Wild by Cheryl Strayed - Review

WILD:

From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

by Cheryl Strayed

I put this book on my summer read list, longing for adventure, and wow what a ride has been! I loved it.

After finishing the book I needed a moment to collect my thoughts, it felt like the end of a journey where you look at all the photo you took and feel both happy and nostalgic.

Wild is Cheryl Strayed's memoir, of her experience hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State - and what brought her on this trail.

At twenty-two, Cheryl's mother dies, she was her fixed point, her friend. With her death, everything else comes loose in her life, her family scattered and her marriage is soon destroyed with her own hand. Four years later, felling empty of everything but grief, with nothing more to lose, she makes the impulsive decision of starting the PCT. She has no experience or training, she os alone with her will to keep pushing herself. This journey will test her, feeling frighten, dirty, exhausted, lost - only to be found.

This memoir is extremely well written. It reads like a novel, it's exciting, adventurous and will keep your mind on the book even when you are not reading it.

Cheryl emotions and feelings, are strong and raw, she found the perfect word to portray how she felt during that crucial stage of her life. What struggle, both mental and physical, her hiking the Pacific Trail has been. She strips of all her feeling, good and bad, using strong words and powerful images.

"God was not a granter of wishes. God was a ruthless bitch."

Her display of visceral emotion, makes you feel with her how unbearable it is to lose her mum, how taken her away, the whole castle falls apart, because she was the one making it stand.

It's hard to understand why life put us in front of some big challenges, she makes us tremble and fall. But what this book shows it's how important it is to pick up from there, to let things go, freeing yourself of some burden, without why and what if.

Beyond the emotional pull, it's an adventure story. We see the physical straggle Strayed had to face during her trail: from rattlesnakes, bears and the most dangerous of them all humans, to dehydration, bruises and destroyed feet. She was unprepared for this journey, but her strong character will make her push on.

It was wonderful to read about such a strong, vivid woman. The book is well balanced between sad, hopeful and more rare funny moments. I enjoyed reading it a lot, it made me long for adventure. So imagine when I found out a movie was made I was totally on it. Here is my Book vs Movie post.

4.5/5 STARS

Here is a book talk with Cheryl Strayed: