Editorial Content for The High Sierra: A Love Story
Contributors
Reviewer (text)
I’ve never read any of Kim Stanley Robinson’s novels as I’m not much of a science fiction reader. Although I’m aware that he has a stellar reputation for his fiction writing, what drew me to his new volume of nonfiction is the fact that I’m a recent transplant to northern California. I’ve been eager to learn more about the impressive mountains, the trailheads of which are now less than a half-day’s drive from me. Who better to learn from than someone who has been hiking in the Sierras for decades --- and is an immensely talented writer to boot? As Robinson notes, after his first trip to the Sierras when he was a college student, he became “a Sierra person” and never looked back.
"THE HIGH SIERRA is a fascinating combination of memoir, travelogue, scientific overview, history and much more.... This handsome volume is also generously illustrated, primarily with Robinson’s own color photographs..."
THE HIGH SIERRA is a fascinating combination of memoir, travelogue, scientific overview, history and much more. Robinson cleverly breaks up his book (which is over 500 pages) into short chapters, interspersing these various strands with one another.
For example, he features nearly 20 different profiles under the category “Sierra People,” which includes everyone from early environmentalist John Muir to “reclusive neighbors” like coyotes and pine martens. He recounts his own Sierra experiences --- some dramatic, some mundane, some transcendant --- under the category “My Sierra Life” and recalls a “typical” day of backpacking that becomes much more. He considers the complicated and beautiful geology of this remote place, comparing it with other ranges, particularly the Alps.
This handsome volume is also generously illustrated, primarily with Robinson’s own color photographs (though it is a shame that the matte paper the pictures are printed on fails to show them to their best advantage).
Through all of these wide-ranging considerations, Robinson’s personal knowledge of this place and his curiosity to learn more are palpable. In particular, his chapters on the names of various Sierra places (which he categorizes as “The Good,” “The Bad” and “The Ugly”) make a compelling case for reconsidering how we think about place names not only in the Sierra but elsewhere. This encourages genuine investigation about why and for whom places got their names and considers if renaming them might be part of a process of reducing harm.
Most profoundly --- and this, I suspect, is where his background as a science fiction writer, especially one grappling with the climate crisis, comes in --- Robinson shows, in countless moving and wise ways, what a landscape like the High Sierra can illustrate about deep ecology, deep time, and what we can both learn from and owe to the peoples who populated these mountains for thousands of years, not to mention the varied species of animals that still roam there.
Robinson’s personal love story with the Sierra is a significant one, but it’s just one of countless stories of this place --- stories with human and non-human characters, stories in which the mountains, although perhaps not quite everlasting, still outlast almost everything else we know of.
Teaser
Kim Stanley Robinson first ventured into the Sierra Nevada mountains during the summer of 1973. He returned from that encounter a changed man, awed by a landscape that made him feel as if he were simultaneously strolling through an art museum and scrambling on a jungle gym like an energized child. He has returned to the mountains throughout his life --- more than a hundred trips --- and has gathered a vast store of knowledge about them. THE HIGH SIERRA is his lavish celebration of this exceptional place and an exploration of what makes this span of mountains one of the most compelling places on Earth.
Promo
Kim Stanley Robinson first ventured into the Sierra Nevada mountains during the summer of 1973. He returned from that encounter a changed man, awed by a landscape that made him feel as if he were simultaneously strolling through an art museum and scrambling on a jungle gym like an energized child. He has returned to the mountains throughout his life --- more than a hundred trips --- and has gathered a vast store of knowledge about them. THE HIGH SIERRA is his lavish celebration of this exceptional place and an exploration of what makes this span of mountains one of the most compelling places on Earth.
About the Book
A “sublime” and “radically original” exploration of the Sierra Nevadas, the best mountains on Earth for hiking and camping, from New York Times bestselling novelist Kim Stanley Robinson (Bill McKibben, Gary Snyder).
Kim Stanley Robinson first ventured into the Sierra Nevada mountains during the summer of 1973. He returned from that encounter a changed man, awed by a landscape that made him feel as if he were simultaneously strolling through an art museum and scrambling on a jungle gym like an energized child. He has returned to the mountains throughout his life --- more than a hundred trips --- and has gathered a vast store of knowledge about them. THE HIGH SIERRA is his lavish celebration of this exceptional place and an exploration of what makes this span of mountains one of the most compelling places on Earth.
Over the course of a vivid and dramatic narrative, Robinson describes the geological forces that shaped the Sierras and the history of its exploration, going back to the indigenous peoples who made it home and whose traces can still be found today. He celebrates the people whose ideas and actions protected the High Sierra for future generations. He describes uniquely beautiful hikes and the trails to be avoided. Robinson’s own life-altering events, defining relationships and unforgettable adventures form the narrative’s spine. And he illuminates the human communion with the wild and with the sublime, including the personal growth that only seems to come from time spent outdoors.
THE HIGH SIERRA is a gorgeous, absorbing immersion in a place, born out of a desire to understand and share one of the greatest rapture-inducing experiences our planet offers. Packed with maps, gear advice, more than 100 breathtaking photos and much more, it will inspire veteran hikers, casual walkers and travel readers to prepare for a magnificent adventure.
Audiobook available, read by Kim Stanley Robinson
