Awards

• Winner of National Outdoor Book Awards (History/Biography) 2013
• Winner of Reading the West (Nonfiction) 2013

Overview

"From one of Outside magazine's ""Literary All-Stars"" comes the thrilling true tale of the fastest boat ride ever through the Grand Canyon, atop the legendary Colorado River flood of 1983. 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--through the heart of the Grand Canyon atop 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."

Full Product Details

9781439159859

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Reviews

The Emerald Mile is the rarest of creations-a magical convergence of words and paper, wood and water, rock and sky, human character and cosmic caprice. Can an adventure story be as beautiful as it is heart-stopping and exciting? This one is, and Fedarko's book is as beautiful as a dory itself, flying down a wild river. I have no doubt it will become an instant classic, a timeless chronicle of what can still be legitimately called the American spirit. <p><p>--Bob Shacochis author of Swimming in the Volcano and Easy in the Islands

From the bottom of our planet's most awesomelandscape, Kevin Fedarko has found and rescued a great American talltale that just happens to be true. As a boatman, Fedarko knows this worldintimately. As a writer, he'll make you understand it, savor it, and ultimatelylove it as you never have before. Here is an instant classic of adventure literature--astory shot through with bravura but also touched by the rarest kind ofgrandeur.--Hampton Sides editor-at-large at Outside magazine and author of Blood and Thunder and Ghost Soldiers

Author Information

Kevin Fedarko has spent the past twenty years writing about conservation, exploration, and the Grand Canyon. He has been a staff writer at Time, where he worked primarily on the foreign affairs desk, and a senior editor at Outside, where he covered outdoor adventure. His writing has appeared in National Geographic, The New York Times, and Esquire, among other publications. His first book, The Emerald Mile: The Epic Story of the Fastest Ride in History Through the Heart of the Grand Canyon, which won a National Outdoor Book Award and the Reading the West Book Award, was a New York Times bestseller. He lives in Flagstaff, Arizona.

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