General

Outdoor Books for Outdoor People (2024 Edition)

By March 10, 2024 No Comments

Happy National Reading Month!

It’s time to share my list of outdoor books again. In March 2020 I shared this list for the first time and I’ve updated it each subsequent year. Now, I’m adding thirty-eight books that I read in 2023.

What’s the origin of this list?

In January 2005, I decided to start keeping a list of every book that I read. My list is pretty simple; I just record the title, author, number of pages, and where the book came from (my person library, a public library, borrowed from someone else, etc.). I don’t record anything else about the book. With one major exception, I’ve faithfully kept that list ever since. In March 2011, we moved and in the hubbub of moving my book list was temporarily lost. Rather than starting a new list, I didn’t record anything for the next nine months… I wish I knew what I read in that time. Even with that missing interval, there are more than 1,000 books on my list.

I read little of everything – biography, history, science fiction, fantasy, mystery, historical fiction, and more – but this list only included books in the categories of science, nature, the outdoors (including hiking, fishing, and hunting stories), and related topics. With more than 500 books on this list, I understand that it can be a bit daunting.

The books have been grouped into rough categories. Many books could easily fit in more than one category and at some point I will probably go back and reclassify a few of them into other categories.  Books that have been boldfaced are either ones that I particularly liked or thought were important.

You’ll probably notice that some authors appear multiple times on this list. These authors are either A) my favorite authors, B) extremely prolific, or C) both. Number one on this list with thirteen titles is John Gierach – all of his books are (nominally) about fishing. Bernd Heinrich comes in at number two with 10 titles – most are in the Nature/Ecology/Natural History section. Three authors (Rick Bass, John McPhee, and Craig Childs) clock in with seven books each – their books are scattered in a number of categories. Michigan author Jerry Dennis has five books on the list – in a couple different categories. Four authors (Sigurd Olson, Guy De La Valdene, Adam Shoalts, and Christopher Camuto) each have four books on the list. There are numerous authors with two or three titles listed.

Maybe you’ll find your next favorite book on this list!

-Mike LeValley (March 10, 2024)

Alaska/Canada

One Man’s Wilderness by Sam Kieth and Richard Proenneke

Alaska’s Wolf Man:  The 1915-55 Wilderness Adventures of Frank Glaser by Jim Rearden

Shopping for Porcupine:  A Life In Arctic Alaska by Seth Kantner

Standing Ground:  Alaska Stories, Police Tales, and Things I’d Rather Not Talk About by Alan L. White

Fifty Miles from Tomorrow:  A Memoir of Alaska and the Real People by William L. Iggiaruk Hensley

Tide, Feather, Snow:  A Life in Alaska by Miranda Weiss

First Wilderness:  My Quest in the Territory of Alaska by Sam Keith

The Final Frontiersman:  Heimo Korth and His Family Alone in Alaska’s Arctic Wilderness by James Campbell

Yukon Alone:  The World’s Toughest Adventure Race by John Balzar

Winterdance:  The Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod by Gary Paulsen

Red Summer:  The Danger, Madness, and Exaltation of Salmon Fishing in a Remote Alaskan Village by Bill Carter

Braving It:  A Father, a Daughter, and an Unforgettable Journey into the Alaskan Wild by James Campbell

Death on the Barrens:  A True Story of Courage and Tragedy in the Canadian Arctic by George James Grinnell

The Alaskan Retreater’s Notebook:  One Man’s Journey into the Alaskan Wilderness by Ray Ordonica

Disappointment River:  Finding and Losing the Northwest Passage by Brian Castner

Where the River Reigns: One Man’s Dream for a Log Cabin in the Wild of Alaska by Brian P. Horacek

Beyond the Trees: A Journey Alone Across Canada’s Arctic by Adam Shoalts

Running North: A Yukon Adventure by Ann Mariah Cook

Alone Against the North by Adam Shoalts

The Sun is a Compass: My 4,000-mile Journey into the Alaskan Wild by Caroline van Hemert

The Only Kayak: A Journey Into the Heart of Alaska by Kim Heacox

The Whisper on the Night Wind: The True History of a Wilderness Legend by Adam Shoalts

Where the Falcon Flies: A 3,400 Kilometer Odyssey From My Doorstep to the Arctic by Adam Shoalts

Arctic/Antarctica

Being Caribou:  Five Months on Foot With an Arctic Herd by Karsten Heuer 

South With the Sun:  Roald Amundsen, His Polar Exploration and the Quest for Discovery by Lynn Cox 

The Last Light Breaking:  Living Among Alaska’s Inupiat Eskimos by Nick Jans

Roald Amundsen by Tor Bomann-Larsen

White Eskimo:  Knud Rasmussen’s Fearless Journey into the Heart of the Arctic by Stephen R. Brown

The Last Imaginary Place:  A Human History of the Arctic World by Robert McGhee

Boundless: Tracing Land and Dream in a New Northwest Passage by Kathleen Winter

The Magnetic North: Notes from the Arctic Circle by Sara Wheeler

The Memoirs of Stockholm Sven: A Novel by Nathaniel Ian Miller

Extreme North: A Cultural History by Bernd Brunner

Wanderlust: An Eccentric Explorer, An Epic Journey, A Lost Age by Reid Mitenbuler

The North Country

Open Horizons by Sigurd F. Olson 

Woman of the Boundary Waters:  Canoeing, Guiding, Mushing, and Surviving by Justine Kerfoot

The Grand Portage by Walter O’Meara

The Long-shadowed Forest by Helen Hoover 

We Took to the Woods by Louise Dickinson Rich

At Home in the Woods:  Living the Life of Thoreau Today by Bradford Angier and Vera Angier 

