Here are 44 books that A Beautiful Work In Progress fans have personally recommended if you like
A Beautiful Work In Progress.
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I didn’t really take up hiking until I was in my 30s, but outdoor adventures have become a way of life. I love walking along a trail, marveling at my surroundings and wondering what new delight I’ll discover around the next bend or over the next hill. Upon turning 70, I tackled my most challenging walk yet – trekking over 250 miles along the spectacular South West Coast Path in Cornwall, England. I found the immersion in focusing solely on walking each day to be both meditative and uplifting. The books on this list reflect my love for the outdoors, with some inspiring me to try something new, while others I prefer to experience vicariously.
This fascinating history about hiking the Appalachian Trail spotlights a woman who demonstrated that age and gender aren't barriers to remarkable physical feats. Or should I say "feet"?
Grandma Gatewood was a pioneer, not only for women trekking alone, but for people of any age who set out on a journey others say isn’t possible for them. I was inspired by her story to take on a journey I thought would be marvelous, but beyond my capabilities. And I made it happen!
2014 National Outdoor Book Award Winner in History / Biography
Emma Gatewood told her family she was going on a walk and left her small Ohio hometown with a change of clothes and less than two hundred dollars. The next anybody heard from her, this genteel, farm-reared, sixty-seven-year-old great-grandmother had walked 800 miles along the 2,050-mile Appalachian Trail. By September 1955 she stood atop Maine’s Mount Katahdin, sang “America, the Beautiful,” and proclaimed, “I said I’ll do it, and I’ve done it.”
Driven by a painful marriage, Grandma Gatewood not only hiked the trail alone, she was the first person—man…
Jennifer Pharr Davis has covered over 14,000 miles - and explored trails on six different continents - and in all fifty states. In 2011 she set a record on the Appalachian Trail by covering 2,190 mile miles in 46 days (an average of 47 miles per day). Jennifer is a National Geographic Adventurer of the Year and a member of the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition.
Carol Ruckdeschel is one of the foremost naturalists of our time. The majority of her learning did not come from books or classrooms but from tens of thousands of hours spent outdoors studying animals and their environment. A book that leaves you feeling more wild.
Carol Ruckdeschel is the wildest woman in America. She wrestles alligators, eats roadkill, rides horses bareback, and lives in a ramshackle cabin that she built by hand in an island wilderness. A combination of Henry David Thoreau and Jane Goodall, Carol is a self-taught scientist who has become a tireless defender of sea turtles on Cumberland Island, a national park off the coast of Georgia.
Cumberland, the country’s largest and most biologically diverse barrier island, is celebrated for its windswept dunes and feral horses. Steel magnate Thomas Carnegie once owned much of the island, and in recent years, Carnegie heirs…
Jennifer Pharr Davis has covered over 14,000 miles - and explored trails on six different continents - and in all fifty states. In 2011 she set a record on the Appalachian Trail by covering 2,190 mile miles in 46 days (an average of 47 miles per day). Jennifer is a National Geographic Adventurer of the Year and a member of the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition.
Hikers come in all colors, shapes, and sizes. Kara proves that the summit does not belong to people who look like Patagonia models, but to anyone who is willing to carry their weight and offload their burdens. An inspiring read for anyone who wants to climb Kilimanjaro and individuals who have dealt with eating disorders.
Kara knew she could reach the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro. She had done it once before. That's why, when she failed in a second attempt, it brought her so low. As she struggled with food addiction and looked for ways to cope with feelings of failure and shame, Kara's weight shot to more than 300 pounds. Deep in her personal gorge, Kara realized the only way out was up. She resolved to climb the mountain again,and this time, she would reach the summit without waiting for her plus-sized status to disappear. Gorge: My Journey Up Kilimanjaro at 300 Pounds is…
I’m a former indoor kid and big-city girl, and I never imagined I’d wind up spending months of each year pooping in the woods—by choice! But walking all day every day on footpaths through the wilderness has become one of the greatest loves of my life, and I’m so glad to have books by other adventurous folks to keep me company when I’m back at home. I’ve written two of these books myself: How To Be Alone and What We Owe to Ourselves. I also write a weekly newsletter called Wild Letters, where I share honest stories of self-exploration both on and off the trail.
This story of Heather’s record-setting hike on the Appalachian Trail absolutely blew my mind: 2,180 miles in just 54 days!
I was so enthralled by the grit it takes to push yourself to this kind of extreme (through rain, sleep deprivation, physical deterioration, and more), which combined with Heather’s raw honesty about her initial lack of self-belief just made me want to root for her louder and louder.
