No comments about Scott's Last Journey.

No comments about Comock: The True Story Of An Eskimo Hunger.

3 comments about God of the Hinge: Soujorns in Cloud Cuckoo Land.

1. Pool and West show us such a rich way to live! Their connection with Hermes and the adventures on which he leads them are a powerful reminder of how many dimensions the world has. I very much enjoyed the fearless quest on which these two ladies take us. Terrific book!



2. "God Of The Hinge: Sojourns In Cloud Cuckoo Land" is the autobiography and memoir of Eleanor West, a woman who has participated in a host of preservation efforts, foundations, special projects and creative endeavors that ranged from organizing the address for preserving wilderness on barrier islands to appearing as a key speaker at the Marshlands Conference in 1968. Eleanor West wrote, narrated and co-produced the film 'Search for Ecological Balance' and conveyed Ossabaw island to the State of Georgia, thereby making Ossabaw Island the first Heritage Preserve property under Georgia's Heritage Trust Program. She also has served on numbers boards of directors for such philanthropic enterprises as the Frank Settlement, the Boys Republic, the Roeper School for Gifted Children, and Michigan's Brookside School Cranbrook. She has served as Chair for the American Red Cross Nurses Aides and the Detroit Chapter of Planned Parenthood. Her many awards for distinguished service include the Michigan Academy of Arts and Sciences' Gold Medal for her contribution to the arts. Very highly recommended reading and a welcome addition to school and community library American Biography collections, "God Of The Hinge" is a remarkable and inspiring memoir of a remarkable and inspiring life of service.



3. This book ranges delightfully over many topics, from mythology to pigs. It is written in two, alternating voices, and you really get to know the authors--remarkable women now in their nineties who have been friends for more than seventy years. They are hungry for new ideas and experiences, open and original in their thinking, and eager to follow paths wherever they may lead. Reading the book, I felt astonishment, appreciation, and envy. Check it out! I think you will share my emotions and learn a lot in the process.

1 comments about The Golden Grindstone: One Man's Adventures in the Yukon (Arctic Adventure).

1. Reviewed by Debra Gaynor for Reader Views (3/07)
   
   In 1897-1898 "would be miners ascended Alaska's Chilkoot Pass the Yukon River basin." But there were other trails that lead to the Klondike Gold Rush. All the routes were harsh but some were almost unendurable.
   
   "George M. Mitchell was an insurance broker in his early thirties." George had always lived an inactive life. He would occasionally fish or hunt but most of his life was inactive. Lured by the adventure of the Klondike Gold Rush, George "chose the most obscure, arduous, and downright implausible route to the goldfields." It's as though he said to himself: "no one, not even me, would ever think of insuring a person so incautious as to try to reach the Klondike via the peel river system and, specifically, the Wind River."
   
   Athabasca Landing was a small unassuming place before the gold rush. There were about 40 or 50 white men and about 200 Indians that came and went. George settled in for a bit preparing for the next leg of his journey. The party needed more manpower. When Craigie, a Scotsman, and Smith, a Welsh, approached George he hired them both. George enjoyed his time in Athabasca especially getting to know the people.
   
   "Grizzly bears were quite plentiful, and when he was on the main river or the larger creeks Mitchell used to see one or two of them every day, grubbing among the roots of the willows by the stream-side. One time George shot a young grizzly bear and when Bonnet Plume found out he cursed him. It was unsafe to tackle a grizzly alone. On another occasion he saw a large, pure white grizzly bear. It reared up in front of him. One time when George woke up a grizzly was sitting up on his haunches watching him.
   
   "The Golden Grindstone" by Angus Graham tells the fascinating story of one man on the adventure of a lifetime. Mr. Graham is an excellent storyteller and successfully shares the journey of George M. Mitchell as he makes his way to the Klondike Gold Rush. George Mitchell comes to life on the pages of this book. Many of the adventures are told with a humorous slant. Mr. Mitchell was a very brave man and faced many hardships as did other miners. I particularly enjoyed the tales concerning the wildlife and the Indians. I enjoyed learning about this special time in history and the men that sacrificed so much for gold and adventure. I highly recommend this book to fans of history, adventure and non-fiction.