The Meaning of Wilderness by Sigurd F. Olson

Chips from a Wilderness Log by Calvin Rutstrum

Northland: A 4,000-mile Journey Along America’s Forgotten Border by Porter Fox

Lure of the Lone Trail: Writings from the North Woods by Glen Sheppard

Reflections from the North Country by Sigurd F. Olson

The Singing Wilderness by Sigurd F. Olson

Birds/Birdwatching

To See Every Bird on Earth:  A Father, A Son and a Lifelong Obsession by Dan Koeppel 

The Ardent Birder:  On the Craft of Birdwatching by Todd Newberry and Gene Holtan

The Ghost With Trembling Wings:  Science, Wishful Thinking, and the Search for Lost Species by Scott Weidensaul

Out of the Woods:  A Bird Watcher’s Year by Ora E. Anderson

Of a Feather:  A Brief History of American Birding by Scott Weidensaul

All Things Reconsidered:  My Birding Adventures by Roger Tory Peterson

Hope is the Thing With Feathers:  A Personal Chronicle of Vanished Birds by Christopher Cokinos

Wesley the Owl:  The Remarkable Love Story of an Owl and His Girl by Stacey O’Brien

The Verb ‘To Bird’: Sightings of an Avid Birder by Peter Cashwell

A Supremely Bad Idea:  Three Mad Birders and Their Quest To See It All by Luke Dempsey

Birdology:  Adventures With a Pack of Hens, a Peck of Pigeons, Cantankerous Crows, Fierce Falcons, Hip Hop Parrots, Baby Hummingbirds, and One Murderously Big Living Dinosaur by Sy Montgomery

Crow Planet:  Essential Wisdom From the Urban Wilderness by Lyanda Lynn Haupt

Gifts of the Crow:  How Perception, Emotion and Thought Allow Smart Birds to Behave Like Humans by John Marzluff and Tony Angell 

Feathers:  The Evolution of a Natural Miracle by Thor Hanson

Life Birds by George Levine

H is for Hawk by Helen MacDonald 

Ravens in Winter by Bernd Heinrich

Falcon Fever:  A Falconer in the Twenty-first Century by Tim Gallagher

One Wild Bird at a Time:  Portraits of Individual Lives by Bernd Heinrich 

The Most Perfect Thing:  Inside (and Outside) a Bird’s Egg by Tim Birkhead

Lost Among the Birds:  Accidentally Finding Myself in One Very Big Year by Neil Hayward

The Falcon Thief: A True Tale of Adventure, Treachery and the Hunt for the Perfect Bird by Joshua Hammer

George: A Magpie Memoir by Frieda Hughes

Nature/Ecology/Natural History

Swampwalker’s Journal:  A Wetlands Year by David M. Carroll

Natural Coincidence:  The Trip from Kalamazoo by Bil Gilbert

Why Moths Hate Thomas Edison edited by Hampton Sides

Wintering by Diana Kappel-Smith

Teaching a Stone to Talk:  Expeditions and Encounters by Annie Dillard

Return to Wild America:  A Yearlong Search For the Continent’s Natural Soul by Scott Weidensaul

Northwoods Wildlife:  A Watcher’s Guide to Habitats by Janine M. Benyus

Last Child in the Woods:  Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder by Richard Louv

It’s Raining Frogs and Fishes:  Four Seasons of Natural Phenomena and Oddities of the Sky by Jerry Dennis

The Eternal Frontier:  An Ecological History of North America and Its Peoples by Tim Flannery

Wilderness Ethics:  Preserving the Spirit of Wildness by Guy Waterman and Laura Waterman

My Story as Told by Water:  Confessions, Druidic Rants, Reflections, Bird-watching, Fish-stalkings, Visions, Songs and Prayers Refracting Light, From Living Rivers, In the Age of the Industrial Dark by David James Duncan

Squirrels at My Window:  Life with a Remarkable Gang of Urban Squirrels by Grace Marmor Spruch

Life Counts:  Cataloguing Life on Earth by Michael Gleich, Dirk Maxeiner, et al

A Trail Through Leaves:  The Journal as a Path to Place by Hannah Hinchman

The World Without Us by Alan Weisman

The Animal Dialogues:  Uncommon Encounters in the Wild by Craig Childs

Looking for Hickories:  The Forgotten Wildness of the Rural Midwest by Tom Springer

Ecology of A Cracker Childhood by Janisse Ray 

Life in the Soil:  A Guide for Naturalists and Gardeners by James B Nardi

The Search for a Sense of Wildness by Michael P. Ausema

Stalking the Plumed Serpent and Other Adventures in Herpetology by D. Bruce Means

Where the Wild Things Were:  Life, Death, and Ecological Wreckage in a Land of Vanishing Predators by William Stolzenburg

The Snake Charmer:  A Life and Death in Pursuit of Knowledge by Jamie James

The Wild Places by Robert MacFarlane

Watchers at the Pond by Franklin Russell

Dry Storeroom No. 1:  The Secret life of the Natural History Museum by Richard Fortey

A Year in the Maine Woods by Bernd Heinrich

One Square Inch of Silence:  One Man’s Search for Natural Silence in a Noisy World by Gordon Hempton ans John Grossman

Mean and Lowly Things:  Snakes, Science, and Survival in the Congo by Kate Jackson

The Book of Yaak by Rick Bass

Summer World:  A Season of Bounty by Bernd Heinrich

Every Creeping Thing:  True Tales of Faintly Repulsive Wildlife by Richard Conniff

