I would recommend that you finish the book, because all of the things you are talking about are feelings that she was feeling at that time, and by the end of the book, she comes to an understanding about pretty much all of those issues. I think we all have moments where we act selfish and have selfish thoughts. She was in a very selfish frame of mind, she was angry and sad. By the end of her journey, she figures that stuff out. Don't give up on it yet :)

I agree with Chelsea. It is inappropriate to write such a review without completing the book.

I did finish the book, and nothing material about the tone or insight that I might have expected revealed itself. By the end of the book, the author has walked a thousand miles, endured terrible physical discomfort, but still has not shown any of the introspectiveness I might expect from someone who was trying to delve deep into herself to augur her real identity. 90210 Odyssey, imo.

I usually loathe books where well-off women complain about the very lives they should be grateful for, but I did not find this book to be one of those. She DID have a wonderful mother and what seemed to be a wonderful (ex)husband and she is honest about how she may have not treated either of those relationships the way she wished she had. I didn't find her to be a brat at all, she didn't justify her actions or try to blame anyone other than herself. At the end of the book, she came to a resolve within herself about her step-father, her husband, and the loss of her mother and realized they all played loving, important, and special roles in her life at the times she needed them to.

Yea I feel the emotional insight and transformation exhibited was just too shallow for a book of this length. She just doesn't talk about her emotional experience in any kind of visceral way. For example, if she spent all that time sleeping with others after her mother passed, then I would have liked to hear more, using present and vivid language, of how hard it was to wake up to the aftermath. How she woke up feeling shame, which then she shook off by going to another bar. But all of these descriptions, including that of her heroin period, were just too shallow, superficial. So it was hard to understand the depth of her grief, the depth of her desperation.

That said, I generally like two kinds of personal books:

ones where not much actually happens, but the author goes so deep into the emotional experience that you feel like you're wearing a second skin by the end; or

ones where the circumstances of the author's life are so extraordinary that any part of it is interesting.

this was neither of those.

I lost my mother at age 42, and when I read her account of spending her last days in the hospital with her mother, I had to put the book down and sob; it was that real and accurate to me. And now, over a year later. I am still completely leveled by my mother's death. So, point A that she was too whiny re her mom's death, despite the fact she had such a great, caring mother, is perplexing, and pretty irritating, to me. Should she have suffered her death more had her mom been horrible? Should she not feel something so deeply because she was young, and confused and selfish? Does it matter what age or mind-frame you're in when your mother dies, and should you be affected accordingly?
On that note, she was in her early 20's for God's sake. Who ISN'T a selfish asshole at that age? That's the point of a lot of the story, and she spends a good amount of time speaking about just that.
Also, why did you need more details of her post-coital/drug remorse? Maybe she had none due to extreme numbness, maybe she felt it wasn't going to add to the story she wanted to tell, maybe she felt no remorse at all (and who says she has to?), and last, maybe she'd think what I am right now: Mind your own Effing Business. You don't necessarily get every detail of every story that you want.
Point C...It seems like you went into the book with the sole purpose of eviscerating this woman for your own gratuitous needs. Why would you read this with the intention of being so critical? Her writing is flawless, she is modest and self-deprecating enough that she is at no risk of being smug or self-serving (this despite the fore-mentioned 20-something asshole-ness, and she accomplished something most people wouldn't dream of, and those that do dream of don't do.
I am a very critical reader, but am not critical of an author, as a person, unless she or he deserves it. And Cheryl Strayed doesn't. Her book was riveting and interesting and humble and thoughtful and smart. I loved every page.

I went into it expecting to read something as wise, insightful and moving as her Dear Sugar columns. I didn't find any of that here in this book. So to answer your critique, I came into the reading of the book with excited anticipation and was gravely disappointed. There is none of the rawness or urgency or insight that one would expect reading Dear Sugar

You have obviously never lost a parent. You shouldn't judge peoples' reactions to traumatic events when you have no experience in the matter at hand. Sure she had a loving and supportive mother, but I can tell you from personal experience that that only makes the loss more difficult, and that the pure anguish she describes at the beginning is something shared by many. As someone who lost a parent in a similar way, I guess I just have a different perspective on this book than you. It sounds like what you wanted was a hiking story, not a memoir about dealing with the loss of a parent.
I hope that you never have to feel the kinds of emotions that will make you relate to this book. Oh, and learn how to spell the word "whine."