I’m forever fascinated by chosen suffering—why we often crave hard things and how the pursuit of them changes us—and this no-holds-barred look into the world of competitive hiking was a delight to read.
Despite her success setting a self-supported Fastest Known Time record on the Pacific Crest Trail in 2013, Heather “Anish” Anderson still had such deep-seated insecurities that she became convinced her feat had been a fluke. So two years later she set out again, this time hiking through mud, rocks, and mountain blazes to crush her constant self-doubt and seek the true source of her strength and purpose.
The 2,180 miles of the Appalachian Trail, from Maine to Georgia, did not make it easy. Anderson struggled with its infamous rain, humidity, insects, and steep grades for 54 days. But because she…
When I was a journalist, writing about health and fitness for women’s magazines and national newspapers, I had a strong sense that much of the advice being doled out by personal trainers and other ‘experts’ was dubious, to say the least. I decided to see for myself, embarking on an Exercise and Sport Science degree and training as a running coach. Two decades on, with a handful of running books and a 13-year-strong column in Runner’s World to my name, I still like to delve into the science underpinning physical activity to see if it really stands up, and if so, for who, and under what circumstances?
This must be one of the most widely read running books. For good reason – it’s a great read – exciting story, quirky characters – by an excellent journalist.
But at the heart of it lies one question: ‘Why does my foot hurt?’ McDougall’s quest to find out, his deep dive into the evidence underpinning many accepted aspects of the ‘science’ of running, is what influenced me as a runner, and as a coach.
Why do runners wear built-up shoes? Why do runners only move their bodies in one plane of motion and expect to have all-round fitness? Why do so many people lose the joy in running? Why don’t we eat salad for breakfast? If you read this book, and change nothing about your running, I’ll be surprised.
At the heart of Born to Run lies a mysterious tribe of Mexican Indians, the Tarahumara, who live quietly in canyons and are reputed to be the best distance runners in the world; in 1993, one of them, aged 57, came first in a prestigious 100-mile race wearing a toga and sandals. A small group of the world's top ultra-runners (and the awe-inspiring author) make the treacherous journey into the canyons to try to learn the tribe's secrets and then take them on over a course 50 miles long.
With incredible energy and smart observation, McDougall tells this story while…
An internationally recognized endurance athlete and New York Times bestselling author, Dean Karnazes has pushed his body and mind to inconceivable limits. Among his many accomplishments, he has run 350 continuous miles, foregoing sleep for three nights. He's run across Death Valley in 120-degree temperatures, and run a marathon to the South Pole in negative 40 degrees. On ten different occasions, he's run a 200-mile relay race solo, racing alongside teams of twelve. His long list of competitive achievements include winning the world's toughest footrace, the Badwater Ultramarathon, running 135 miles nonstop across Death Valley during the middle of summer. His most recent endeavor was running 50 marathons, in all 50 US states, in 50 consecutive days, finishing with the NYC Marathon, which he ran in three hours flat.
To say Charlie Engle has led a colorful life would be putting things mildly. An addict and alcoholic, after nearly losing his life to a hail of bullets, Charlie turned to running as his savior.
After a decade-long addiction to crack cocaine and alcohol, Charlie Engle hit rock bottom after a near-fatal six-day binge ended in a hail of bullets. Then he found running, and it has helped keep him sober, focused and alive. He began to take on the most extreme endurance races, such as the 155-mile Gobi March, and developed a reputation as an inspirational speaker. However, after he made the documentary Running the Sahara, narrated by Matt Damon, which followed him on a 4500-mile crossing of the desert and helped raise $6 million, he was sent to prison after failing to complete…
I think that we’re all a Work In Progress whatever our relative levels of success so I’m drawn to people who share that belief, are way out there and are still working on their own stuff. Especially if they’ve managed to do so without becoming a righteous arse in the process.
‘Cos I want reasons to be reminded how incredible it can be to use as much of what we’ve been given and be ALIVE in every sense of the word. I want to keep learning and growing and getting stronger and faster and more bombproof and compassionate and connected as I moved through my fifth decade and beyond. These books really resonate with me – I hope they will for you too.
