Outdoor Survival

This anthology of survival stories covers the craziest and most enthralling wilderness encounters in American history. After mining our 126-year archive, we uncovered 10 tales of adventure and near tragedy that include close calls with aggressive grizzly bears, epic blizzards, hungry wolves, and much more. The thread that ties all of these narratives together is the authors’ grit and will to preserve — and then tell the tale.

After her plane crashes, a 17-year-old girl spends 11 days walking through the Peruvian jungle. Against all odds, with no food, shelter, or equipment, she gets out. A better equipped group of adult survivors of the same crash sits down and dies. What makes the difference?

Would you survive? Vince Walker and the remaining survivors from the town of Cloverdale, Indiana continue to come to terms with their new reality. Accepting the fact that the country has been thrust into nuclear war with an unknown enemy means they must forget their former lives and forge ahead. The affects of the EMP blasts have left the survivors with no utilities, and no communication with the world outside of their once sleepy little town. A power surge also resulted in widespread fires, destroying most buildings and homes, leaving few resources intact.

The legendary American outdoor writer’s finest collection. For decades, Gene Hill’s articles and books have captured the spirit of the outdoors in a way that inspires and entertains millions of readers. A Hunter’s Fireside Book captures the essence of the life of a sportsman and explores the full spectrum of the hunter’s experience: sunrises in the duck blind, an unforgettable hunter’s moon, the camaraderie of men who know the pleasures of being wet and cold and a little bit lost.

Lightning and bugs and bears - oh my! This handy guidebook provides basic tips and tricks to surviving in the wilderness, including sheltering against weather extremes, battling bugs, and fending off meddlesome animals. OUTDOOR ADVENTURE GUIDES will have first-time campers and enthusiasts alike opting outside.

Like most college students, all Callie Norton has worried about for weeks was passing this semester’s finals. After a night out celebrating, she and her friends wake up, sick with way more than the hangover of the century. All too soon, Callie realizes that this is not just a common cold she’s suffering from—and when she wakes up from a coma in a quarantine tent as the sole survivor, lack of food and water aren’t her only problems.

There’s unrivaled beauty in the off-grid life, and it can be viewed as a treasure, not just a survival plan. It’s the pathway to a better life – a life in which you can forget the rat race and replace it with fresh homegrown foods and an appreciation of what the world around you truly has to offer.

In May of 1963, Seattle mountaineer Jim Whittaker stepped into world history by becoming the first American to summit Mount Everest. More than 50 years later, he is still regarded as a seminal figure in North American mountaineering, as well as an astute businessman who helped create the outdoor recreation industry. A Life on the Edge: Memoirs of Everest and Beyond is Jim's courageous, no-punches-pulled autobiography and a look at a peripatetic, sometimes difficult life.

On a beautiful summer afternoon in 1998, Dan Stephens, a 22-year-old canoeist, was leading a trip deep into Ontario's Quetico Provincial Park. He stepped into a gap among cedar trees to look for the next portage - and did not return. More than four hours later, Dan awakened from a fall with a lump on his head and stumbled deeper into the woods, confused. Three years later, Jason Rasmussen, a third-year medical student who loved the forest's solitude, walked alone into the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness on a crisp fall day.

Freeze up in a crisis? Panic in the unknown? Doubt your ability to lead yourself or others through chaos? The truth is, most survival books focus on gear and techniques—but forget the most important tool of all: your mind. Mental breakdowns—not broken equipment—are what get people killed in survival scenarios.

In Wild Men, Wild Alaska professional hunting and fishing guide and outfitter Rocky McElveen tells the stories of his own adventures as well as those of some of his well-known clients. The book takes listeners directly into the Alaskan bush, and shares the intense challenges of a majestic wilderness that pushes a man to his limits.

After an epic battle, the weapon is lost, but Atlas won’t succumb so easily. He’s vanished with the key to humanity’s survival, and David Bryce is left to fight on his own. Atlas finds himself in the middle of a hornet’s nest, amid an alien people that he can hardly comprehend. But their motivations are clear, and that’s enough to keep him focused on retrieving the prize.

Stephen Alter was raised by American missionary parents in the hill station of Mussoorie, in the foothills of the Himalayas, where he and his wife Ameeta, now live. Their idyllic existence was brutally interrupted when four armed intruders invaded their house and viciously attacked them, leaving them for dead. The violent assault and the trauma of almost dying left him questioning assumptions he had lived by since childhood. For the first time, he encountered the face of evil and the terror of the unknown.

This true-life wilderness survival epic recounts 17-year-old Alex Messenger's near-lethal encounter with a grizzly bear during a canoe trip in the Canadian tundra. The story follows Alex and his five companions as they paddle north through harrowing rapids and stunning terrain. Twenty-nine days into the trip, while out hiking alone, Alex is attacked by a barren-ground grizzly. Left for dead, he wakes to find that his summer adventure has become a struggle to stay alive.

When Chick Ferguson made plans to go to the Yukon, he wasn’t planning on taking his newlywed Mary. He definitely was not planning on spending much of the next 18 years in the wilderness. For he was just a photographer with a little studio in a little town in Montana. His business was failing and having heard of the riches of the fur trade he was hoping to spend a year or two trapping, making a stake and returning to his routine life. But he didn’t figure on love....

It’s December 1997, and a man-eating tiger is on the prowl outside a remote village in Russia’s Far East. The tiger isn’t just killing people, it’s annihilating them, and a team of men and their dogs must hunt it on foot through the forest in the brutal cold. As the trackers sift through...

Former Navy SEAL and preeminent American survivalist Cade Courtley delivers step-by-step instructions anyone can master in this user-friendly guide. From random shootings to deadly wildfires to terrorist attacks, the reality is that modern life is unpredictable and dangerous. Don't live in fear or rely on luck. Learn the SEAL mindset: Be prepared, feel confident, step up, and know exactly how to survive any life-threatening situation.

Curious how your child can become a young wilderness expert? Want to nurture your child's love for nature and adventure safely? Looking for a way to boost your child's confidence and independence outdoors? Empower Your Child with Essential Survival Skills!

No one in the small, west Texas town of Shadow Ridge knows what took down the power grid, or when it's going to be back up, but everyone knows exactly where they were the moment it went down. And now, with no electricity, no internet, and no modern technology, the men and women responsible for keeping the town safe are going to have to learn how to fight crime all over again. When one of the men in charge of storing food for the town of Shadow Ridge is found murdered execution style, it's up to Jace McQuaid to find the killer.

Gail Muller was told she’d be in a wheelchair by the age of 40. At 41, she set out to hike one of the world’s toughest treks: the Appalachian Trail - a 2,200-mile journey that would help her reclaim her life and heal her mind and body. An inspiring, moving, and uplifting memoir for fans of Cheryl Strayed’s Wild and Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love.