I completely agree with your review!!!

Su, I have been thinking about your review since I read it last night. I remain surprised that you think that the loss of a mother can't tear a woman from her moorings. Strayed's mother was only forty-five at the time of her death, and had given her three children the only love they had ever known. Mine was 79, was a huge, but not the only, part of my very grounded and fortunate life, and I didn't know if I could ever breathe again when I lost her.

Cheryl Strayed made huge errors of judgement In her young and careless life, and she and I couldn't be more different. I had never read anything by 'Sugar', so was neither influenced nor disappointed by her writing in this book. Taking all the above into consideration, I continue to be amazed at how much this book impressed and moved me.

Ditto to Crystal B and Caitlin's posts.

I'm about half way through and I alternate between wanting to throw it across the room and being engrossed in it. When I want to throw it across the room is when she is whining about how horrible her life is. Honestly you'd think she was 10 years old. What a baby. The part I like the most is when she's hiking and the descriptions of the people she's met and the places she goes. But I can't get over how incredibly stupid and ill prepared she was for this. She's lucky to make it out alive.

to crystal B - she spelt whinging correctly - that's the British version. Google it.

As someone who lost my mom to suicide, and attempted the PCT...I didn't think she was whining. And you know what? She was honest. Totally honest. And sometimes that involves being pitiful and human and flawed. We're all entitled to our own opinions...but I don't understand how you can call an author a spoiled brat. She was poor. Yes, she had a great mother, but she died, when the author was pretty young. That's tragic and sad, but the author got through it and wrote this book about her transformative experience.
And yeah, you have obviously never lost a parent.

Dear SU~Like you, I felt that Cheryl was a bit melodramatic (in relation to my response to tragedy)in her response to the awful experiences that she had. However, I try to tell myself that each of that suffering is subjective. That being said, I thought Cheryl told her story most eloquently; she weaved the characters into the story in the same way that she weaved her way along the PCT.

Melissa

Nice! I totally agree with your critique. I just wanted to finish the book and was pretty dissatisfied with its tone. I am surprised at how many people rated this book so highly. I found myself asking, "Why should I care about your exploits? Tell me more about how the trail transformed you." I just didn't care that much during and upon completing the book.

I agree with your review.

She told you point-blank how the trail transformed her. She felt that she had always been looking for a way "out" and the trail experience made her realize that she was really looking for a way "back in." She was an outcast before and now was trying to work her way back in.

Of course, those of us who have lost an awesome parent (no matter at what age), understand this journey more so than those who have not gone through that hellish experience.

I agree with this review. The behaviors described were self indulgent but so was the writing of the book. And just for the sake of being shocking it was truly raunchy on occassion. I could almost imagine her sitting there pleased with herself. Considering that this was written so long after she actually did the hike I would say it changed her not at all.

Yeah. I didn't really get this book. From the choosing of the name "Strayed" After her divorce (yes I read her explanation, but I didn't get it--why use the verb form? It seemed like penance. Maybe it was) to the minimal telling about the trail itself. And it seemed rather formulaic--"go do something unusual and then you can write about it." what she did is remarkable, but she didn't climb Everest for goodness sakes. It was an interesting story and she writes well, but I don't think all the hype is merited.

I thought your review was quite judgmental. People experience things in different ways that is what makes us unique. At 22, you don't have a whole lot of wisdom. Not to many people at that age are grateful about anything. It was her journey and she was writing about her experience period. Who are you to judge?

Oh and by the way. I have cancer and my daughter is 22. Should I tell her to stop whining?

Another "I lost my mother at 20" story, and she was not whining, she was describing accurate stages of grief without holding back to keep from offending the potential delicate sensibilities or judgments of her readership. *I* find your review offensive. The trail was where she learned about "real life"? That's laughable. Lose the person closest to you, there's your lesson on real life. You clearly have no idea what grief feels like, and your review made me angry.

