For me, it has to be Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer and the world of survival nonfiction. Everything about this book just seemed to work in his favor helping him make this incredible book. It is his personal account of a Mt Everest climb that went terribly wrong with people dying. He is an author and was sent to tag along on this expedition but in doing so, they ran into incredible hardship. Into Thin Air works so well because you get a first hand account of what went on by someone who is already an author and can create tension, drama and stress. This whole book just felt like an endless shot of adrenaline. I’ve gone on to read:
-“The Indifferent Stars Above” about the Donner party
-“Alive” and the story about the Uruguayan rugby team that crashed in the Andes and resorted to cannibalism
-“In the Heart of the Sea” about a sperm whale that struck and sank a ship, inspiring Moby Dick
by SerDire
3 Comments
Beserk manga series got me super into Dark Fantasy
Good Country People by Flannery O’Connor and her short stories in general got me so obsessed with “southern gothic” as a vague literary term. Now I’m a sucker for anything even remotely related to that kind of decaying once-noble once-industrious family trope. I live in rural Australia and can’t drive for five minutes without seeing the rusted ruins of some grain factory or wool shed or grand old house. Funnily enough I find the same genre set in Australia to be less interesting and I wonder if rural Americans feel the same way about stories set in their country.
I feel so blessed to be alive at a time when the Coen brothers are making films and stuff like True Detective is coming out. Authors like Amelia Gray are keeping the writing alive too.
Beautiful Boy by David Sheff really sparked my obsession with memoirs.
I read it back in 2020 and followed it up with 25 more memoirs. It was the only genre I read for awhile.