The Founding Fish by John McPhee

A Reenchanted World:  The Quest for a New Kinship With Nature by James William Gibson

Wilderness Warrior:  Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America by Douglas Brinkley

Footnotes on Nature by John Kieran

Why We Run:  A Natural History by Bernd Heinrich

The Path:  A One-mile Walk Through the Universe by Chet Raymo

The Wild Marsh:  Four Seasons at Home in Montana by Rick Bass

Water:  A Natural History by Alice Outwater

The Forgotten Pollinators by Stephen L. Buchmann and Gary Paul

The Mountains Next Door by Janice Emily Bowers

Still Life:  Adventures in Taxidermy by Melissa Milgram

The Snoring Bird:  My Family’s Journey Through A Century of Biology by Bernd Heinrich

Why I Came West by Rick Bass

Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat:  Why It’s So Hard to Think Straight About Animals by Hal Herzog

The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elizabeth Tova Bailey

Kingdom Under Glass:  A Tale of Obsession, Adventure, and One Man’s Quest to Preserve the World’s Great Animals by Jay Kirk

Wading For Bugs:  Exploring Streams With the Experts edited by Judith L. Li and Michael T. Barbour

The Big Swamp:  A Wildlife Biologist’s Lifetime of Adventures by Raymond D. Schofield

Life Everlasting:  The Animal Way of Death by Bernd Heinrich

Time and Tide in Acadia:  Seasons on Mount Desert Island by Christopher Camuto

Rambunctious Garden:  Saving Nature in a Post-wild World by Emma Marris

The Forest Unseen:  A Year’s Watch in Nature by David George Haskell

Dirt Work:  An Education in the Woods by Christine Byl

Eating Dirt:  Deep Forests, Big Timber, and Life with the Tree-Planting Tribe by Charlotte Gill

The Endangered Species Road Trip:  A Summer’s Worth of Dingy Motels, Poison Oak, Ravenous Insects, and the Rarest Species in North America by Cameron MacDonald

Fire Season:  Field Notes from a Wilderness Lookout by Philip Connors

A Sand County Almanac:  With Essays on Conservation from Round River by Aldo Leopold

Beyond Walden:  The Hidden History of America’s Kettle Lakes and Ponds by Robert M. Thorson

Keith County Journal by John Janovy Jr.

Island Year by Hazel Heckman

A Sting in the Tale:  My Adventures with Bumblebees by Dave Goulson

A Buzz in the Meadow:  The Natural History of a French Farm by Dave Goulson

The Prophet of Dry Hill:  Lessons From a Life in Nature by David Gessner

Theodore Roosevelt in the Field by Michael R. Canfield

The Urban Bestiary:  Encountering the Everyday Wild by Lyanda Lynn Haupt

Once They Were Hats:  In Search of the Mighty Beaver by Frances Backhouse

Under the Stars:  How America Fell in Love with Camping by Dan White

The Carry Home:  Lessons From the American Wilderness by Gary Ferguson

Bog tender:  Coming Home to Nature and Memory by George Szanto

The Eternal Frontier:  An Ecological History of North America and Its Peoples by Tim Flannery

The Home Place:  Memoirs of a Colored Man’s Love Affair with Nature by J. Drew Lanham

Hawk’s Rest:  A Season in the Remote Heart of Yellowstone by Gary Ferguson

Gathering Moss:  A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses by Robin Wall Kimmerer

The Pine Barrens by John McPhee

Becoming Teddy Roosevelt:  How a Maine Guide Inspired America’s 26th President by Andrew Vietze

The Lost Species:  Great Expeditions in the Collection of Natural History Museums by Christopher Kemp

The Snow Tourist:  A Search for the World’s Purest, Deepest Snowfall by Charles English

Citizen Scientist:  Searching for Heroes and Hope in an Age of Extinction by Mary Ellen Hannibal

Hiking Naked:  A Quaker Woman’s Search for Balance by Iris Graville

Saving Tarboo Creek:  One Family’s Quest to Heal the Land by Scott Freeman

The Nature Fix:  Why Nature Makes Us Happier Healthier, and More Creative by Florence Williams

The Power of a Plant:  A Teacher’s Odyssey to grow Healthy Minds and Schools by Stephen Ritz

The Naturalist at Large by Bernd Heinrich

The Art of Naming by Michael Ohl

Buzz:  The Nature and Necessity of Bees by Thor Hanson

The Feather Thief:  Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century by Kirk Wallace Johnson

Apocalyptic Planet:  Field Guide to the Everending Earth by Craig Childs

The Ninemile Wolves by Rick Bass

Nature Wars:  The Incredible Story of How Wildlife Comebacks Turned Backyards Into Battlegrounds by Jim Sterba

Never Home Alone: From Microbes to Millipedes, Camel Crickets, and Honeybees: The Natural History of Where We Live by Rob Dunn

The River in Winter by Stanley Crawford

The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt & The Fire That Saved America by Timothy Egan

Death of A Hornet and Other Cape Cod Essays by Robert Finch

Saving Arcadia: A Story of Conservation and Community in the Great Lakes by Heather Shumaker

The Geese of Beaver Bog by Bernd Heinrich

In Service of the Wild: Restoring and Reinhabiting Damaged Land by Stephie Mills

Wild and Rare: Tracking Endangered Species in the Upper Midwest by Adam Regn Arvidson

Wild at Heart: America’s Turbulent Relationship with Nature, from Exploitation to Redemption by Alice Outwater

Tamed: Ten Species That Changed Our World by Alice Roberts

Grinnell: America’s Environmental Pioneer and His Restless Drive to Save The West by John Taliaferro