@Susan and Amanda;I was not going to respond to these because it was not my original review and I don't agree with anything related to the author's emotional progress. She has not described that she made any. I think she portrays herself exactly as she is. A self absorbed addict. The book was such a great idea and I really wanted to go along on the journey and see what was learned and experienced.The writing just plain old stunk with the sky is blue and the trees are green. She just is not a good author.In order to make it interesting she resorted to the occasional salacious commentary such as the truly disgusting part regarding the menstrual sponge as if somehow I would want to be a participant in that particular truly offensive interaction.She could easily have refrained from not only doing that but also no relating it.In fact, I would be she did.She included it because she truly believed it would make her stinky book better.Revolting.And there are other examples.And there are other examples that bring this authors character and writing into question.In the end the book reflects that she is disingenuous and didn't care any more about respecting her reader than she respects anything else. Susan,I think the pain you are enduring regarding the real life struggle that faces you and one of your children could not possibly compare to this stinky book.I wish you all the best and don't waste your good energy upset about this author, she isn't worth it.Amanda,There was no accurate portrayal of the stages of grief. Just the portrayal of a young woman who wanted to use the death of her mother to make a buck.I know a lot about grief in my own life and if this young woman experienced it (and we must presume she did) she did not relate it, hence, the book stunk.I wondered if it were because she was so young and then I saw how many years had passed before she authored the book. It just stunk.

Janet, you thought the author's description of the use of a menstrual sponge disgusting and "truly offensive"? ... Are you 12? Incidentally, I had wondered how she was going to deal with her period hiking for three months, so I found that little tidbit, very informative - I had never heard of a menstrual sponge. I'm sorry if it offends you that women nowadays actually TALK about these things, and it is no longer shameful to discuss openly.

If you found her book "stinky" (another very adult description), that is completely your choice - we all have our own opinions. However, for you to judge her by saying she used her mom's death as a way to make a quick buck is even more childish and ridiculous than being offended by period talk. This was HER grief, HER feelings, and HER journey. And feeling lost and alone because she lost her mother at the young age of 22 does not make her self-absorbed, it makes her a human being. She does not brag about her mistakes, her drug use, or the bad decisions she makes, she actually ACKNOWLEDGES that something needed to change and she needed time alone to process what was happening in her life. If you didn't like it, your choice. However, I find it humorous that someone who is criticizing the writing of an author uses the word 'stunk' multiple times in a review to describe anything.

I don't think there are any circumstances where personal attacks are called for "fivesunflowers". The book stunk. You don't know me or whether discourse about menstruation offends me. I said this author and this relating of it offended me. And you think to call me less than a real woman for being offended is mature? I wonder why such intense venom over an opinion...by the way; did you pick the number five for in front of sunflowers because it is odd like you? Stinks, stunk, stank. To bad you didn't recognize that but there is no need to insult me because I don't agree with you.

A memoir that is "self-indulgent"? Aren't most of them? ;-)

Hey, folks. Not to put words in the reviewer's mouth, but I don't think anyone who was impatient with parts of this book would say that the struggles Cheryl describes don't ring true, that the book isn't touching, or even that she can't write like a demon. It's more that the book could have been edited it like a demon with devastating effect, but wasn't.

Scott, that's what I was thinking. Memoirs are self-indulgent. That's kind of the point.

When I first picked it up, I didn't realize that the mother's illness and death would play such a pivotal role in the story and if had I probably would not have read it. I have been through a lot of family illness and death and found it a bit hard to stomach what seemed to me to be excessive self pity. However, I kept reminding myself that she was young and that her mother's death seemed to lead to to the complete unravelling of her already fragile family structure, and I took pity. Plus who are any of us to judge or even know how one feels or should feel in the face of tragedy. But, more importantly, the story, for me, was one of redemption and growth. After having the wind knocked out of her, the author took on a monumental challenge of self-reliance and ultimately came out on top. For me it was inspirational. Rather than try to fill the void of her loneliness, she tried to embrace the loneliness and learn to feel comfortable with loss and deprivation. Of kcourse I could poke a lot of holes in the story but that seems sort of beside the point.

