Book Spotlight
TWO Client Recommendations
Our books this month come not from our crack editorial staff, but from a longtime client. Let’s hear from Alan Y…
On 4/1/2025 9:18 AM, Alan Y. wrote:
Alan here. Just read through the Newsletter and Loved the Making Changes Around the Shop!! This one was right up Tom’s alley. Loved the insanity of it, and the lack of any material justification… So Funny!!!!!! Great April Fools joke! On another note – I just used a very thoughtful Gift Cert you guys gave me a while back. I purchased two books from Wallace Books. Same author – Kevin Fedarko – the first is The Emerald Mile – a must read if you have any interest in the Grand Canyon. The 2nd is A Walk in the Park – just published in 2023 – another riveting tale about the Grand Canyon. I highly recommend both of them.
Thanks Alan! Here are the books he recommended. Hope you enjoy them!
The Emerald Mile– from the publisher “In the spring of 1983, massive flooding along the length of the Colorado River confronted a team of engineers at the Glen Canyon Dam with an unprecedented emergency that may have resulted in the most catastrophic dam failure in history. In the midst of this crisis, the decision to launch a small wooden dory named “The Emerald Mile” at the head of the Grand Canyon, just fifteen miles downstream from the Glen Canyon Dam, seemed not just odd, but downright suicidal.
The Emerald Mile, at one time slated to be destroyed, was rescued and brought back to life by Kenton Grua, the man at the oars, who intended to use this flood as a kind of hydraulic sling-shot. The goal was to nail the all-time record for the fastest boat ever propelled — by oar, by motor, or by the grace of God himself — down the entire length of the Colorado River from Lee’s Ferry to Lake Mead. Did he survive? Just barely. Now, this remarkable, epic feat unfolds here, in The Emerald Mile.”
A Walk In The Park– from the publisher “Two friends, zero preparation, one dream. A few years after quitting his job to follow an ill-advised dream of becoming a guide on the Colorado River, Kevin Fedarko was approached by his best friend, National Geographic photographer Pete McBride, with a vision as bold as it was harebrained. Together, they would embark on an end-to-end traverse of the Grand Canyon, a journey that, McBride promised, would be “a walk in the park.” Against his better judgment, Fedarko agreed, unaware that the small cluster of experts who had completed the crossing billed it as “the toughest hike in the world.”
The ensuing ordeal, which lasted more than a year, revealed a place that was deeper, richer, and far more complex than anything the two men had imagined – and came within a hair’s breadth of killing them both. They struggled to make their way through a vertical labyrinth of thousand-foot cliffs and crumbling ledges where water is measured out by the teaspoon and every step is fraught with peril – and where, even today, there is still no trail along the length of the country’s best-known and most iconic park.”
The BOOK SPOTLIGHT at Wallace Books- We always link our Book Spotlight to Powells.com so you can order the book if you’re interested, but it’s also available Sellwood’s Wallace Books, in the “Tom Dwyer Book Spotlight” display. Check it out!
