A walk in the woods - Bill Bryson - Audio book review

Posted by admin on Apr 22, 2011

I started on Bryson’s A short history of nearly everything a long, long time ago. It bored me to tears. Load of jumbled, disjointed stories piled on top of each other, or that’s as far as I got anyway. So when I accidentally stumbled on A walk in the woods I wasn’t expecting much. And I was ever so pleasantly surprised!

You know when you read a book and you want everyone you love to read that book as well? They don’t come by that often, for me, but David Guterson’s East of the mountains was one, and Michael Cunningham’s The Hours. Wow. Unlike those two books, who are deeply moving and, I thought, life altering in their sheer beauty, A walk in the woods is just very, very funny. Bryson has moved back to the US after 20 years in Britain, to a village, somewhere in New Hampshire. The famous Appalachian Trail basically runs through his backyard, so he decides he should walk the darn thing. Mind you: the Trail runs for 2100 miles, through inhospitable terrain, from Springer Mountain in Georgia to Mount Katahdin in Maine. Definitely not a walk in the park!

Bryson tells everyone he knows, and, I expect, his publisher as well, so he can’t back out anymore, when he starts reading up on the Trail, and all the stuff that can go wrong. Grizzly bears. Cougars. Mad men. Snakes. Freezing to death. To name a few. So Bill decides he really needs a companion, if only so he has someone to say “Did you hear that?” to. And doesn’t have to die alone.

There aren’t many takers and the date of his departure is looming when an unlikely old friend called Katz offers to come with him. Not the fittest of prospective walking comrades, “he brought to mind Orson Welles after a very bad night.” And this is where the fun really starts! I won’t say anymore, but it turns out to be a riotously funny adventure, and it made me think that a) I really want to do some long distance walking and b) that won’t be anywhere near the Appalachian Trail!

Bryson reads his own work and as practically always that really enhances the listening experience. He’s self deprecating, which I like, and he has a pleasant voice. Go on, give it whirl!