Barbara M. reviewed on + 159 more book reviews
I had heard about Alex McCandless being found dead in the Alaska wilderness at the time it happened. What was also reported at the time was that he starved to death, apparently from eating some kind of plant or seed that prevented the body from metabolizing food (or something like that). I read reviews on this site as well as Amazon (both after finishing this book) which were mostly positive. Many readers apparently applauded Alex's daring in braving the Alaska wilderness. I, however, agree with many of the negative reviews critical of Alex for going into the wilderness clearly unprepared.
Krakauer admits in his "Author's Note" at the start of the book that he is NOT impartial re Alex--the author identifies with him in some ways. Krakauer's original piece was an article for "Outside" magazine. At some point he decided to expand the news piece into a book. He did so by tracking down folks who crossed paths with Alex during Alex's hitch-hiking tour of the western U.S. (if I recall, he started that a year or two before heading to Alaska). Krakauer wrote about conversations he had with these folks. I wondered if Krakauer had recorded all these conversations because he wrote the conversations in quotes as if they were verbatim. I suspect Krakauer didn't record the conversations otherwise he likely would have said so in his author's note or elsewhere in the book. I don't recall him doing so. If that's the case, he shouldn't have written them as if they were direct quotes.
One thing that annoyed me is that Krakauer often referred to Alex as "the boy." Alex was 24 when he died so he was a full grown man. I suspect Krakauer kept referring to him as "the boy" because of his biased feelings about Alex and Alex's tragic end or it was a ploy for readers to feel some sympathy for Alex.
Several times Krakauer veered off with stories about other "explorers" like Alex, many or most of whom disappeared and were never found. While interesting, I wondered if they were included to reach a certain number of pages to make a book. Ditto with the couple chapters Krakauer included about his own life and apparently why he came to identify with Alex. After reading partway through the first chapter about the author's reasons for going off the grid, I decided I wasn't interested in the author's story so I skipped the next chapter.
The book is slim--203 pages. If the author hadn't included stories of other explorers as well as his own odyssey, the book probably wouldn't have even been 100 pages.
Krakauer admits in his "Author's Note" at the start of the book that he is NOT impartial re Alex--the author identifies with him in some ways. Krakauer's original piece was an article for "Outside" magazine. At some point he decided to expand the news piece into a book. He did so by tracking down folks who crossed paths with Alex during Alex's hitch-hiking tour of the western U.S. (if I recall, he started that a year or two before heading to Alaska). Krakauer wrote about conversations he had with these folks. I wondered if Krakauer had recorded all these conversations because he wrote the conversations in quotes as if they were verbatim. I suspect Krakauer didn't record the conversations otherwise he likely would have said so in his author's note or elsewhere in the book. I don't recall him doing so. If that's the case, he shouldn't have written them as if they were direct quotes.
One thing that annoyed me is that Krakauer often referred to Alex as "the boy." Alex was 24 when he died so he was a full grown man. I suspect Krakauer kept referring to him as "the boy" because of his biased feelings about Alex and Alex's tragic end or it was a ploy for readers to feel some sympathy for Alex.
Several times Krakauer veered off with stories about other "explorers" like Alex, many or most of whom disappeared and were never found. While interesting, I wondered if they were included to reach a certain number of pages to make a book. Ditto with the couple chapters Krakauer included about his own life and apparently why he came to identify with Alex. After reading partway through the first chapter about the author's reasons for going off the grid, I decided I wasn't interested in the author's story so I skipped the next chapter.
The book is slim--203 pages. If the author hadn't included stories of other explorers as well as his own odyssey, the book probably wouldn't have even been 100 pages.
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