Adventure Biography

"In Paris (or anywhere else, really) a table for one can be a most delightful place." --Alone Time, as seen in The New York Times A wise, passionate account of the pleasures of traveling solo In our increasingly frantic daily lives, many people are genuinely fearful of the prospect of solitude...

On 30 January, 1981 Joe Tasker and Ade Burgess stood at 24,000 feet on the west ridge of Mount Everest. Below them were their companions, some exhausted, some crippled by illness, all virtually incapacitated. Further progress seemed impossible. Everest the Cruel Way is Joe Tasker's story of an attempt to climb the highest mountain on earth - an attempt which pushed a group of Britain's finest mountaineers to their limits. The goal had been to climb Mount Everest at its hardest: via the infamous west ridge, without supplementary oxygen and in winter.

Meet Doctor Ben MacFarlane - a very modern flying doctor. His job is get on a plane and bring patients home after holiday disasters, gap year crises, embarrassing incidents on business trips and all the other things that can go wrong when we head overseas. Holiday SOS is his extraordinary story. It’s a unique medical memoir of the people he helps - and a year in the life of one of the world’s most frequent flyers!

Douglas Mawson, born in 1882 and knighted in 1914, was Australia’s greatest Antarctic explorer. On 2 December 1911, he led an expedition from Hobart to explore the virgin frozen coastline below, 2000 miles of which had never felt the tread of a human foot. After setting up Main Base at Cape Denision and Western Base on Queen Mary Land, he headed east on an extraordinary sledging trek with his companions, Belgrave Ninnis and Dr Xavier Mertz. After tragedy struck, Mawson found himself all alone, 160 miles from safety, with next to no food.

Under Egypt’s wind-swept sands, mummies and breathtaking treasure await those savvy and daring enough to seek them out. Intrepid archaeologist Zahi Hawass is one such adventurer, having made major discoveries in the pyramids at Giza and the Valley of the Golden Mummies.

A stunning debut; a Departures original publication. The ultimate survival story; a wild ride—the wildest—down a South American river in the thick of the Amazon Basin; a true and thrilling adventure of a young married couple who survive a plane crash only to later raft hundreds of miles...

“One of the finest wordsmiths in modern sport . . . with infectious passion and singular craft [Smith] has created a truly fabulous and unique piece of work. On the Grid is incredibly special. I loved every thoughtfully written word.” —Will Buxton, award-winning broadcaster, star of Drive...

On this unique audio program, Sylvia dispels the popular myths about angels, spirit guides, and ghosts. With her trademark candor, she explains that you can communicate with your angels and guides, and that they're here to help you along your journey. In addition, she covers topics from...

Joseph Plumb Martin (1760-1850) was a soldier in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. Martin participated in the Battles of Brooklyn, the White Plains and Monmouth, and the siege of Fort Mifflin, and the Battle of Monmouth. The Adventures of a Revolutionary Soldier relates the adventures of a young private serving his country under terrible conditions. There are engaging accounts of army life, adventures, dangers, and suffering during the years 1776-1783.

As a child, Maggie Downs often doubted that she would ever possess the courage to visit the destinations her mother dreamed of one day seeing. "You are braver than you think," her mother always insisted. That statement would guide her as, over the course of one year, Downs backpacked through seventeen countries - visiting all the places her mother, struck with early-onset Alzheimer's disease, could not visit herself - encountering some of the world's most striking locales while confronting the slow loss of her mother.

One of The Economist's 2011 Books of the Year THE TRUE BUT UNLIKELY STORIES OF LIVES DEVOTED―ABSURDLY! MELANCHOLICALLY! BEAUTIFULLY!―TO THE RUSSIAN CLASSICS No one who read Elif Batuman's first article (in the journal n+1) will ever forget it. "Babel in California" told the true story of...

"I never set out to hike 10,000 miles. It just sort of happened over the course of a decade." And so goes Lawton Grinter's compelling collection of short stories that have been over ten years and 10,000 trail miles in the making. I Hike brings the reader trailside with blissful moments on the highest mountain ridges to the mental lows of mosquito hell and into some peculiar situations that even seasoned hikers may find unbelievable.

Flying helicopters is more dangerous than flying fixed-wing aircraft - and helicopter rescue is one of the most dangerous occupations on earth. Now, Col. Fleming takes listeners along for a bracing ride as he recounts the most thrilling episodes of his long career. With all the nail-biting excitement of a thriller, Heart of the Storm brings to life dramatic jungle rescues in the Philippines, the longest helicopter rescue mission in history to save crew members of a Ukrainian freighter 840 miles off the coast of Nova Scotia, and many more.

The Age Of Turbulence is Alan Greenspan’s incomparable reckoning with the contemporary financial world, channeled through his own experiences working in the command room of the global economy longer and with greater effect than any other single living figure. Following the arc of his...

Packed with intrigue, high-stakes schemes, and adrenalin-fueled action on-and-off the track, the brilliant and gripping inside story of Formula One’s most fascinating, swagger-rich, and win-at-all-costs team, Red Bull, now celebrating its twentieth anniversary. A propulsive, dramatic thrill...

The amazing true story of pilot Tammie Jo Shults for young readers! This autobiography of a woman aviator overcoming gender bias to achieve her dreams will inspire young people to work hard toward their goals, never give up, and stand firm in who God created them to be. A must-read memoir for...

Poland, 1940. The Russian army invades the beautiful city streets of Vilna. Soldiers storm 10-year-old Esther Rudomin's house and arrest her entire family. The Rudomins, the soldiers say, are "capitalists - enemies of the people". Forced from their home and friends, the Rudomins are herded onto crowded cattle cars. Their destination: the endless steppe of Siberia.

The companion volume to Ken Burns's PBS documentary film, with more than 150 illustrations, most in full color. In the spring of 1804, at the behest of President oThomas Jefferson, a party of explorers called the Corps of oDiscovery crossed the Mississippi River and started up the Missouri...

Erik Weihenmayer was born with retinoscheses, a degenerative eye disorder that would leave him blind by the age of 13. But Erik was determined to rise above this devastating disability and lead a fulfilling and exciting life. In this poignant and inspiring memoir, he shares his struggle to push past the limits imposed on him by his visual impairment - and by a seeing world.

Pop Song is a book about love and about falling in love - with a place, or a painting, or a person - and the joy and terror inherent in the experience of that love. Plumbing the well of culture for clues and patterns about love and loss - from Agnes Martin's abstract paintings to James Turrell's transcendent light works, and Anne Carson's Eros the Bittersweet to Frank Ocean's Blonde - Larissa Pham writes of her youthful attempts to find meaning in travel, sex, drugs, and art, before sensing that she might need to turn her gaze upon herself.