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Are you ready for an adventure (without leaving your couch or putting on your outdoor pants)? Here are 11 of my favorite adventure nonfiction books. Many of them are "ice books" because I have a never-ending obsession with cold places.

Would you rather read adventure fiction? I have a list of those too!

Best Adventure Nonfiction Books

SURVIVING THE EXTREMES: WHAT HAPPENS TO THE BODY AND MIND AT THE LIMITS OF HUMAN ENDURANCE BY KENNETH KAMLER, M.D.

A true-life scientific thriller no reader will forget, Surviving the Extremes takes us to the farthest reaches of the earth as well as into the uncharted territory within the human body, spirit, and brain. A vice president of the legendary Explorers Club, as well as surgeon, explorer, and masterful storyteller, Dr. Kenneth Kamler has spent years discovering what happens to the human body in extreme environmental conditions. Divided into six sections—jungle, high seas, desert, underwater, high altitude, and outer space—this book uses firsthand testimony and documented accounts to investigate the science of what a body goes through and explains why people survive—and why they sometimes don’t.

 

Why I recommend it: If you’re interested in medical nonfiction, this book is completely captivating. And completely horrifying. It kept me awake for several nights because I couldn’t stop reading. The book is exactly what it says on the cover. The author is an “extreme medicine” doctor who works with astronauts, deep ocean divers, and mountain climbers. The book is about what happens to humans in environments that are not human friendly. The stories the author tells are simultaneously terrifying and amazing. That’s why I couldn’t stop reading them. I liked every chapter, but I think my favorite is the one about Everest. I’m never going to climb that mountain. Nope, nope, not worth the potentially horrific side effects.

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ADA BLACKJACK: A TRUE STORY OF SURVIVAL IN THE ARCTIC BY JENNIFER NIVEN

In September 1921, four young men and Ada Blackjack, a diminutive 25-year-old Eskimo woman, ventured deep into the Arctic in a secret attempt to colonize desolate Wrangel Island for Great Britain. Two years later, Ada Blackjack emerged as the sole survivor of this ambitious polar expedition. This young, unskilled woman—who had headed to the Arctic in search of money and a husband—conquered the seemingly unconquerable north and survived all alone after her male companions had perished.

Following her triumphant return to civilization, the international press proclaimed her the female Robinson Crusoe. But whatever stories the press turned out came from the imaginations of reporters: Ada Blackjack refused to speak to anyone about her horrific two years in the Arctic. Only on one occasion—after charges were published falsely accusing her of causing the death of one of her companions—did she speak up for herself.

 

Why I recommend it: I have massive respect for Ada. She needed money, so she agreed to be a cook / seamstress / housekeeper for an Arctic expedition. She didn’t know how to hunt or build shelters, but she figured it out real quick when she got trapped on a freezing island for two years. I wish more people knew about Ada. I’d never heard of her before reading this book. I'm glad her story is being told.

 

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DESTINATION TRUTH: MEMOIRS OF A MONSTER HUNTER BY JOSH GATES

World adventurer and international monster hunter Josh Gates has careened through nearly 100 countries, investigating frightening myths, chilling cryptozoological legends, and terrifying paranormal phenomena. Now, he invites fans to get a behind-the-scenes look at these breathtaking expeditions.

Follow Gates from the inception of his groundbreaking hit show (at the summit of Kilimanjaro) to his hair-raising encounters with dangerous creatures in the most treacherous locations on earth.

Why I recommend it: Josh Gates is the host of several TV shows on the Travel/Discovery Channels. He's one of my favorite humans because I love his sense of humor and his curiosity. He always seems like he's having a good time on his travels, which makes them fun to watch.

Josh's TV shows (and his book, honestly) are brilliant because they're not overly organized. He just goes to a place and hopes to find interesting things. It leads to a lot of humor. One of the funniest moments in the book is when Josh's team finds a possible bigfoot footprint. They have no idea what to do about the print because they never expected to find actual evidence of the monsters they were hunting. They thought they were just making TV. They didn't believe in monsters.

Like most celebrity memoirs, this one is probably only worth reading if you're already a fan of the celebrity. You won't get much out of it if you haven't seen Destination Truth. If you're already a fan, I recommend the book!

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RANGER CONFIDENTIAL: LIVING, WORKING, AND DYING IN THE NATIONAL PARKS BY ANDREA LANKFORD

For twelve years, Andrea Lankford lived in the biggest, most impressive national parks in the world, working a job she loved. She chaperoned baby sea turtles on their journey to sea. She pursued bad guys on her galloping patrol horse. She jumped into rescue helicopters bound for the heart of the Grand Canyon. She won arguments with bears. She slept with a few too many rattlesnakes.

Hell yeah, it was the best job in the world! Fortunately, Andrea survived it.

In this graphic and yet surprisingly funny account of her and others’ extraordinary careers, Lankford unveils a world in which park rangers struggle to maintain their idealism in the face of death, disillusionment, and the loss of a comrade killed while holding that thin green line between protecting the park from the people, the people from the park, and the people from each other. Ranger Confidential is the story behind the scenery of the nation’s crown jewels—Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Great Smokies, Denali. In these iconic landscapes, where nature and humanity constantly collide, scenery can be as cruel as it is redemptive.

