Mountain Survival Stories

On the anniversary of the day his best friend, Byrd, had a tragic accident on the mountain that had been the boys' paradise and escape, Wolf Truly reaches for the summit again with the intention of not coming home. But Wolf meets three women in the cable car on the way up from Palm Springs and finds himself agreeing to help them get to a mountain lake. As the weather suddenly deteriorates, the group is stranded on a lethal ridge, and the lights of the city twinkle below, so close and yet so terrifyingly far away.

Frightful, the peregrine falcon who first appeared in My Side of the Mountain, is back. Her amazing journey through life continues in the face of many rousing wildlife adventures. Will she survive the wilderness, even though she was raised by a human? When an old friend rescues her from captors, Frightful soars into the unfamiliar woodlands and searches for home. Before finding her mountain, she adopts a nest of motherless peregrine chicks.

The shark attacked while she was snorkeling, tearing through Micki Glenn’s breast and shredding her right arm. Her husband, a surgeon, saved her life on the spot, but when she was safely home she couldn’t just go on with her life. She had entered an even more profound survival journey: the aftermath. The survival experience changes everything because it invalidates all your previous adaptations, and the old rules don’t apply. In some cases survivors suffer more in the aftermath than they did during the actual crisis. In all cases, they have to work hard to reinvent themselves.

Virgil is making his older siblings trek to a mountain lake on a trip unlike any they have taken before. They carry precious cargo: the ashes of their beloved mother, who asked that her remains be scattered at her favorite spot. But when a forest fire is sparked by a bolt of lightning at the exact moment when their van breaks down, the journey quickly turns to disaster. Virgil finds himself separated from his sister and alone in the wilderness. He isn’t sure he can make it, but with the memory of his mother and her lessons to guide him, he learns that survival starts with letting go.

1933. When Ellie and her family lose everything, they flee to Echo Mountain to build a new life. Ellie runs wild, exploring the mountain's mysteries. But the one she can't solve is who's leaving the gifts for her: tiny, beautiful wooden carvings of animals and flowers, dotted around the mountain for her to find. Then Ellie's father has a terrible accident. Now he lies in a coma, while Ellie shoulders the blame for what happened. When she sets out to find a cure for him, she discovers Cate, the outcast witch, and Larkin, a wild mountain boy.

On the afternoon of July 13, 1977, having become the first climbers to reach the summit of the Ogre, Doug Scott and Chris Bonington began their long descent. In the minutes that followed, any feeling of success from their achievement would be overwhelmed by the start of a desperate fight for survival. And things would only get worse.

Year after year, climbers return to the world's most difficult mountains. At these places, even the most cautious climber is vulnerable to mistakes, bad weather, and bad luck, which often leads to death. This collection offers harrowing accounts of extreme mountaineering and its potentially fatal consequences.

Twelve-year-old Donn Fendler steps away from his Boy Scout troop for only a minute, but in the foggy mountains of Maine, a minute is all it takes. After hours of trying to find his way back, a nervous and tired Donn falls down an embankment, making it impossible for him to be found. One sleepless night goes by, followed by a second...and before Donn knows it, almost two weeks have passed, leaving him starving, scared, and delirious.

Discovering their newfound tradition and love for camping at the Grand Tetons, The Campground Kids anticipate their next adventure—exploring the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

The siblings are pressed to use their skills and wits as they face the trials of being alone and afraid. Not only do they have to find food and shelter, but they quickly learn that there is something very unusual about the mountain they are lost on. They are threatened by natural disasters, as well as evil creatures who seek to harm them and trap them and fill them with fear and doubt. When the siblings get separated and the evil creatures capture Socorro, they almost give up hope of ever surviving and finding their parents again.

Robyn Grew up in the mountain community La Poudre, and her heart has stayed in the grassy moose meadows and mountain heights of the Rockies, where there are no better friends than the katz who've come to stay and the Community of Eagles.

A deeply personal travel memoir that combines alpine adventure, family connections, and spiritual encounters in two very different worlds: a Himalayan village and Vancouver, Canada. In 2012, Michael Schauch and his wife, Chantal, undertook an expedition deep in the Himalaya of northern Nepal, into a remote valley that had been closed off to outsiders for decades. They led a team of artists (a photographer, a musician, and a painter), with the objective of capturing a moment in time through their unique lenses.

Ian was the one who chased the majestic buck into the forest. (His motto: act first, think later.) Kendra didn't want to become separated from the other sixth graders, but she followed Ian anyway, despite what her analytical mind told her. PJ followed him too. Even though he was scared, he figured he might catch some amazing footage with his video camera. They all hoped to return to the hiking trail before anyone noticed they were gone. However, the mountain had other plans for them: dark, sinister plans that only nightmares are made of.

When New York native Samuel Dubois moves to Montana, he learns the hard way that his favorite fantasy novel doesn’t help when he’s lost in the wilderness. Surrounded by animals that scream like creatures from his books, towering, creaky trees, and blood-sucking insects, Samuel spends the worst night of his life perched on top of a rock with only his book and the moon for comfort.

Kelton Fielding has always felt out of place, never sure what to say to his peers who, truth be told, only tolerate him. When a snowmobile race is announced at McCall’s annual Winter Festival, Kelton sees his chance to impress his classmates. He’ll fix up his old sled and get it running, and he’s planned out a risky shortcut through the wilderness that he’s sure will win him the prize. But when the popular Swann Siddiq and Kelton’s nemesis follow him into the backcountry, Kelton quickly runs into trouble and realizes that the competition is the least of his worries.

The adventure continues when Abby and Derick begin their second semester at Cragbridge Hall, the most prestigious secondary school in the world. But when Grandpa Cragbridge admits them to the Council of Keys - a secret group of people who have keys to travel back in time - strange things begin to happen. One by one, members are found unconscious and unable to wake, their keys stolen. Now Abby and Derick must scramble to figure out who is behind the attacks before they become the next victims, which would give their enemy the power to change the past forever.

In the winter of 1959, a group of nine young and experienced hikers embarked on a journey into the Ural Mountains of Russia. Although they had previously undertaken cold-weather trips, this particular expedition would tragically be their last. During their trek, the hikers encountered something unexpected in the supposedly desolate region, resulting in the demise of the entire group. The exact events of that fateful night remain unknown, but the incident has since become one of the world's most perplexing mysteries.

The Seventh Taking is the chilling tale of a young man’s journey through harsh mountain country in his search for the girl he loves and the two friends who dare to brave the dangerous elements - both human and natural - to support a friend. When Joy Vincent disappears in the Blue Summit Mountains of Tennessee while vacationing with her family, park rangers begin an intensive search for the Louisiana high-school junior. Seven weeks later, the search is abandoned, and authorities conclude that Joy voluntarily ran away because of a fight with her father.

Impossible! Suicidal! That's 13-year-old Cat's reaction to her impulsive, irrepressible cousin Ty's harebrained scheme to spread the ashes of their late fathers at the summit of the same treacherous mountain that claimed both their lives. But when Ty sets off on his own - stealing her dog and her father's ashes - Cat is forced to follow against her better judgment. Things deteriorate quickly. Avalanches, dangerous glacial crevasses, and a blinding blizzard force Cat to put all her mountaineering knowledge to work if they are to survive.