Layne Beachley, surfer
Life of Pi, by Yann Martel (2001)
An incredibly inspirational novel about a young Indian boy stranded on a small lifeboat in the Pacific for months—with a tiger, a zebra, a hyena, and an orangutan. I could not put it down.
Kit DesLauriers, ski mountaineer
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life, by Barbara Kingsolver, with Steven L. Hopp and Camille Kingsolver (2007)
The true story of the authors' one-year commitment to eating only locally grown foods. It's an amazingly timely statement on the way we've been feeding ourselves over the past 30-plus years, which, in a nutshell, has been in a nonsustainable and less than optimally healthy way.
David de Rothschild, adventurer
Beasts of No Nation, by Uzodinma Iweala (2005)
An inspiring novel about a child soldier in West Africa. The book's power to show the resilience of the human spirit and a determination to survive against all the odds is without equal.
Mike Fay, conservationist
The Last Place on Earth, by Michael (Nick) Nichols and Mike Fay (2005)
That's easy for me—not because I'm one of the authors but because it represents a sustained push over 15 years by two friends—a photographer and a conservationist—that resulted in the creation of some 17 national parks in Congo forests totaling more than ten million acres. We did it by showing everyone the wonders of those forests. Nick's photos will go down in history as the best wildlife photography of the century, flat out.
Tim Flannery, writer
The Origins of Virtue: Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation, by Matt Ridley (1997)
A spellbinding exposé of how human economics is an outgrowth of our species's evolutionary experience—and of how trade in particular has created some human virtues. It gave me hope that our economic system can be reformed to deliver a better outcome for all humanity.
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| "It was the greatest trip I've taken in recent years, as mind-altering as any journey I have ever made."
—PICO IYER on Mason & Dixon |
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Pico Iyer, writer
Mason & Dixon, by Thomas Pynchon (1997)
Mason & Dixon may well be the greatest American epic since Melville. For those of us who believe that the Summer of Love is at least as important as any winter of our discontent, for those of us who long to see Hunter S. Thompson brought into the same sentence as Samuel Johnson, and for those who suspect that the American West may conceal truths and possibilities that nothing in New York can match, Mason & Dixon is the kind of work that can change our lives, by showing us that we and our country, our minds, our language had riches inside that could never have been guessed at. In that respect, it was the greatest trip I've taken in recent years, an adventure as mind-altering (as fun, as full of excitement) as any journey I have ever made.
Will Gadd, adventurer
Touching the Void: The True Story of One Man's Miraculous Survival, by Joe Simpson (1989)
It's one of those books every climber has read or should read—it's a hell of a story.
Colin Angus, adventurer
Ultimate High: My Everest Odyssey, by Göran Kropp (1999)
In an era when summiting Everest has become ho-hum, Ultimate High—which details Swedish adventurer Göran Kropp's incredible unsupported bicycle ride from Sweden to Everest and back, and his summit without oxygen—puts the sparkle back into the ultimate climb. Göran's amicable way, unfettered ambition, and passion for adventure leap from the pages.
