Into the Wild

John and I just finished listening to this book on CD and LOVED it! Never have we read a book that sparked so much discussion between us. It really was fascinating and thought provoking. A book I think all of us can relate to in someway. (Heads up there is some language in it.)

Book Summary:
Christopher McCandless came from a well-to-do family in the Washington D.C. area. When he graduated from Emory University he donated more than $25,000 of savings (savings his parents thought would pay for law school) and completely broke contact with all that he knew , giving away everything he owned, and lived the life of a homeless man for two years.
During the time McCandless spends on the road he renounces society and develops an anarchist mindset fueled by the writings of Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, and Leo Tolstoy. He even changes his name to Alexander Supertramp. McCandless ultimately decides to go to Alaska to live in the wild. He lives in an abandoned bus in the Alaskan bush and keeps a careful diary of his time, his thoughts, and his reasons for fleeing from society. He eventually decides that nature is only a refuge for a short while, that true happiness can only be shared with others. After being in the wild for 112 days Moose hunters found McCandless’s lifeless body in his sleeping bag inside the bus, his diary, several books, and a few meager supplies nearby.

"Two years he walks the earth. No phone, no pool, no pets, no cigarettes. Ultimate freedom. An extremist. An aesthetic voyager whose home is the road. Escaped from Atlanta. Thou shalt not return, 'cause "the West is the best." And now after two rambling years comes the final and greatest adventure. The climactic battle to kill the false being within and victoriously conclude the spiritual pilgrimage. Ten days and nights of freight trains and hitchhiking bring him to the Great White North. No longer to be poisoned by civilization he flees, and walks alone upon the land to become lost in the wild."
— Alexander Supertramp May 1992