Why I recommend it: Since I work at a park, I thought reading this book would be stressful. It was! I picked it up and put it down so many times. It's a book full of worst-case scenarios. I mean, this quote is in the introduction:

"In the United States, a park ranger is more likely to be assaulted in the line of duty than is any other federal officer."

Fun times. Let's quickly move on before I convince myself to quit my job.

Andrea Lankford spent twelve years as a ranger in various national parks. This book includes all the behind-the-scenes stuff that park visitors don't see. The author writes about the accidents and deaths, the brutal work schedule, and the crappy living conditions for the staff. Her writing style is surprisingly funny. She has the gallows humor that seems to be common among park employees.

If you want to work in parks, I highly recommend this book. It'll give you a realistic view of all the bad things that happen. But, the job isn't all bad. You get to see bizarre and beautiful things that (often) make the pain worth it.

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DEAD MOUNTAIN: THE UNTOLD TRUE STORY OF THE DYATLOV PASS INCIDENT BY DONNIE EICHAR

In February 1959, a group of nine experienced hikers in the Russian Ural Mountains died mysteriously on an elevation known as Dead Mountain. Eerie aspects of the incident—unexplained violent injuries, signs that they cut open and fled the tent without proper clothing or shoes, a strange final photograph taken by one of the hikers, and elevated levels of radiation found on some of their clothes—have led to decades of speculation over what really happened. This gripping work of literary nonfiction delves into the mystery through unprecedented access to the hikers' own journals and photographs, rarely seen government records, dozens of interviews, and the author's retracing of the hikers' fateful journey in the Russian winter.

Why I recommend it: A few years ago, I became obsessed with the Dyatlov Pass incident and read everything I could find on the internet about it. It's a freakin' terrifying mystery!

This book is the author's attempt to solve the mystery. He mixes the hikers' photos and journal entries with police reports and interviews. It's a short book, and it feels very personal. You really start to care about the young hikers. Even though I already knew all the theories about what happened to them, I couldn't put the book down. If you like unsolved mysteries or wilderness disaster stories, you need to read this one. I don't want to say more because I don't want to spoil the mystery.

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Ice Ghosts: The Epic Hunt For The Lost Franklin Expedition by Paul Watson

Ice Ghosts weaves together the epic story of the Lost Franklin Expedition of 1845—whose two ships and crew of 129 were lost to the Arctic ice—with the modern tale of the scientists, divers, and local Inuit behind the incredible discovery of the flagship’s wreck in 2014. Paul Watson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who was on the icebreaker that led the discovery expedition, tells a fast-paced historical adventure story: Sir John Franklin and the crew of the HMS Erebus and Terror setting off in search of the fabled Northwest Passage, the hazards they encountered and the reasons they were forced to abandon ship hundreds of miles from the nearest outpost of Western civilization, and the decades of searching that turned up only rumors of cannibalism and a few scattered papers and bones—until a combination of faith in Inuit lore and the latest science yielded a discovery for the ages.

Why I recommend it: I was completely fascinated by the attempts to locate Franklin. His wife never gave up on him. It's sad that she died from old age without leaning what happened to her husband. The families of Franklin's crew also had to live with the mystery. I don't think I could have done that. It would have made me insane.

It's interesting that whole generations of people let their racism get in the way of their goals. Pretty much nobody talked to the Inuit people about the lost ships. For an Inuit person in the early 1800s, seeing two massive ships get crushed by ice would be like seeing a UFO crash. It's news that they spread to their neighbors and passed down to their children. Franklin's ships were found in 2014. They were found exactly where the Inuit said they sank. It seems like this mystery could have been solved a lot faster if we used our words.

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THE INDIFFERENT STARS ABOVE: THE HARROWING SAGA OF A DONNER PARTY BRIDE BY DANIEL JAMES BROWN

In April of 1846, twenty-one-year-old Sarah Graves, intent on a better future, set out west from Illinois with her new husband, her parents, and eight siblings. Seven months later, after joining a party of emigrants led by George Donner, they reached the Sierra Nevada Mountains as the first heavy snows of the season closed the pass ahead of them. In early December, starving and desperate, Sarah and fourteen others set out for California on snowshoes and, over the next thirty-two days, endured almost unfathomable hardships and horrors.

In this gripping narrative, Daniel James Brown sheds new light on one of the most infamous events in American history. Following every painful footstep of Sarah's journey with the Donner Party, Brown produces a tale both spellbinding and richly informative.

Why I recommend it: You'll be grateful that you're sitting in a warm room while you read this book. It's the type of story you can't believe is true. It's too scary. Who wants to starve to death in the freezing wilderness with 80+ random strangers? Nobody! There are a lot of books about the Donners, but I recommend this one because the author doesn't just retell the familiar story that most Americans already know. He puts the story in historical and scientific context to help the reader understand how and why everything went wrong for the Donner Party.