That is a very nice thing to say and way to feel and I think a lot of people have been nice. Still, it is a book and a story and not a good one. I hope someone decides to take that hike and write about it, the experience and growth as a result. I think your assessment of excessive self pity is accurate and I see the same element of her in everything that she communicated. Everything excessive and self indulgent. She is addicted to everything. If you look at it from that perspective she did not grow at all. You know what I remember most about that book? The repeated descriptions of her toenails. Sorry - not the trip I anticipated.

It's incredibly harsh to lable writing about the loss of your mother as whining...

This book is hideous on mutiple levels. Here is why -

It is a self indulgent miasmic mess that has all the profundity one would except from an admitted "left-wing feminist campus radical". It is a triumph of narcissim and solipsism. Cheryl Strayed has the insight of a ham sandwich when it comes to her self analysis. She takes light years of strange dick, commits adultery, has an abortion, dabbles in heroin, and after weeks on the trail contmeplating the wreckage of her past what is one of the first things she does? Take a strange dick. Yet somehow she has the audactity to claim she wouldn't carve her initials on someone else's wooden table because she was "raised by mom". No to vandalism, yes to adultery and abortion. Did I get that straight? The finale of the book where she justifies her all her past actions with such banal pedestrian solipsim is just the final nail in the coffin of such a predictable feminist trope.

Let's examine the so called profound revelation in detail. It goes as follows:

"“What if I forgave myself? I thought. What if I forgave myself even though I'd done something I shouldn't have? What if I was a liar and a cheat and there was no excuse for what I'd done other than because it was what I wanted and needed to do? What if I was sorry, but if I could go back in time I wouldn't do anything differently than I had done? What if I'd actually wanted to fuck every one of those men? What if heroin taught me something? What if yes was the right answer instead of no? What if what made me do all those things everyone thought I shouldn't have done was what also had got me here? What if I was never redeemed? What if I already was?”

The part about wanting to fuck all those men qualifies for "superficial dense statement of the year". This comment is truly stupid. OF COURSE YOU WANTED TO FUCK THOSE MEN YOU NITWIT! Otherwise it is called rape. Think about it. How fucking obvious is this? She fails utterly to grasp the lesson which is this - A fully actualized human intimimate relationship contain sacrifice, compromise, committment, and conscientiousness. A person demonstrates his or her love by SACRIFICING those opportunities to hump other people because the REALIZATION that the OTHER PERSON'S FEELINGS actually triumph one's own selfish desires. This is truly living above one's animal nature.

Instead, Cheryl Strayed points out the absurdly stutifyingly obvious and then prcolaims it as some sort of justification for her incredibly selfish and nauseating behavior. She demonstrates that she has learned nothing. Absolutely nothing.

A liar and a cheat was what she "needed" to do???? Please explain. In detail. Using ethical and logical reasoning....Oh wait it's just thrown out there and left to stink like the festering turd of irrationality that it is.

She wouldn't go back and change a thing. Oh the true stupidity of the "everything happens for a reason" garbage in all it's glory. All those people had to be hurt and devastated so Cheryl Strayed, center of the universe, could "learn lessons" (which, in the height of irony, she clearly didn't learn anything useful).

She justifies her "say yes" philosophy with the mental gymnastics of a skilled sophist. Instead of recognizing how this is a truly flawed and illogical approach to life, she succumbs to the typical "everything happens for a reason and I wouldn't be who I am today without have experienced..." mumbojumbo. I guess 7 million jews had to be gassed too. Think about it. I mean all that HAD to happen just so Cheryl Strayed could (partially by the way) hike a trail and "realize" that a teleological convergence of universal forces transpired to have those things happen to her all so it could bring her, and her alone, to this special place at Bridge of The Gods where...TADA! (instead of accepting responsibility and examing the consequences of her actions) - she realizes the abortion was a GOOD thing. The herion use was a GOOD thing. The adultery was a GOOD thing. The rampant sluttery was a GOOD thing... Holy solipsism Batman!!!

