Fierce Country - by Heather Hansman (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

For readers of Susan Casey and Rinker Buck, the inspiring, untold story of three incredible women who pioneered the outdoor movement in America

In the spring of 1945, when even the most courageous outdoor enthusiasts had yet to see the depths of the Grand Canyon, Georgie White jumped into the river at Diamond Creek with just a lifejacket and a backpack full of food. Shortly thereafter, she became the first woman to row the Grand Canyon. At the same time, she also exclusively wore leopard print leotards and subsisted only on canned tuna and beer.

While Georgie was running the river, Anne LaBastille was building her life in the Adirondacks. She would go on to become a celebrate author, ecologist and an emblem of the back to the land movement.

And in the Rockies, Dolores LaChapelle, was burnishing her name as one of the best skiers in America. She was climbing and skiing first descents before National Geographic and Warren Miller created an entire industry around such feats.

In Fierce Country, outdoor journalist and celebrated author of Powder Days, Heather Hansman brings these women's fascinating lives to the forefront of the outdoor movement, affirming the rightful place in the larger story of an evolving American landscape.

Review Quotes

Praise for Powder Days

"A sparkling account of one woman's passion and enduring love of powder."--Wall Street Journal

"A riveting plunge into ski culture... [Powder Days] is as exhilarating as the act of skiing itself."--Publishers Weekly STARRED review

"An entertaining and eye-opening look at the history and economics of skiing and ski resorts in the United States."--Library Journal

"Superbly reported and lyrical."--Outside Magazine

"Entertaining...blade-sharp...[Hansman's] passion for the sport shimmers on every page, with prose as smooth as a turn in dry powder."--San Francisco Chronicle

An in-depth look at a fascinating sports culture from a respected ski journalist."--New York Post, Best Books of the Week

"A love letter to the freedom seekers, the fun hogs, the dirt bags--the ones our culture hasn't yet managed to tame. This is a timely, sharply observed, and beautifully written story of wildness and obsession."--Susan Casey, New York Times bestselling author of The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean

"An enchantingly lyrical ode to the peculiar allure of the cold, the steep, the remote, the hard, the fast, and the fallen. I was never a ski bum, but this book makes me wish I had been."-- Robert Moor, New York Times bestselling author of On Trails: An Exploration