The acclaimed science writer presents a wide-ranging exploration of Antarctica’s history, nature, and global significance in this “rollicking good read” (Kirkus).
 
From the early expeditions of Ernest Shackleton to David Attenborough’s documentary series Frozen Planet, the continent of Antarctica has captured the world’s imagination. After the Antarctic Treaty of 1961, decades of...

Henry David Thoreau had a very close relationship with his older brother, John. Sadly, after cutting himself while shaving, John developed lockjaw, and died tragically in 1842. Thoreau, who was only 25 at the time, was deeply affected by the loss of his brother. During his two year stay in his cabin on the shore of Walden Pond, he wrote an account of a two week boat trip he took with John in August of 1839. The brothers built a boat and began their...

Like many others, around the time Elizabeth Gilbert turned 30, she went through an early-onslaught midlife crisis. Although she had everything an educated, ambitious American woman was supposed to want, including a husband, a home, and a successful career as a magazine writer, she was consumed with panic, grief, and confusion. This is an account of her yearlong worldwide pursuit of pleasure, spiritual devotion, guidance, and what she really wanted...

"In 1899, railroad magnate Edward H. Harriman organized a most unusual summer voyage to the wilds of Alaska: He converted a steamship into a luxury "floating university," populated by some of America's best and brightest scientists and writers, including the anti-capitalist eco-prophet John Muir. Those aboard encountered a land of immeasurable beauty and impending environmental calamity. More than a hundred years later, Alaska is still America's most...

Accounts by thru-hikers, organized by topic. Foreword by hiker Maurice Forrester and stunning color photos by Mike Warren.

Robert Pinsky is Professor of English at Boston University and an editor of the weekly online magazine Slate. He is the author of many books of poetry and literary criticism. He served two terms as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, 1997-2000. This new paperback edition of Henry D. Thoreau's compelling account of Cape Cod contains the complete, definitive text of the original. Introduced by American poet...

Mark Twain's semi-autobiographical travel memoir, "Roughing It" was written between 1870-1871 and subsequently published in 1872. Billed as a prequel to "Innocents Abroad", in which Twain details his travels aboard a pleasure cruise through Europe and the Holy Land in 1867, "Roughing It" conversely documents Twain's early days in the old wild west between the years 1861-1867. Employing his characteristically humoristic wit and flare for regional dialect,...

"A memoir of one young man's coming of age on a cross-country trek, told through the stories of the people of all ages, races, and inclinations he meets along the highways of America"--Amazon.com.

Shadow of the Silk Road records a journey along the greatest land route on earth. Out of the heart of China into the mountains of Central Asia, across northern Afghanistan and the plains of Iran and into Kurdish Turkey, Colin Thubron covers some seven thousand miles in eight months. Making his way by local bus, truck, car, donkey cart and camel, he travels from the tomb of the Yellow Emperor, the mythic progenitor of the Chinese people, to the ancient...