No comments about Three Women of Herat: A Memoir of Life, Love and Friendship in Afghanistan.

4 comments about Just Wind: Tales Of Two Pilots Under Pressure.

1. I just finished reading the book. The two stories presented are amazing. I'd really like to know more about the technical details of both projects, but none the less, the book is an engrossing page turner. The stories of the Earthwinds are particularly amazing.... could the program really keep continuing with the utterly amazing amount of drama therein? The book presents an amazing contrast of big project versus small project. Recommended reading!



2. I have knowledge about both of the stories in this book. I can tell you that both of these stories are really true and that alone makes it better than any fiction. It is amazing how this author was able to retain all of that detail and then narrate it so interestingly.



3. THE NEW YORK TIMES

   In the quest for ultimate achievement--the scaling of the highest peak or a descent to the deepest ocean trench, for example--even heroic efforts often fall short of victory. The losers, alas, usually end up as forgotten footnotes to history.

   But monumental failures can be as fascinating as successes. Although Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay went into the record books in 1953 as the first climbers to conquer Mount Everest, climbing fans will forever remember an earlier failure: the fatal attempt on Everest's summit in 1924 by George Leigh Mallory, who disappeared a few hundred yards short of the mountain's mist-shrouded peak.

   Bill Armstrong's Just Wind brilliantly chronicles two of ballooning's magnificent failures--the ill-fated 1974 attempt by Col. Tom Gatch to be the first balloonist to cross the Atlantic Ocean, and the struggle by Larry Newman and his Earthwinds balloon team two decades later to circle the earth non-stop.

   As a long-duration balloon pilot himself, Mr. Armstrong was a close friend of Col. Gatch. He also served as spokesman for the Earthwinds group, and his insider's perspective endows this book with rare technical details and insights into the sometimes bitter human conflicts that often characterize big-league ballooning.

   For any reader awakened to the heady thrill of long-distance ballooning, this book is a must.

   -- Malcolm W. Browne, The New York Times

   AKRON BEACON JOURNAL

   Bill Armstrong provides a compelling look from the inside at the dreams and efforts of two men to expand the world of ballooning.

   His book is the definitive and detailed inside story of two aerial expeditions and the men and women behind those dreams. It is a book for those who care about expanding aerial frontiers and humans working to overcome challenges.

   -- Bob Downing, Akron Beacon Journal

   BUOYANT FLIGHT
   (THE LIGHTER THAN AIR SOCIETY BULLETIN)

   As an experienced balloonist himself, Bill Armstrong brings unique credentials to the telling of these sagas. He successfully combines a strong factual account of events with his personal observations on the motives and methods of those who sought to make ballooning history. JUST WIND fills an important gap in the chronicle of balloon history in America, and I highly recommend it.

   -- Eric Brothers, editor, Buoyant Flight




4. I knew Tom Gatch. As a member of the Balloon Club of Amrerica, I helped train Tom to fly. His death was and is a tremendous loss to all of us who knew him. As interesting a book as Just Wind is, the speculations left me a little perplexed. Since Tom was not in contact with us for most of the flight it is impossible to describe what he was doing unless you are just trying to tell a story. I had high hopes about reading the book and was a bit disappointed.

   I also believe that there was technical details left out of the book which might have explained his predicament a bit better. All in all, however, it is good to have some documentation about Tom's attempt. I am happy to have the book on my shelf. It is too bad that more isn't known about the flight itself. Now if someone wants to write about Bob Burger you might have an even more sorrowful tale.

No comments about Undercurrents: Episodes from a Life on the Edge.

No comments about Sir Peter Blake: An Amazing Life.

No comments about Die Trying: One Man's Quest to Conquer the Seven Summits.

5 comments about Tuva or Bust!: Richard Feynman's Last Journey.

