On your nightstand now:
O.K., there is a stack beneath my little nightstand. The top one I just finished last night: Paths of Glory by Jeffrey Archer. The others are Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv, The Maytrees by Annie Dillard, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman, The Lady Rode Bucking Horses by Dee Marvine and believe it or not, War and Peace by Tolstoy on the bottom. I am working up the courage to begin that one.
Favorite book when you were a child:
The Snow Goose by Paul Gallico. My grandmother read it to me the first time when I was quite young, and I have read it many times since. It is still one of my favorite reads.
Your top five authors:
Ivan Doig, Norman Maclean, Robert Frost, Beryl Markham and Peter Matthiessen.
Another five:
Jon Krakauer, David Quammen, Barbara Kingsolver, Isak Dinesen and Mary Clearman Blew. I could keep going to a hundred or so.
Book you've faked reading:
War and Peace. I read it long ago but skipped most of the war parts.
Book you're an evangelist for:
Endurance by Alfred Lansing is the one of best adventure stories ever written. People of any age can enjoy it and be inspired.
Book you've bought for the cover:
That would have to be Miss Spider's Wedding, a children's book by David Kirk. Irresistibly illustrated. I still love children's books even though our youngest child just turned 13. Another recent one was Beyond the Great Wall by Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid, a mouth-watering, lusciously illustrated cookbook that I hope will inspire me to make momos.
Book that changed your life:
The Lost Explorer by Conrad Anker and David Roberts helped me along the path of falling in love with my husband. A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold was given to me by my best friend in high school, and it had a profound influence on the person I became. This House of Sky by Ivan Doig is another that I have read and reread. I aspire to write with the poetic style and easy dialogue that Doig so deftly pens.
Favorite line from a book:
"In our family, there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing."--From A River Runs Through It and Other Stories by Norman Maclean.
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas. I remember struggling to begin and then being swept along until the end and feeling the disappointment that I couldn't keep reading it.