Wilding: Returning Nature to Our Farm by Isabella Tree

Rewild Yourself: Making Nature More Visible in Our Lives by Simon Barnes

Virga & Bone: Essays from Dry Places by Craig Childs

The Wild Remedy: How Nature Mends Us – A Diary by Emma Mitchell

Outpost: A Journey to the Wild Ends of the Earth by Dan Richards

Coming of Age at the End of Nature: A Generation Faces Living on a Changed Planet edited by Julie Dunlap and Susan A Cohen

Dancing with Bees: A Journey Back to Nature by Brigit Strawbridge Howard

An Unspoken Hunger: Stories From the Field by Terry Tempest Williams

Grass Roots: The Universe of Home by Paul Gruchow

Feral: Rewilding the Land, the Sea, and Human Life by George Monbiot

Wayfinding: The Science and Mystery of How Humans Navigate the World by M.R. O’Connor

Trout Reflections: A Natural History of the Trout and Its World by David M. Carroll

Reading the Mountains of Home by John Elder

Sky Time in Gray’s River: Living for Keeps in a Forgotten Place by Robert Michael Pyle

Another Country: Journeying Toward the Cherokee Mountains by Christopher Camuto

Underland: A Deep Time Journey by Robert MacFarlane

Surfacing by Kathleen Jamie

The Nature of Nature: Why We Need the Wild by Enric Sala

Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Future by Merlin Sheldrake

Leave Only Footprints: My Acadia-to-Zion Journey Through Every National Park by Conor Knighton

The 2084 Report: An Oral History of the Great Warming by James Lawrence Powell

My Wilderness: The Pacific West by William O. Douglas

Whatever You Do, Don’t Run: True Tales of a Botswana Safari Guide by Peter Allison

The Future of Conservation in America by Gary E. Malchis and Jonathan B. Jarvis

The Hermit’s Story by Rick Bass

The Patch by John McPhee

Fox & I: An Uncommon Friendship by Catherine Raven

Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss by Margaret Renkl

The Way Home: Tales From a Life Without Technology by Mark Boyle

Into the Tangled Bank: In Which Our Author Ventures Outdoors to Consider the British in Nature by Lev Parikian

Seasons on Harris: A Year in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides by David Yeadon

Young Men and Fire: A True Story of the Mann Gulch Fire by Norman Maclean

The Last Wilderness: A Journey Into Silence by Neil Ansell

Where the Deer and the Antelope Play: The Pastoral Observations of One Ignorant American Who Loves to Walk Outside by Nick Offerman

Consolations of the Forest: Alone in a Cabin in the Middle Taiga by Sylvain Tesson

Heartbreak: A Personal and Scientific Journey by Florence Williams

Embrace Fearlessly the Burning World by Barry Lopez

The Circling Sky: On Nature and Belonging in an Ancient Forest by Neil Ansell

Lookout: Love, Solitude, and Searching for Wildfire in the Boreal Forest by Trina Moyles

Wild Ones: A Sometimes Dismaying, Weirdly Reassuring Story About Looking at People Looking at Animals in America by Jon Mooallem

The Secret Knowledge of Water by Craig Childs

At Home on an Unruly Planet: Finding Refuge on a Changed Earth by Madeline Ostrander

Awe: The Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life by Dacher Keltner

Wild Card Quilt: The Ecology of Home by Janisse Ray

Burn: A Story of Fire, Woods and Healing by Ben Short

Through the Woods: The English Woodland – April to April by H.E. Bates

Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country by Pam Houston

Light Rain Sometimes Falls: A British Year Through Japan’s 72 Seasons by Lev Parikian

Nightwalk: A Journey the the Heart of Nature by Chris Yates

The Story of More: How We Got to Climate Change and Where to Go from Here by Hope Jahren

Trees/Plants/Gardens

Beautiful Madness:  One Man’s Journey Through Other People’s Gardens by James Dodson

The Trees in My Forest by Bernd Heinrich

The Wild Trees:  A Story of Passion and Daring by Richard Preston 

People With Dirty Hands:  The Passion for Gardening by Robert Chotzinoff

American Chestnut:  The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Perfect Tree by Susan Freinkel

The Man Who Planted Trees:  A Story of Lost Groves, the Science of Trees, and a Plan to Save the Planet by Jim Robbins 

Wood:  Craft, Culture, History by Harvey Green 

Lab Girl by Hope Jahren

Unearthed:  Love, Acceptance, and Other Lessons from an Abandoned Garden by Alexandra Risen

Nature’s Temples:  The Complex World of Old-Growth Forests by Joan Maloof

The Hidden Life of Trees:  What They Feel, How They Communicate:  Discoveries from a Secret World by Peter Wohlleben

Urban Forests:  A Natural History of Trees and People in the American Cityscape by Jill Jonnes

The Wood for the Trees:  One Man’s Long View of Nature by Richard Fortey

Witness Tree:  Seasons of Change with a Century-old Oak by Lynda V. Mapes

The Ghost Orchard:  The Hidden History of the Apple in North America by Helen Humphreys

The Man Who Climbs Trees by James Aldred

The Long, Long Life of Trees by Fiona Stafford

The Flavor of Wood: In Search of the Wild Taste of Trees From Smoke and Sap to Root and Bark by Artur Cesar-Erlach

Sprout Lands: Tending the Endless Gift of Trees by William Bryant Logan

The Sakura Obsession: The Incredible Story of the Plant Hunter Who Saved Japan’s Cherry Blossoms by Naoka Abe

To Speak for the Trees: My Life’s Journey From Ancient Celtic Wisdom to a Healing Vision of the Forest by Diana Beresford-Kroeger

