- Author: Cheryl Strayed (website/facebook/twitter)
- Publisher & Date: Vintage Books, 2012
- Pages: 311
- Intended Audience: Adult/Young Adult
- Genre: Memoir, Adventure, Travel, Survival, Inspirational
- Goodreads Rating: 3.91/5.0
- Sneak Peak by Jess:
Picture this: You are a 26-years-old female, recently divorced from a man you love dearly, still grieving the loss of your mom who passed away four years prior to this very moment, and you are standing on the edge of a forest line about to take on a 1,100 mile journey through the wilderness, alone, after uprooting your entire life. On top of this slightly irrational decision, you have never hiked a day in your life. Got the idea?
As crazy as that may sound to some, it is the only thing that sounded sane to Cheryl Strayed at that time in her life. And that is exactly what she, the author of Wild: From Lost and Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, decided to do for herself after her life was seemingly becoming more and more out of her control.
Young and in love with her high school sweet-heart, Cheryl married at the very young age of 19, and her life was everything she wanted it to be, until her mom fell suddenly ill. After her mother's passing, Strayed did just as her name suggests... she strayed from everything that was once holding her together in one piece; her friends, her family, her husband, her life, her job, and her morals. With all else gone, and having nothing else to lose, she makes the decision to quit her job, sell all of her belongings, and travel across the country to the Mojave desert to hike the infamous Pacific Crest Trail, where she would be faced with some of the most brutal, unforgiving, and loneliest days of her life.
This memoir takes the reader through a step-by-step retelling of Cheryl Strayed's remarkable journey, as she recounts what it was like to spend three grueling months on her own with just herself and a "Monster."
"Told with great suspense and style, sparkling with warmth and humor, Wild vividly captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddened, strengthened, and ultimately healed her." -Goodreads.com
Let me begin by saying that anyone who can hike for 1,100 miles in one lifetime is a BEAST in my eyes. Kudos to you! However, not only did Cheryl Strayed hike 11,000 miles, but she did it alone. A woman, in the woods, for months, alone. That would terrify me; yet, at the same time, I envy her adventure.
This would not typically be a book that I would grab off of the shelves and read just because it sounded good. I honestly know very little about hiking and the outdoors, and I couldn't really care less about someone taking a trip along the PCT. And if we're being completely honest, I probably would not have read this book if it had not been a true story. The fact that the story was actually lived out by the author made this a good read to me.
So let's back up. Strayed takes this journey.. a kind of pilgrimage, if you will, in search of personal fortitude. I guess it was hard for me to grasp why she felt she needed to go hiking (Keep in mind she had never been hiking- it would be like me saying that I needed to go sailing solo down the West Coast to help me find inner peace.) to find such a thing, but then again, I suppose I have never felt that lost. Some people will probably consider this a very reckless decision on her part, and others will love her courage and the struggles that she overcomes. Strayed uses some pretty vivid detail when she writes about her time in these various desserts and mountain ranges, which in a sense is nice, because she paints a picture for you, but can get a bit lengthy for my taste. (Again, if your into that kind of thing, then you'll love it.) She also explains some background on her life and events leading up to her final decision to take on the PCT. Growing up with an absent father, moving from place to place, and losing the one person that kept the family glued together, could easily cause anyone to fall into a dark, bottomless pit. Who really knows what it would take to rebuild a life from such a place until you reach that point yourself? To wrap it all up, this memoir is painstaking proof that even through the midst of defeat, starvation, and loneliness, humans are equipped with what it takes to survive. Just strap in tight because this story can be very emotionally raw, sadly relateable at times, and brutally descriptive, but it will leave you cheering her on around every bend.
This would not typically be a book that I would grab off of the shelves and read just because it sounded good. I honestly know very little about hiking and the outdoors, and I couldn't really care less about someone taking a trip along the PCT. And if we're being completely honest, I probably would not have read this book if it had not been a true story. The fact that the story was actually lived out by the author made this a good read to me.
So let's back up. Strayed takes this journey.. a kind of pilgrimage, if you will, in search of personal fortitude. I guess it was hard for me to grasp why she felt she needed to go hiking (Keep in mind she had never been hiking- it would be like me saying that I needed to go sailing solo down the West Coast to help me find inner peace.) to find such a thing, but then again, I suppose I have never felt that lost. Some people will probably consider this a very reckless decision on her part, and others will love her courage and the struggles that she overcomes. Strayed uses some pretty vivid detail when she writes about her time in these various desserts and mountain ranges, which in a sense is nice, because she paints a picture for you, but can get a bit lengthy for my taste. (Again, if your into that kind of thing, then you'll love it.) She also explains some background on her life and events leading up to her final decision to take on the PCT. Growing up with an absent father, moving from place to place, and losing the one person that kept the family glued together, could easily cause anyone to fall into a dark, bottomless pit. Who really knows what it would take to rebuild a life from such a place until you reach that point yourself? To wrap it all up, this memoir is painstaking proof that even through the midst of defeat, starvation, and loneliness, humans are equipped with what it takes to survive. Just strap in tight because this story can be very emotionally raw, sadly relateable at times, and brutally descriptive, but it will leave you cheering her on around every bend.
- Favorite Quotes:
-"I'd made a plan: I
would follow this road wherever it led me. I'd ignore all others that
crossed its path, no matter how intriguing or promising they looked."
-"There is no way to know what makes one thing happen and not another. What leads to what. What destroys what. What causes what to flourish or die or take another course."
-"There is no way to know what makes one thing happen and not another. What leads to what. What destroys what. What causes what to flourish or die or take another course."
- Biggest Takeaway:
- Cons:
- Questions:
-Did she really ever find what she was looking for?
-In your opinion, did her brutal honesty about some of her previous mistakes seem like bragging points?
-Was her decision to take on this journey irrational or justified?
-Was her decision to take on this journey irrational or justified?
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