ADK Book Club
The Adirondacks have inspired lots of great books. Whether you’re listening to an audio book on your drive, flight or hike, or want to curl up with a good book at the cottage. Stop by the Bookstore Plus or Lake Placid Public Library to discover something great. Here are some of my favorite ADK books. All of these are non-fiction.
Finding True North: A History of One Small Corner of the Adirondacks. By Fran Yardley. 2018. Local bonus: The author, Fran Yardley, has repeatedly hosted AARCH tours of her camp. She still lives on Upper Saranac Lake and is a fantastic storyteller. Book summary: An evocative and personal history of a unique historic place in the Adirondacks. In 1968 Fran and Jay Yardley, a young couple with pioneering spirit, moved to a remote corner of the Adirondacks to revive the long-abandoned but historic Bartlett Carry Club, with its one thousand acres and thirty-seven buildings. The Saranac Lake–area property had been in Jay’s family for generations, and his dream was to restore this summer resort to support himself and, eventually, a growing family. Fran chronicles their journey and, along the way, unearths the history of those who came before, from the 1800s to the present. Offering an evocative glimpse into the past, Finding True North traces the challenges and transformations of one of the world’s most beautiful, least-celebrated places and the people who were tirelessly devoted to it.
Woodswoman: Living Alone in the Adirondack Wilderness. By Anne LaBastille. 1991. Local bonus: The author’s original cabin is on display at the Adirondack Experience Museum in Blue Mountain Lake, and provided by the museum as a virtual tour. Book summary: Ecologist Anne LaBastille created the life that many people dream about. When she and her husband divorced, she needed a place to live. Through luck and perseverance, she found the ideal spot: a 20-acre parcel of land in the Adirondack mountains, where she built the cozy, primitive log cabin that became her permanent home. Miles from the nearest town, LaBastille had to depend on her wits, ingenuity, and the help of generous neighbors for her survival. In precise, poetic language, she chronicles her adventures on Black Bear Lake, capturing the power of the landscape, the rhythms of the changing seasons, and the beauty of nature’s many creatures. Most of all, she captures the struggle to balance her need for companionship and love with her desire for independence and solitude. Woodswoman is not simply a book about living in the wilderness, it is a book about living that contains a lesson for us all.
At the Mercy of the Mountains: True Stories of Survival and Tragedy in New York's Adirondacks. By Peter Bronski. 2008. Book summary: Every year thousands of outdoor enthusiasts venture into a six-million-acre wilderness that is the size of Yosemite, Yellowstone, and the Grand Canyon combined. They are attracted by its accessibility, spectacular views, and challenging terrain. But, when adventure is easy to find, so, too, is misadventure. In this compelling book, award-winning adventure writer and former Lower Adirondack Search and Rescue team member Peter Bronski chronicles true stories of survival and tragedy, from famous historical cases during the early twentieth century to modern tales of harrowing struggle in the mountains and wilderness. Extensively researched, these gripping tales pull together historical accounts, firsthand interviews, previously untold stories, and expert analysis to retrace each misadventure. More than just a recounting of tragedy in the wilderness, At the Mercy of the Mountains is an affirmation of the triumph of the human spirit in the face of adversity and an insight into why misadventure happens in the first place—and how to avoid it. At the Mercy of the Mountains is a must-read for hikers, climbers, paddlers, armchair travelers—anyone who loves great tales of adventure.
The Dirty Life: On Farming, Food, and Love. By Kristin Kimball. 2019. Book summary: When Kristin Kimball left New York City to interview a dynamic young farmer named Mark, her world changed. On an impulse, she shed her city self and started a new farm with him on 500 acres near Lake Champlain. The Dirty Life is the captivating chronicle of the couple’s first year on Essex Farm, from the cold North Country winter through their harvest-season wedding in the loft of the barn. Kristin and Mark’s plan to grow everything needed to feed a community was an ambitious idea, and a bit romantic. It worked. Every Friday evening, all year round, over a hundred people travel to Essex Farm to pick up their weekly share of the “whole diet” - beef, pork, chicken, milk, eggs, maple syrup, grains, flours, dried beans, herbs, fruits, and 40 different vegetables - produced by the farm. In The Dirty Life, Kristin discovers the wrenching pleasures of physical work, learns that good food is at the center of a good life, falls deeply in love, and finally finds the engagement and commitment she craved in the form of a man, a small town, and a beautiful piece of land.
Sworn to Silence: The Truth Behind Robert Garrow and the Missing Bodies' Case. By Jim Tracy. 2021. True crime. Book summary: Why would two small-time American public defenders search, locate, and photograph the lifeless bodies of young women their client raped, murdered, and hid, and then leave the bodies where they found them and not tell authorities? And how did they have the audacity to meet with one of the fathers of a missing girl and tell him they knew nothing about her fate or whereabouts? When the nation eventually learned of the lawyers' actions, they were horrified and outraged that two officers of the law could act in a way that seemed beyond any concept of humanity. In Sworn to Silence, award-winning reporter Jim Tracy tells the lawyers' story within the framework of a true crime narrative. He uncovers a criminal who police and the public never learned was an American serial killer. Tracy does so while taking the listener back briefly to American life in the early 1970s.
Upwards: The Story of the First Woman to Solo Thru-Paddle the Northern Forest Canoe Trail. By Laurie Apgar. 2017. Book summary: In the summer of 2015, at age 53, Laurie Apgar Chandler became the first woman to solo thru-paddle New England’s Northern Forest Canoe Trail. Achieving her improbable dream, to travel 740 miles alone in a small canoe, was by no means certain. Relatively new to wilderness paddling, she encountered challenges, expected and unexpected, that pushed her to the limits of her courage and endurance. Surprisingly, the scariest of these had a human face. Weaving faith, nature, and the abiding goodness of people into a captivating adventure tale, Upwardstakes readers along storied waterways from New York’s Adirondacks to Maine’s Allagash Wilderness Waterway, proving that dreams are meant to be followed.