Britain used to be a hotbed of marathon talent that ruled the world over 26.2 miles decades before Lottery funding. This is a collection of 21 interviews of men and women who left their mark on the sport often by force of will alone. For those of us who grew up watching these people – and I was one - this is the how and why they did it which at the time was the bit that was never really in the spotlight. So it squares the circle for me. And for those of you who came later – welcome to Old School…
After the running boom of the 1980s, British marathon running standards gradually started to decline. This was despite the continued advancements in scientific backup, training methods, equipment, full-time professionalism and sponsorship. As a consequence, in the late 1990s, Gabrielle Collison decided to research the factors as to why this was happening and conducted interviews with some of the top British marathon runners from the previous era. Interviewees include London Marathon winners: Hugh Jones, Mike Gratton, Veronique Marot and Joyce Smith; Olympic bronze medallist, Charlie Spedding; and several other "Big City" marathon winners. The stories about their lifestyles and training make…
When I became a minimalist, I found that having less made my household chores so much easier. Before then, I thought I was a loser who lets dirty dishes and laundry pile up. But when my environment changed, what I had believed was my personality also shifted. Once my apartment was tidy, it became a habit to do the dishes right away and vacuum the floor before going out, and my life became consistently enjoyable. But other habits were harder nuts to crack, like quitting drinking or exercising regularly. In Hello, Habits I write about my journey of acquiring these habits through a process of trial and error.
What really fascinates me about Haruki Murakami is not his body of work per se, but the process through which he rose from anonymity and became a world-renowned author. Until he was 29, he’d never imagined he had the talent to write a novel. Before his rise to fame, novelists were known to live a wild and intemperate existence, drinking lots of alcohol into the wee hours and getting started on their manuscript past deadline. Murakami, however, broke this stereotype as someone who wakes up early, works out every day, and has run multiple full marathons. I have no doubt it was the power of his habits that made him a world-famous author. He even says his motto is to turn himself into “a creature of habits.”
A compelling mediation on the power of running and a fascinating insight into the life of this internationally bestselling writer. A perfect reading companion for runners.
In 1982, having sold his jazz bar to devote himself to writing, Murakami began running to keep fit. A year later, he'd completed a solo course from Athens to Marathon, and now, after dozens of such races, he reflects upon the influence the sport has had on his life and on his writing.
Equal parts travelogue, training log and reminiscence, this revealing memoir covers his four-month preparation for…
Writing the Olga book was a privilege in several senses. I got to hang out for five years with a remarkable human who kicked my butt (in the nicest possible way) and pulled me out of a midlife funk with the example of her indomitable spirit. Just as significantly, I got to delve deeply into the question of What makes some people almost … bulletproof? To what degree is healthy aging, well … a choice? This is really all a writer can ask for: to stumble on a subject that will never exhaust itself, that will just continue to open new angles. One way or another, I keep writing about Olga, and I suspect I always will.
An absolute denominator of life is resistance. Nietzsche had it right: adversity helps so long as it doesn’t do us in, and we make the biggest changes in our life when life pushes back. That applies to longevity too; the kites that stay longest in the air are pinned there by resistance. John Jerome gets this. This isn’t a book about longevity, it’s a book about running – slight but wise, with a kind of shopcraft-as-soulcraft turn of mind, if you think of your own body as the machine in the shop. Really, the book is a defense of stretching, in every sense of the word. You have to make periodic jaunts to “edge city,” where you eat the beans of just-manageable difficulty.
Takeaway sentence: “Heroism is endurance for one moment longer.”
All runners, from beginners to Olympians, will delight in this luminous compendium of wisdom wrought from many years of running. Applying his clear vision and wry wit to a smorgasbord of running-related topics, including stretching, dancing, bugs, falling, spaghetti, sweat, and the food police, John Jerome shares his contagious passion for the most basic of sports. Stripping the art of running down to its barest elements, he takes readers and runners with him on a joyous journey -- a run that revels in a profound affection and respect for the single sport that is as pure and simple as it…
I have been a runner for 50 years and a coach for 30 years. From 2001-2016 I was the coach of Team USA Minnesota Distance Training Center. During that time I coached 24 U.S. National Champions, including an Olympian & 2 USATF Running Circuit Champions, at 1500 meters, 3000 meters, and 10,000 meters on the track; the mile, 10k, 15k, 10 miles, half-marathon, 20k, 25k, and marathon on the road; 4k, 6k, 8k and 10k in cross country. Athletes I coached qualified for 30 U.S. national teams competing in IAAF World Championships in cross country, indoor track, outdoor track, and road, and achieved 73 top-three finishes in U.S. Championships.
Murphy writes about the early years of women’s distance running as women discover their desire and ability to run long, and push for acceptance to participate. It traces the experience of the first competitive female long-distance runners who laid the groundwork for the next generation of girls and women runners to begin to experience the benefits.
The Silence of Great Distance is the story of the developing world of women's athletics, focused on long-distance runnning. With significant chapters on Doris Brown Heritage, the women of the Soviet Union, and Mary Decker Slaney, the primary narrative is carried by Stephanie Herbst, a nine-time all-American who competed for the University of Wisconsin between 1984 and 1988.
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