Recommended Reading

Born in 1939 in rural Japan, Junko Tabei became the first woman to climb Mt. Everest in 1975 and complete the Seven Summits, and she continued to climb big, scary peaks until she passed away in 2016. Who was this 4’9″ mountaineer behind the Tokyo Ladies Climbing Club (slogan: “Let’s go on an overseas expedition by ourselves.”), who balanced a home with a beloved climber husband and two kids and was renowned for her superhuman strength and gentle giggle? Honouring High Places is Tabei’s first book in English, a translated collection of memoirs and photographs filled with the details of post-WWII culture, groundbreaking expeditions, and a life fully enraptured by mountains. In addition to her long list of remarkable firsts, it’s arguable that in the history of world climbing Tabei should also win for “best smile,” and Honouring nearly reads like a series of meditative love letters—to the alpine, to lost climbing partners, to family, to life itself.

Part science storytelling and part memoir, Spineless takes us around the world and down in deep-sea submersibles to explore the mysteries of jellyfish. Yes, jellyfish. You’ll learn a lot about the world’s oceans and cutting-edge science, yet all the research stays afloat with enthusiasm: “There’s a copepod that says ‘Fooled you!’ when it releases bioluminescent globs of light…” We also meet people who’ve dedicated their lives to the soft-bodied-yet-mighty jelly, and while there’s no red-beanied Steve Zissou, this cast of characters could hold their own in a movie: a Frank Zappa-obsessed Italian marine biologist, engineers infatuated with jellyfish propulsion systems, a quirky inventor of a sting-blocking lotion. Author Juli Berwald, a former ocean scientist, threads in just enough of her personal story to get you thinking about your own shelved dreams. If you grew up wanting to be the next Jacques Cousteau or Sylvia Earle, or even a Wes Anderson oceanographer, this book is for you.

Two winters back, over a lunch of dried caribou along the Arctic’s Noatak River, Alaskan writer Seth Kantner told me I had to read Sherry Simpson’s The Way Winter Comes. First published a decade ago and awarded the Chinook Literary Prize, this little-known collection of essays immerses readers in short scenes of northern wilderness, animals, and people. Juneau-born Simpson’s journalistic accounts of everyday Alaska—”ride behind a North Pole trapper named Phil on his Tabasco-red snowmachine”—intertwine with graceful lyricism—”In winter the flat, frozen surface of the upper Chena River becomes a boulevard for wildlife, where tracks inscribe a calligraphy of motion in the snow. Everything is going somewhere.” Seth was right. If this book had a spirit animal, it would be the wolverine: small in stature and surprisingly badass. Get the original hardcover if you can, or wait for the forthcoming version from Shorefast Editions.

If you thought the last wisp of van life soul had long since sputtered out, this new hardcover could convince you otherwise. As the guy behind the #vanlife hashtag, Foster Huntington knows all about four-wheeled labor-of-loves, and this overstuffed book showcases hundreds of crowd-sourced photographs he’s collected over the years. It features thoughtful interviews with van dwellers—how much they spent; the realities of gas mileage and engine maintenance; where they make space for surfboards, dogs, bookshelves, guitars, and dirt bikes. And from Australia to France to Michigan, there are shots of custom campers, Vanagons, Sprinters, and school buses, each with their own hard-earned style and affectionately named: Gigi, Chewy, Greta, Hayduke, Walter, The Bunkhouse Road-Tripper. You’ll spend less time worrying if adventure has lost its purity and more getting stoked by this ode to the art of a well-stocked vehicle and its promise of open horizons.