Seed to Dust: Life, Nature, and a Country Garden by Marc Hamer

Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest by Suzanne Simard

A Woods of One’s Own by Ruth Pavey

Old Growth: The Best Writing About Trees From Orion Magazine

The Arbornaut: A Life Discovering the Eighth Continent in the Trees Above Us by Meg Lowman

The Oak Papers by James Canton

The Journey of Trees: A Story About Forests, People, and the Future by Zach St. George

Tree Thieves: Crime and Survival in North America’s Woods by Lyndsie Bourgon

Spring Rain: A Life Lived in Gardens by Marc Hamer

The Garden Jungle (or Gardening to Save the Planet) by Dave Goulson

In Search of the Old Ones: An Odyssey Among Ancient Trees by Anthony D. Fredericks

Geology/Geography/Other Sciences

On the Map:  A Mind-expanding Exploration of the Way the World Looks by Simon Garfield

Rising From the Plains by John McPhee

Coming Into the Country by John McPhee

Annals of the Former World by John McPhee

The Ground Beneath Us:  From the Oldest Cities to the Last Wilderness, What Dirt tells Us About Who We Are by Paul Bogard

Stories in Stone:  Travels Through Urban Geology by David B Williams

The Map That Changed The World:  William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology by Simon Winchester

Reading the Rocks: How Victorian Geologists Discovered the Secret of Life by Brenda Maddox

The Book of Unconformities: Speculations on Lost Time by Hugh Raffles

Farming/Rural Life

 A Country Year:  Living the Questions by Sue Hubbell

The Last American Man by Elizabeth Gilbert

See You in a Hundred Years:  Four Seasons in Forgotten America by Logan Ward 

Clearing Land:  Legacies of the American Farm by Jane Brox

Heirloom:  Notes From and Accidental Tomato Farmer by Tim Stark

Clabbered Dirt, Sweet Grass by Gary Paulsen

It’s a Long Road to a Tomato:  Tales of an organic Farmer Who Quit the Big City for the (Not So) Simple Life by Keith Stewart

Ripe:  The Search for the Perfect Tomato by Arthur Allen

Claiming Ground:  A Memoir by Laura Bell

Wisdom of the Last Farmer:  Harvesting Legacies From the Land by David Mas Masumoto 

Mostly in Clover:  Growing Up in Rural Ontario. A Boy Now a Man Recounts His Memories by Harry J. Boyle

Little Heathens:  Hard Times and High Spirits on an Iowa Farm During the Great Depression by Mildred Armstrong Kalish 

Folks, This Ain’t Normal:  A Farmer’s Advice for Happier Hens, Healthier People, and a Better World by Joel Salatin

Cabin:  Two Brothers, a Dream, and Five Acres in Maine by Leo Ureneck 

Triple Ridge Farm by Ruth Fouts Pochmann

Battlefield:  Farming a Civil War Battleground by Peter Svenson

The Shepherd’s Life by James Rebanks

More Scenes From the Rural Life by Verlyn Klinkenborg

Farm:  A Year in the Life of an American Farmer by Richard Rhodes

Cabin Lessons:  A Nail-by-Nail Tale:  Building Our Dream Cottage from 2x4s, Blisters, and Love by Spike Carlsen 

Growing A Revolution:  Bringing Our Soil Back to Life by David R. Montgomery

Craeft:  An Inguiry into the Origins and True Meaning of Traditional Crafts by Alexander Langlands

The Dirty Life:  A Memoir of Farming, Foods, and Love by Kristin Kimball

Letter to a Young Farmer: How to Live Without Wealth on the New Garden Farm by Gene Logsdon

The Farmer’s Son: Calving Season on a Family Farm by John Connell

The Rural Life by Verlyn Klinkenborg

Pastoral Song by James Rebanks

Galloway: Life in a Vanishing Landscape by Patrick Laurie

The Smell of Summer Grass: Pursuing Happiness, Perch Hill, 1994 – 2011 by Adam Nicholson

Red Sky at Night by John Barrington

Woodsqueer: Crafting a Sustainable Rural Life by Gretchen Legler

Living a Country Year: Wit and Wisdom From the Good Old Days by Jerry Apps

Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life by John Jerome

Little Britches: Father and I were Ranchers by Ralph Moody

Sylvia’s Farm: The Journal of an Improbably Shepherd by Sylvia Jorrín

Wild Idea: Buffalo & Family in a Difficult Land by Dan O’Brien

Logging

Hard Maple, Hard Work by John Gagnon 

McTaggart’s Red Keg:  Logging From A-Z on the Tittabawassee in Michigan by Irene M. Hargreaves and Harold M. Foehl

“Daylight in the Swamp”:  Lumberjacking in the Late 19th Century by Robert W. Wells

Timber!  The Bygone Life of the Northwoods Lumberjacks by John C. Frohlicher

Food

In Defense of Food:  An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan

The Earth Knows My Name:  Food, Culture, and Sustainability in the Gardens of Ethnic Americans by Patricia Klindienst

Empires of Food:  Feast Famine, and the Rise and Fall of Civilizations by Evand D.G. Fraser and Andrew Rimas

The Omnivore’s Dilemma:  A Natural History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle:  A Year of Food Life by Barbara Kingsolver

The Third Plate:  Field Notes on the Future of Food by Dan Barber

The Mushroom Hunters:  On the Trail of an Underground America by Langdon Cook

A Really Big Lunch:  The Roving Gourmand on Food and Life by Jim Harrison

100 Million Years of Food:  What Our Ancestors Ate and Why it Matters Today by Stephen Le

American Terroir:  Savoring the Flavors of Our Woods, Waters, and Fields by Rowan Jacobsen

