Wild (Movie Tie-In Edition)

From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

Paperback, 336 pages

English language

Published Nov. 18, 2014 by Vintage.

ISBN:
978-1-101-87344-1
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4 stars (5 reviews)

A powerful, blazingly honest memoir: the story of an eleven-hundred-mile solo hike that broke down a young woman reeling from catastrophe—and built her back up again. At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she'd lost everything when her mother died young of cancer. Her family scattered in their grief, her marriage was soon destroyed, and slowly her life spun out of control. Four years after her mother's death, with nothing more to lose, Strayed made the most impulsive decision of her life: to hike the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State—and to do it alone. She had no experience as a long-distance hiker--indeed, she'd never gone backpacking before her first night on the trail. Her trek was little more than “an idea, vague and outlandish and full of promise.” But it was a promise of piecing back together a life that had come undone. …

13 editions

Review of 'Wild' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

this is the same author of Tiny Beautiful Things and so I was already primed to be irritated by her style of writing: lots of hyperbole and continued use of contrast as in: I felt so 'one thing', but also felt 'the opposite thing'. it feels like how I wrote in university, for one: immature and certain this small thing happening before me was filled with significance and trying so earnestly to express it's unique moment.
but the biggest annoyance was her lack of true growth. in the last 1-2 pages of the book she fast forwards to being a mature, married, mother of 2 that has obviously gotten past her mother's death, but we don't get to see how that came to be. the story really ends with her successfully surviving the trail even though she was incredibly unprepared for it and, on many occasions, could have been severely …

Review of 'Wild' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

I really wasn't sure what to make of this book at first - in spite of the way it's marketed it really isn't a book about hiking. Anyone who picks it up as I did expecting to read about the scenery, wildlife or experience of the Pacific Crest Trail is going to be very disappointed - the author may as well have been walking the Appalachian Trail or the South Downs Way or indeed doing any physically demanding activity with little preparation for all you learn about the trail itself, and I did find it extremely frustrating to read about the hardships she endured as a result of not really having done any research.

Having said that, I did find it a fascinating read from a feminist perspective. The central theme, about accepting your mistakes, forgiving yourself and moving on and about how society really doesn't accommodate the fact that …