This woman is so obtuse to the obvious it is laughable. She is totally clueless to the priviledge she experiences on the trail as a white woman. She actually believes it is the goodness of people and not the fact that she has a vagina is why she experiences such ease overcoming "difficulties" on the trail. Any man reading this drivel instantly recognizes her innate priviledge being invoked over and over and over.... Then there is her constant repetition of the superficial dichotomy she foists practically all men into. She is either afraid of being raped or experiencing vagina tingles. I bet if you asked the hunter in the woods he thought he was just hitting on a woman. You see, if you are a "hot sexy bearded hippie" then it's game on lickety split. If, however, you are just some schlub hunting in the woods then male/female interaction with a midly sexual undertone it is borderline rape. This again is female priviledge that she is totally oblivious to. She relishes her right to engage in sex and express sexual interest whenever she wants but seems obtuse to the fact that other people might have their own sexual desires. Once again, total self absorption.

There is more though. I am highly suspicious of some of the dialogue and encounters. That have a ring of falsity that I can't shake, especially the so-called "Spider" encounter and the ensuing dialogue between her and the woman. It has the genuine feel of a spam sandwich. I am very cynical about the authenticity.

It is also needlessly tawdry.

I can't help myself - I am truly sorry her mother died, but she was a complete flake. A moon unit.
Again she fails utterly to learn the lesson

Oh more - SHE DOESN'T ACTUALLY HIKE THE PCT!!!! ONLY PARTS OF IT!!!

Sigh...More - It is chock-a-block full of illogical gibberish, head scratching juxtapositions, and plain old non-sequiters such as the following -

"That perhaps being amidst the undesecrated beauty of the wilderness meant I too could be undesecrated, regardless of the regrettable things I'd done to others or myself or the regrettable things that had been done to me"

HUH????!!!

or

"“There's no way to know what makes one thing happen and not another. What leads to what. What destroys what. What causes what to flourish or die or take another course.”

WTF. This is truly a statement that is complete gibberish. It is painfully clear she included nonsense such as this because it "sounds profound and lyrical and insightful" when in fact it is TOTAL VERBAL VOMIT.

For all these reasons this book isn't just bad, it is truly, truly awful. I feel sorry for her husband and kids that this "memoir" was published. I would feel humiliated.

Thank you for your review, it helped me decide I did NOT want to read this book. And I agree, it is whining. I lost my Dad at 13, my very close Grandma at 15 and then watched my step-dad die in the hospital when I was 25. But rather than saying PLEASE pity me! I'm the ONLY one EVER that has had to experience hardship, I grew the F*%# up and took responsibility for my own stupid mistakes and moved on. Rather than using the death of my loved ones as an excuse to be a a self-absorbed, vapid sex fiend. The sum of a person's experiences isn't what makes them who they are, it's how they react, deal with and learn from their experiences. Or I guess not learn in this author's case.

Did you forget that she saw her bio father beat her mother bloody when she was a small child? This book wasn't only about the death of her mother. She was orphaned and un-anchored, without competent people around to teach her how the world works. Impulsiveness comes with that territory. The fact that all she did was try heroin and go through a promiscuous phase (don't forget how young and ignorant she was, as most of us are, about marriage) is a miracle. The typical story for a kid growing up in the life Cheryl did usually ends up with smoking drugs, prostituting, institutionalization and/or death. Cheryl was a very strong and insightful young woman. I think this book went way over the heads of some who have such negative opinions

It’s easy to tell who’s “walked through fire” and who hasn’t with your review. I was profoundly affected by this book because my own mother died when I was 20. The summer she died, 41 years ago, I got on my bicycle and rode it to Canada from Boston. This book was raw and real. Instead of lamenting the giant rock of tragedy that couldn’t be removed from her garden, Cheryl Strayed used it as the centerpiece of her landscape. She planted around it a beautiful garden called “Wild”,the heartbreakingly true account of her loss and triumph.

She's not whining. Give her credit for dealing with her issues the only way she chose to. I can definitely resonate with her pain and choosing a path of healing that I have been criticized for.