The Scavenger’s Guide to Haute Cuisine by Steven Rinella

The Traveling Feast:  On the Road and at the Table With My Heroes by Rick Bass

Save Me the Plums: My Gourmet Memoir by Ruth Reichl

Uncultivated: Wild Apples, Real Cider, and the Complicated Art of Making a Living by Andy Brennan

Kitchen Yarns: Notes on Life, Love, and Food by Ann Hood

Feasting Wild: In Search of the Last Untamed Food by Gina Rae La Cerva

We Are What We Eat: A Slow Food Manifesto by Alice Waters

Pig Years by Ellyn Gaydos

Under the Tuscan Sun: At Home in Italy by Frances Mayes

Fieldwork: A Forager’s Memoir by Iliana Regan

In Winter’s Kitchen: Growing Roots and Breaking Bread in the Northern Heartland by Beth Dooley

National Dish: Around the World in Search of Food, History, and the Meaning of Home by Anya Von Bremzen

The Secret History of Food: Strange But True Stories About the Origins of Everything We Eat by Matt Siegel

Mountaineering/Adventure

Tracks:  A Woman’s Solo Trek Across 1700 Miles of Australian Outback by Robyn Davidson

Foot by Foot Through the USA by Winfield H. Line and Francis R. Line 

Seaworthy:  Adrift with William Willis in the Golden Age of Rafting by T.R. Pearson

A Sense of the World:  How A Blind Man Became History’s Greatest Traveler by Jason Roberts

Touching My Father’s Soul:  A Sherpa’s Journey to the Top of Everest by Jamling Tenzing Norgay w/ Broughton Coburn

Halfway to Heaven:  My White-knuckled – And Knuckleheaded – Quest for the Rocky Mountain High by Mark Obmascik

A Splendid Savage:  The Restless Life of Fredrick Russell Burnham by Steve Kemper

Breaking Trail:  A Climbing Life by Arlene Blum

Way Out There: Adventures of a Wilderness Trekker by J. Robert Harris

Out and Back: A Runner’s Story of Survival Against All Odds by Hillary Allen

Fifty Shades of the USA: One Woman’s 11,000 Mile Cycling Adventure Through Every State of America by Anna McNuff

Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

The Wilderness Idiot: Lessons from an Accidental Adventurer by Ted Alvarez

The Impossible Climb: Alex Honnold, El Capitan, and the Climbing Life by Mark Synnott

Classic Krakauer: Essays on Wilderness and Risk by John Krakauer

Small Game: A Novel by Blair Braverman

The Backyard Adventurer by Beau Miles

Continental Divide: A History of American Mountaineering by Maurice Isserman

Paddling/Canoeing/Rafting

Canyon Solitude:  A Woman’s Solo River Journey Through Grand Canyon by Patricia C. McCairen 

From a Wooden Canoe:  Reflections on Canoeing, Camping, and Classic Equipment by Jerry Dennis

An Adirondack Passage:  The Cruise of the Canoe Sairy Gamp by Christine Jerome

Canoeing With the Cree by Eric Severeid 

One Incredible Journey by Clayton Klein and Verlen Kruger

The Survival of the Bark Canoe by John McPhee

Cold Summer Wind by Clayton Klein

Portage Into the Past:  By Canoe Along the Minnesota-Ontario Boundary Waters by J. Arnold Bolz 

The Last Voyageurs:  Retracing LaSalle’s Journey Across America:  Sixteen Teenagers on the Adventure of a Lifetime by Lorraine Boissoneault

Waterwalk:  A Passage of Ghosts by Steven Faulkner

Hidden Nature:  A Voyage of Discovery by Alys Fowler

Kings of the Yukon: One Summer Paddling Across the Far North by Adam Weymouth

Freshwater Saga: Memoirs of a Lifetime of Wilderness Canoeing in Canada by Eric W. Morse

Hudson bay Bound: Two Women, One Dog, Two Thousand Miles to the Arctic by Natalie Warren

Amazon Woman: Facing Fears, Chasing Dreams, and a Quest to Kayak the World’s Largest River from Source to Sea by Darcy Gaechter

Adventure North: 2,200 Miles by Canoe, 49 Days in the Wild by Sean Bloomfield

Riverman: An American Odyssey by Ben McGrath

Kayaking Alone: Nine Hundred Miles from Idaho’s Mountains to the Pacific Ocean by Mike Barenti

Hiking/Walking

A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson 

A Season on the Appalachian Trail by Lynn Setzer 

Walking My Dog, Jane:  From Valdez to Prudhoe Bay Along the Trans Alaska Pipeline by Ned Rozell

The Marches:  A Borderland Journey Between England and Scotland by Rory Stewart

AWOL on the Appalachian Trail by David Miller

Alone Together:  My Adventure on the Appalachian Trail by Wally Miars

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn

On Trails: An Exploration by Robert Moor

A Walk Across Michigan by Will Swartz

In Praise of Walking: A New Scientific Exploration by Shane O’Mara

In Praise of Paths: Walking Through Time and Nature by Torbjorn Ekelund

Thirst: 2600 Miles to Home by Heather “Anish” Anderson

The Unlikely Thru-Hiker: An Appalachian Trail Journey by Derick Lugo

The Old Ways: A Journey on Foot by Robert MacFarlane

Journeys North: The Pacific Crest Trail by Barney “Scout” Mann

Mud, Rocks, Blazes: Letting Go On The Appalachian Trail by Heather “Anish” Anderson

