Cheryl Strayed was 26 years old when she made the rash and life-changing decision to hike the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave desert to Washington State—1180 miles—alone. The year was 1995; she had just lost her mother to cancer and her marriage had collapsed. Her memoir of the trip, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, was published 17 years later in 2012 and quickly rose to the top of the New York Times Best Seller List, where it stayed at number one for seven weeks.
What makes Strayed's audiobook story even more fascinating is that she had never heard of the Pacific Crest Trail until she happened to run across a trail guide at her local book store in Minnesota, and she had virtually no hiking experience.
Immediately upon setting out on the trail, Strayed discovered her hiking boots did not fit properly. Far from civilization—and a shoe store—she continued her journey in excruciating and unrelenting pain until she had lost all of her toenails.
One aspect of this book which makes Wild unique among adventure chronicles is how Strayed narrates her story on two levels simultaneously: it's a tale of both physical and emotional suffering, and physical and emotional courage. Strayed encounters bears, rattlesnakes, record snowfalls and blistering heat over the course of her hike. She also faces—for the first time—the depths of her grief and her fears of the profound aloneness she faced on a daily basis.
In addition to Wild, Strayed has published two other books, the novel "Torch" and "Tiny Beautiful Things", a compilation of her popular advice columns written as "Dear Sugar" on the website rumpus.net. All of Strayed's titles are available as audiobooks. She has also published a number of personal essays that have appeared in The Washington Times Magazine, The New York Times Magazine and Vogue. Her essays have twice been selected for inclusion in The Best American Essays.
"I looked forward to reading this every day until I was finished. Then I was ready to go back and start over to pick up the pieces I missed but it was a 2-week library e-loan. Unlike Eat, Pray, Love, which was interesting but at the end of the day felt self-indulgent, I felt the pain of her experiences and need to push through some physical challenge, stripping away the daily tasks and responsibilities, allowing her to settle her mental turmoil and find some resolution and peace. Despite the 4-star rating, it left me with a 5-star feeling."
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Jan (4 out of 5 stars)