seas. Musk oxen, polar bears, narwhal, and other exotic beasts of the region come alive through Lopez’s passionate and nuanced observations. And, as he examines the history and culture of the indigenous people, along with parallel narratives of intrepid, often underprepared and subsequently doomed polar explorers, Lopez drives to the heart of why the austere and formidable Arctic is also a constant source of breathtaking beauty, beguilement, and wonder.Written in prose as memorably pure as the land it describes, Arctic Dreams is a timeless mediation on the ability of the landscape to shape our dreams and to haunt our imaginations.Look for Barry Lopez's new book, Horizon, available now.

The award-winning first novel from a legendary travel writer, about a pair of twins and their long, remarkable lives in the farmlands of Wales. For forty-two years, identical twins Lewis and Benjamin Jones have shared a bed, a farm, and a life. But the world has scarred and warped them each in different ways. Lewis is sturdy, still strong enough at eighty to wield an ax all day, and though he’s hardly ever ventured outside his little village on the English border, he dreams of far-off lands. Benjamin is gentler, a cook whose favorite task is delivering baby lambs, and even in his old age, he remains devoted to the memory of his mother. The unusual twins have seen a country change and an empire fall, and in their shared memory lies an epic story of the century that remade Britain. From the stories of their father’s youth to their own dotage, there is nothing these farmers haven’t seen—or heard. Famed travel author Bruce Chatwin brings his unique understanding of landscape and culture to his debut novel, an intense examination of a little patch of Wales. Winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the Whitbread Literary Award, and written in the tradition of Wuthering Heights and The Mayor of Casterbridge, this entry on the list of “1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die” is an all-time classic from the author of bestsellers such as In Patagonia and The Songlines. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Bruce Chatwin including rare images and never-before-seen documents from the author’s estate.

From the author of the bestseller Eat and Run, a thrilling memoir about his grueling, exhilarating, and immensely inspiring 46-day run to break the speed record for the Appalachian Trail.Scott Jurek is one of the world's best known and most beloved ultrarunners. Renowned for his remarkable endurance and speed, accomplished on a vegan diet, he's finished first in nearly all of ultrarunning's elite events over the course of his career. But after two decades of racing, training, speaking, and touring, Jurek felt an urgent need to discover something new about himself. He embarked on a wholly unique challenge, one that would force him to grow as a person and as an athlete: breaking the speed record for the Appalachian Trail.North is the story of the 2,189-mile journey that nearly shattered him. When he set out in the spring of 2015, Jurek anticipated punishing terrain, forbidding weather, and inevitable injuries. He would have to run nearly 50 miles a day, every day, for almost seven weeks. He knew he would be pushing himself to the limit, that comfort and rest would be in short supply -- but he couldn't have imagined the physical and emotional toll the trip would exact, nor the rewards it would offer.With his wife, Jenny, friends, and the kindness of strangers supporting him, Jurek ran, hiked, and stumbled his way north, one white blaze at a time. A stunning narrative of perseverance and personal transformation, North is a portrait of a man stripped bare on the most demanding and transcendent effort of his life. It will inspire runners and non-runners alike to keep striving for their personal best.

Never opened collection of Hunter S. Thompson's work put together by his wife, Anita. Expansive body for work put together lovingly.

"Gripping . . . the narrative is smooth and immediate, almost effortless in its detail, if occasionally breathless, like a good fast run . . ." --The New York Times Book ReviewVisionary American running coach Bob Larsen assembled a mismatched team of elite California runners . . . the start of his decades-long quest for championships, Olympic glory, and pursuit of "the epic run."In the dusty hills above San Diego, Bob Larsen became America's greatest running coach. Starting with a ragtag group of high school cross country and track runners, Larsen set out on a decades-long quest to find the secret of running impossibly fast, for longer distances than anyone thought possible. Himself a former farm boy who fell into his track career by accident, Larsen worked through coaching high school, junior college, and college, coaxing talented runners away from more traditional sports as the running craze was in its infancy in the 60's and 70's. On the arid trails and windy roads of California, Larsen relentlessly sought the 'secret sauce' of speed and endurance that would catapult American running onto the national stage.Running to the Edge is a riveting account of Larsen's journey, and his quest to discover the unorthodox training secrets that would lead American runners (elite and recreational) to breakthroughs never imagined. New York Times Deputy Sports Editor Matthew Futterman interweaves the dramatic stories of Larsen's runners with a fascinating discourse of the science behind human running, as well as a personal running narrative that follows Futterman's own checkered love-affair with the sport. The result is a narrative that will speak to every runner, a story of Larsen's triumphs--from high school cross-country meets to the founding of the cult-favorite 70's running group, the Jamul Toads, from national championships to his long tenure as head coach at UCLA, and from the secret training regimen of world champion athletes like Larsen's protégé, American Meb Keflezighi, to victories at the New York and Boston Marathons as well as the Olympics. Running to the Edge is a page-turner . . . a relentless crusade to run faster, farther.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A gripping story of man pitted against nature’s most fearsome and efficient predator. This "travelogue about tiger poaching in Russia’s far east opens up a new genre ... [the] conservation thriller" (Nature). Outside a remote village in Russia’s Far East a man-eating tiger is on the prowl. The tiger isn’t just killing people, it’s murdering them, almost as if it has a vendetta. A team of trackers is dispatched to hunt down the tiger before it strikes again. They know the creature is cunning, injured, and starving, making it even more dangerous. As John Vaillant re-creates these extraordinary events, he gives us an unforgettable and masterful work of narrative nonfiction that combines a riveting portrait of a stark and mysterious region of the world and its people, with the natural history of nature’s most deadly predator.

In April of 1846, Sarah Graves was twenty-one and in love with a young man who played the violin. But she was torn. Her mother, father, and eight siblings were about to disappear over the western horizon forever, bound for California. Sarah could not bear to see them go out of her life, and so days before the planned departure she married the young man with the violin, and the two of them threw their lot in with the rest of Sarah's family. On April 12, they rolled out of the yard of their homestead in three ox-drawn wagons. Seven months later, after joining a party of emigrants led by George Donner, Sarah and her family arrived at Truckee Lake in the Sierra Nevada Mountains just as the first heavy snows of the season closed the pass ahead of them. After a series of desperate attempts to cross the mountains, the party improvised cabins and slaughtered what remained of their emaciated livestock. By early December they were beginning to starve. Sarah's father, a Vermonter, was the only member of the party familiar with snowshoes. Under his instruction, fifteen sets of snowshoes were hastily constructed from oxbows and rawhide, and on December 15, Sarah and fourteen other relatively young, healthy people set out for California on foot, hoping to get relief for the others. Over the next thirty-two days they endured almost unfathomable hardships and horrors. In this gripping narrative, Daniel James Brown takes the reader along on every painful footstep of Sarah's journey. Along the way, he weaves into the story revealing insights garnered from a variety of modern scientific perspectives–psychology, physiology, forensics, and archaeology–producing a tale that is not only spell-binding but richly informative.