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Wild: From Lost To Found On The Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed

At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother’s death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon destroyed. Four years later, with nothing more to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life. With no experience or training, driven only by blind will, she would hike more than a thousand miles of the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State—and she would do it alone.

Told with suspense and style, sparkling with warmth and humor, Wild powerfully captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddened, strengthened, and ultimately healed her.

Why I recommend it: The author writes about her life honestly. She doesn’t sugarcoat anything or pretend to be perfect. It is hard for the reader to feel sympathy for her at times, but I think it took a lot of bravery to tell this story.

I’m very interested in backpacking, so I’m probably preprogramed to enjoy these kinds of books, but there is a lot of content in this story that will appeal to non-backpackers. The majority of the plot focuses on the Pacific Crest Trail, but Cheryl doesn’t spend all of her time hiking. She occasionally gets off the trail and meets interesting people. There are also flashbacks to her childhood and her mother’s death from cancer. This is a memoir that has stuck in my brain for years. (Mostly because it made me desperate to hike the Pacific Crest Trail.)

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ENDURANCE: SHACKLETON’S INCREDIBLE VOYAGE BY ALFRED LANSING

In August 1914, polar explorer Ernest Shackleton boarded the Endurance and became locked in an island of ice. Thus began the legendary ordeal of Shackleton and his crew of twenty-seven men. When their ship was finally crushed between two ice floes, they attempted a near-impossible journey over 850 miles of the South Atlantic's heaviest seas to the closest outpost of civilization.

In Endurance, the definitive account of Ernest Shackleton's fateful trip, Alfred Lansing brilliantly narrates the harrowing and miraculous voyage that has defined heroism for the modern age.

 

Why I recommend it: If you enjoy real-life snow survival stories, you need to read this one. It’s a classic, and it’s stunning. Shackleton and his crew were complete badasses. Everything went wrong on their mission, and they mostly just shrugged and rolled with it. I would have panicked and died. This book was first published in 1959, and the author conducted extensive interviews with the surviving members of Shackleton's crew. He also had access to the journals kept by the explorers. It’s interesting to read a detailed firsthand account of events that happened so long ago. Even though I knew Shackleton’s story before I started the book, I was on the edge of my seat. There’s so much tension!

 

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THE LOST CITY OF Z: A TALE OF DEADLY OBSESSION IN THE AMAZON BY DAVID GRANN

What happened to the British explorer Percy Fawcett and his quest for the Lost City of Z?

In 1925, Fawcett ventured into the Amazon to find an ancient civilization, hoping to make one of the most important discoveries in history. For centuries Europeans believed the world's largest jungle concealed the glittering kingdom of El Dorado. Thousands had died looking for it, leaving many scientists convinced that the Amazon was truly inimical to humans. But Fawcett, whose daring expeditions inspired Conan Doyle's The Lost World, had spent years building his scientific case. Captivating the imagination of millions round the globe, Fawcett embarked with his 21-year-old son, determined to prove that this ancient civilization (which he dubbed Z) existed. Then his expedition vanished. Fawcett's fate, and the tantalizing clues he left behind about Z, became an obsession for hundreds who followed him into the uncharted wilderness.

Why I recommend it: Mostly, this book taught me to stay out of the Amazon. There are too many bugs! Everything is gross and deadly. I'm too fluffy for that nonsense. Percy Fawcett was an intense dude with controversial ideas about ancient Amazon civilizations. Like many old-time explorers, he was exceedingly selfish. He just left his wife and kids and went gallivanting around the wilderness for years at a time without the ability to contact them. I wouldn't let my husband get away with that. Percy's disappearance is a mystery that kept me flying through the pages. I appreciate the end of the book where the author talks about how our understanding of the Amazon has changed. When Percy Fawcett was exploring, many people thought his ideas about lost Amazon cities were ridiculous. Nowadays, we're not so sure. Maybe Percy was on to something . . . . (I'd search for El Dorado myself, but, you know, there's all that gross and deadly stuff. Maybe it's best to let the city be lost.)

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Touching The Void: The True Story Of One Man's Miraculous Survival by Joe Simpson

The heart-stopping account of Joe Simpson's terrifying adventure in the Peruvian Andes. He and his climbing partner, Simon, reached the summit of the remote Siula Grande in June 1985. A few days later, Simon staggered into Base Camp, exhausted and frost-bitten, with news that that Joe was dead.

What happened to Joe, and how the pair dealt with the psychological traumas that resulted when Simon was forced into the appalling decision to cut the rope, makes not only an epic tale of survival but a compelling testament of friendship.

Why I recommend it: “Miraculous survival” is right. Dang, dude. There’s no way I could have done what Joe Simpson did.

This book has fewer than 200 pages, but it’s a powerful story about the will to live. It’s about how a person finds the strength inside himself to do something that seems impossible. The writing is melodramatic at times, but the plot is harrowing. I had no idea how Joe was going to survive. Life kept getting worse for him, and he kept coming up with new ways to deal with it. If Joe can fall off a cliff and spend three days dragging himself back to base camp, I can get out of bed and go to work in the morning.

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What's your favorite adventure nonfiction book?