1. I am a confirmed Feynman fan and even met him a couple of times. I was eager to learn more about him and his travels. The subtitle promised details of his "last journey", which, it turns out, he never made. Instead, I was bored with insipid details of the author's attempts to arrange a trip to the USSR and other assorted junk. It did not even spend much time on Tuva itself, but on unrelated trivia. It was apparent that the author was immensely more interested in the trip than Feynman, and that even he wasn't interested enough to stay at it to fruition. The author trades on the Feynman name to shamelessly promote the book and con the reader into plodding through endless drivel. Don't bother.



2. It was all just accidental. I stumbled upon this book through a documentary that I rented, called Ganghis Blues. I like all types of music and thought "A documentary about Blues music, cool..." After realizing what a fortune of life I had found in this movie, I was drawn to everything TUVA. SO, to the book I go. The book of course came before the documentary, and obviously was an influence in the boys who produced it. When was the last time a book did something for your soul? This one touches your soul, your heart and your longing to achieve a goal or live out a dream. Aaaah. I loved it.



3. If you are a fan of Richard Feynman, the nuclear physicist that dreamed of going to Tuva, you will just love this video. If you know nothing of Mr. Feynman, you will still enjoy it. It tells the story of Paul Pena's visit to Tuva in a delightful way. You will like seeing the culture of these peaceful, music-loving people.



4. I would never had read this book had I not recently had the chance to see Huun Huur Tu, a throat-singing voice from Tuva. But now that I am fascinated by this little-known, remote area along the Russian-Mongolian border, I found this book very entertaining. It chronicles the enormous challege of trying to visit such a remote land in the days before Glasnost and a fascinating cast of characters at its heart.
   I think my only complaint is that the book loses steam at the end, which I guess is understandable, given the fate of its main protagonist. But overall, it is a wonderful testament to a group of brilliant folks, who spend years trying to follow through on a quest.



5. A peculiar book: Ralph Leighton's TUVA OR BUST isn't really about Richard Feynman, who, the more one reads about him, begins to seem a genius, yes, but more than a little insufferable. He does instigate this whimsical notion of visiting Tannu Tuva (which had become Tuvinskaya of the U.S.S.R. [the book takes place from the late 1970s to Feynman's death in 1989]), but the ball is picked up by Leighton, and Feynman is merely a supporting actor in the book.
   
   The quest carries itself through many frustrations, mostly having to do w/ the hermetic paranoia of the Soviet Union, which seems to work like an enormous rural county: If you know someone, then things can be smoothed out; if not, then the official channels will be little help.
   
   I'm not sure why anyone would read this book. There's no reason to if you're interested in Feynman, because, besides his concoctions to fit in at Esalen, amongst the New Age mumbo-jumbo, his mind is absent from the book. His personality & his drumming are there on occasion, but Feynman's thinking, no.
   
   Leighton is not intrinsically interesting, and though a fluent writer, gives little sense of character. All the foreigners are forgettable, so the index is very handy. When a name turns up on page 150, say, then one can look it up to see which person this is.
   
   As one reads, one begins to have the same thoughts about oneself that one has about Leighton's attempts to visit Tuva: Why am I going on?. Moreover, I think that one comes up with the same answer: Just to get through the damn thing. By the time that Leighton reaches Tuva (without Feynman, who died just a smidgen too soon), the appearance is anti-climactic, and the land is colorless: A Nevada trailer-park suburb, but with yurts instead of double-wides.
   
   TUVA OR BUST! becomes a critique of bureaucracy. The slow, spirit-killing, mind-numbing bureaucracy of the Soviet Union ensured that Feynman would die without reaching Tuva. Our world, in which stupid little men can control our lives, is death to the spirit, and is death to the spirit of Feynman, insufferable though he may be, and inexplicably kow-towed to by everyone (you get the feeling that Feynman never opens a door for anyone or shuts one for himself).
   
   TUVA OR BUST!, in its pedestrian prose, preaches, unwittingly, I think, for a freedom for whimsy, for the spirit, for the individual. At the same time, excepting the author and his male friends (his wife is also colorless), the book has no individuals. So, by the end, nothing: No Tuva to speak of, no more Feynman, nothing but an accomplishment to scratch off the list.