Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

 Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer-215 pages

⭐⭐⭐

Goodreads Synopsis: In April 1992 a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. His name was Christopher Johnson McCandless. He had given $25,000 in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter. How McCandless came to die is the unforgettable story of Into the Wild.

Immediately after graduating from college in 1991, McCandless had roamed through the West and Southwest on a vision quest like those made by his heroes Jack London and John Muir. In the Mojave Desert he abandoned his car, stripped it of its license plates, and burned all of his cash. He would give himself a new name, Alexander Supertramp, and , unencumbered by money and belongings, he would be free to wallow in the raw, unfiltered experiences that nature presented. Craving a blank spot on the map, McCandless simply threw the maps away. Leaving behind his desperate parents and sister, he vanished into the wild.

Thoughts: This was our latest read for the Anything Goes Book Club. It's pretty good and presents a compelling story about McCandless and his escapades. However, much of the Alaskan wilderness part of the story is Krakauer's speculation based on limited evidence and information. McCandless' journal of his time in interior Alaska is only 430 words, so there's very little for Krakauer (or any reader) to glean based on it, but Krakauer tries. There are some of the opinion that this book should be categorized as fiction because of the rampant speculation. I wouldn't go that far, but it is a lot of speculation. Overall, it's a decent read, but it doesn't get full marks.