The Pants of Perspective: One Woman’s 3,000 Kilometer Running Adventure Through the Wilds of New Zealand by Anna McNuff

The Appalachian Trail: A Biography by Philip D’Anieri

The Wild Silence by Raynor Winn

Alone in Wonderland by Christine Reed

The Living Mountain by Nan Shepherd

I Belong Here: A Journey Along the Backbone of Britain by Anita Sethi

Happy Hiker: The Epic Journey of an Unlikely Appalachian Trail Thru-Hiker by Max ‘Happy’ Mason

Six Walks: In The Footsteps of Henry David Thoreau by Ben Shattuck

Bonus Miles by Heather Anderson

Paleontology/Archaeology

Before the Dawn:  Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors by Nicholas Wade

Atlas of a Lost World:  Travels in Ice Age America by Craig Childs

Finders Keepers:  A Tale of Archaeological Plunder and Obsession by Craig Childs

My European Family:  The First 54,000 Years by Karin Bojs

The Lost World of the Old Ones:  Discoveries in the Ancient Southwest by David Roberts

Built on Bones: 15,000 years of Urban Life and Death by Brenna Hassett

House of Rain: Tracking a Vanished Civilization Across the American Southwest by Craig Childs

Mudlark: In Search of London’s Past Along the River Thames by Laura Maiklem

The Sediments of Time: My Lifelong Search for the Past by Maeve Leakey with Samira Leakey

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari

The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber and David Wengrow

Michigan/The Great Lakes

Walking to Mackinac by David E. Bonior

The Superior Peninsula:  Seasons in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan by Lon L. Emerick

The Living Great Lakes:  Searching For the Heart of the Inland Seas by Jerry Dennis

The Fourth Coast:  Exploring the Great lakes Coastline From the St. Lawrence Seaway to the Boundary Waters of Minnesota by Mary Blocksma

Graced by the Seasons:  Fall and Winter in the Northwoods by John Bates

Great Lakes Nature:  An Outdoor Year by Mary Blocksma 

River of Iron by David Lee

The Wolves of Isle Royale:  A Broken Balance by Rolf O. Peterson

Lake Country:  A Series of Journeys by Kathleen Stocking

An Uncrowded Place:  The Delights and Dilemmas of Life Up North and a Young Man’s Search for Home by Bob Butz

Great Lakes Country by Russell McKee

The Turn in the Trail:  Northwoods Tales of the Upper Great Lakes by Walt Sandburg

Native American

Rez Life by David Treuer

Holding Our World Together:  Ojibwe Women and the Survival of Community by Brenda J. Child

Braiding Sweetgrass:  Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Masters of Empire:  Great Lakes Indians and the Making of America by Michael A. McDonnell

Wilderness Empire by Allan W. Eckert

Books and Islands in Ojibwe Country by Louise Erdrich

American Indians and National Forests by Theodore Catton

Spirit Run: A 6,000-Mile Marathon Through North America’s Stolen Land by Noe Alvarez

Walking the Trail: One Man’s Journey Along the Cherokee Trail of Tears by Jerry Ellis

Diversity and Equity in the Outdoors

Black Face, White Spaces: Reimagining the Relationship of African Americans to the Great Outdoors by Carolyn Finney

The Adventure Gap: Changing the Face of the Outdoors by James Edward Mills

Trace: Memory, History, Race, and the American Landscape by Lauret Savoy

Hunting/Fishing/Trapping

Ghosts of Tsavo:  Stalking the Mystery Lions of East Africa by Philip Caputo

Fly-fishing the 41st:  Around the World on the 41st Parallel by James Prosek

Trout Madness by John D. Voelker (Robert Traver)

On The Run:  An Angler’s Journey Down The Striper Coast by David DiBenedetto

Trout Eyes:  True Tales of Adventure, Travel, and Fly Fishing by William G. Tapply

Kerplunk! by Patrick F. McManus

The River Home:  An Angler’s Explorations by Jerry Dennis

The Fish’s Eye:  Essays About Angling and the Outdoors by Ian Frazier

A Place on the Water:  An Angler’s Reflections on Home by Jerry Dennis

Hunting From Home:  A Year Afield in the Blue Ridge Mountains by Christopher Camuto

American Buffalo  In Search of a Lost Icon by Steven Rinella

West With the Rise:  Fly-fishing Across America by James Barilla

The Sporting Road:  Travels Across America in An Airstream Trailer – With Fly Rod, Shotgun, and a Yellow Lab Named Sweetzer by Jim Fergus

Colter:  The True Story of the Best Dog I Ever Had by Rick Bass

Fur, Fortune, and Empire:  The Epic History of the Fur Trade in America by Eric Jay Dolan

Fool’s Paradise by John Gierach

The Everlasting Stream:  A True Story of Rabbits, Guns, Friendship, and Family by Walt Harrington

At the Grave of the Unknown Fisherman by John Gierach

Still Life With Brook Trout by John Gierach

Death, Taxes, and Leaky Waders:  A John Gierach Treasury by John Gierach

The Old Man and the Boy by Robert Ruark

Remembrances of Rivers Past by Ernest Schwiebert

The Fragrance of Grass by Guy de la Valdene

Meat Eater:  Adventures From the Life of an American Hunter by Steven Rinella

Afield:  American Writers on Bird Dogs edited by Robert DeMott and Dave Smith

Upland Autumn:  Birds, Dogs, and Shotgun Shells by William G. Tapply

Fishing the River of Time by Tony Taylor 

Use Enough Gun:  Ruark on Hunting Big Game by Robert Ruark

Every Day Was Special:  A Fly Fisher’s Lifelong Passion by William G. Tapply

Charley Waterman’s Tales of Fly-fishing, Wing-shooting, and the Great Outdoors by Charley Waterman

