My wife recently saw the movie version of this book and when I heard her description of it, I remembered that I had had a copy of the book several years ago but decided to let it go unread. So I decided to check out another copy from the library because the story sounded very intriguing to me. Krakauer mainly uses interviews to piece together the story of Christopher McCandless who in 1992 after graduating from college decides to abandon his family and travel in the West. He ends up hitch-hiking to Alaska and then walking alone into the wilderness near Mt. McKinley where he ended up dying in an abandoned bus that he was using as a base camp. The book details his wanderings in the Southwest along the Colorado River where he tried to canoe down the river to the Gulf of Mexico. He abandons his car after a flash flood contributed to the battery dying. He then burns the cash in his wallet and sets out on foot. He befriends several people along the way and travels north to South Dakota and works for a grain farmer. McCandless liked being around people but not for long periods. He always has a yearning to be alone and his ultimate goal was to travel alone in the Alaska wilderness. Krakauer gives examples of others with similar passions including himself. When he was younger he scaled a mountain peak in Alaska called the Devil's Thumb by himself.
The story of McCandless was very compelling reading. The biggest mystery about his story was how he died. An autopsy indicated he starved to death but how did this happen when he was able to survive for a few months by hunting and gathering in the wild? Krakauer puts forth a theory about eating wild potato seeds that may have contained a poisonous alkaloid. After the book was originally published in 1996, other theories come to light as discussed in the Afterword to this edition published in 2015. Overall, I thought this was a very readable and interesting telling of the McCandless story and I'll be looking out for the movie version. MOVIE TRAILER
The story of McCandless was very compelling reading. The biggest mystery about his story was how he died. An autopsy indicated he starved to death but how did this happen when he was able to survive for a few months by hunting and gathering in the wild? Krakauer puts forth a theory about eating wild potato seeds that may have contained a poisonous alkaloid. After the book was originally published in 1996, other theories come to light as discussed in the Afterword to this edition published in 2015. Overall, I thought this was a very readable and interesting telling of the McCandless story and I'll be looking out for the movie version. MOVIE TRAILER
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