On the Water:  A Fishing Memoir by Guy de la Valdene

Red Stag:  A Novel by Guy de la Valdene

Brown Feathers:  Waterfowling Tales an Upland Dreams by Steven J. Mulak

The Longest Silence:  A Life in Fishing by Thomas McGuane 

Outdoor Chronicles:  True Tales of a Lifetime of Hunting and Fishing by Jerry Hamza

A Fly Fisherman’s Blue Ridge by Christopher Camuto

Midwest Meanders by Tom Huggler

This Reckless Breed of Men:  The Trappers and Fur Traders of the Southwest by Robert Glass Cleland

The Ghosts of Autumn:  A Season of Hunting Stories by Joel Spring

A Fly Rod of Your Own by John Gierach

Jill and I and the Salmon by Jack Russell

Moose in the Water Bamboo on the Bench:  A Journal and a Journey by Kathy Scott

What the River Knows:  An Angler in Midstream by Wayne Fields

Salmon On A Fly:  The Essential Wisdom and Lore from a Lifetime of Salmon Fishing by Lee Wulff

A Rough-shooting Dog:  Reflections From Thick and Uncivil Sorts of Places by Charles Fergus

A Hunter’s Fireside Book:  Tales of Dogs, Ducks, Birds & Guns by Gene Hill

My Secret Fishing Life by Nick Lyons

Covered Waters:  Tempests of a Nomadic Trouter by Joseph Heywood

One River More: A Celebration of Rivers and Flyfishing by W.D. Wetherell

A Naturalist Goes Fishing: Casting in Fragile Waters from the Gulf of Mexico to New Zealand’s South Island by Jame McClintock

Michigan Seasons: Classic Tales of Life Outdoors edited by Ted J. Rulsch

Fifty-five Years a Grouse Hunter by Frank Jezioro

Casting Into the Light: Tales of a Fishing Life by Janet Messineo

Aged in the Woods: Stories and Sketches of Fishing and Shooting by Paul Hyde Bonner

Reflections of a Fly Rod by Mark Usyk

Carp are Jerks by Mark Usyk

Fish On, Fish Off: The Misadventures and Odd Encounters of the Self-Taught Angler by Stephen Sautner

A Cast in the Woods: A Story of Fly Fishing, Fracking, and Floods in the Heart of Trout Country by Stephen Sautner

Stronghold: One Man’s Quest to Save the World’s Wild Salmon by Tucker Malarkey

Dumb Luck and the Kindness of Strangers by John Gierach

Fire in the Straw: Notes on Inventing a Life by Nick Lyons

Blood Knots: A Memoir of Fathers, Friendship, and Fishing by Luke Jennings

The Unreasonable Virtue of Flyfishing by Mark Kurlansky

Trout Water: A Year on the Au Sable by Josh Greenberg

The Optimist: A Case for the Fly Fishing Life by David Coggins

The Zen of Home Waters: True Tales of Adventure, Travel, and Fly Fishing by Jerry Hamza

Home Waters: A Chronicle of Family and a River by John N. Maclean

Fishing Through the Apocalypse: An Angler’s Adventures in the 21st Century by Matthew L. Miller

Standing in a River Waving a Stick by John Gierach

The Earth is Enough: Growing Up in a World of Flyfishing, Trout, & Old Men by Harry Middleton

The Hunter’s Road: A Journey with Gun and Dog Across the American Uplands by Jim Fergus

The Way of the Trout by M.R. Montgomery

Full Creel: A Nick Lyons Reader by Nick Lyons

Trout Bum by John Gierach

Where the Pools are Bright and Deep by Dana S. Lamb

All Fishermen are Liars by John Gierach

On the Spine of Time: A Flyfisher’s Journey Among Mountain People, Streams & Trout by Harry Middleton

A View from a Tall Hill: Robert Ruark in Africa by Terry Wieland

Goodnews River: Wild Fish, Wild Waters, and the Sories We Find There by Scott Sadil

Even Brook Trout Get the Blues by John Gierach

The Bright Country: A Fisherman’s Return to Trout, Wild Water, and Himself by Harry Middleton

Not All Trout are Geniuses by Mark Usyk

Father Water, Mother Woods: Essays on Fishing and Hunting in the North Woods by Gary Paulsen

Dances With Trout by John Gierach

Monsters of River & Rock: My Life As Iron Maiden’s Compulsive Angler by Adrian Smith

Bush Pilot Angler by Lee Wulff

The Habit of Rivers: Reflections on Trout Streams and Fly Fishing by Ted Leeson

Brook Trout Forest by Kathy Scott

Making Game: An Essay on Woodcock by Guy De La Valdene

Reading the Water: Fly Fishing, Fatherhood, and Finding Strength in Nature by Mark Hume

At Forest’s Edge: Tales of hunting, Friendship, and the Future by Joel Springer

Illuminated by Water: Fly Fishing and the Allure of the Natural World by Malachy Tallack

The Big One: An Island, an Obsession, and the Furious Pursuit of a Great Fish by David Kinney

The River You Touch: Making a Life on Moving Water by Chris Dombrowski

Silent Seasons edited by Russell Chatham

All the Time in the World by John Gierach

Whitefish Can’t Jump & Other Tales of Gamefish on the Fly by E. Donnall Thomas, Jr.

Twice Hooked by David Barr

My Moby Dick by William Humphrey

Headwaters Fall As Snow by Kathy Scott