Read: Wild

I was first introduced to Cheryl Strayed when my “best book friend” gave me an anthology of columns she had written giving people advice. I immediately knew her voice resonated with me. And then I read her best-seller Wild, the story of a young woman who cracks, both literally and figuratively, after suddenly losing her mother and best friend to cancer and sets out on a journey to find healing. After reading the first 50 pages I decided to research her life because I almost couldn’t believe it was a true story. It’s a book I would recommend to anyone who has lost a loved one. Strayed’s writing is almost unbearably honest. You can feel her pain through the pages as she struggles to figure out how to move on from her loss. And in between the emotion she does an incredible job of describing her thousand mile hike along the Pacific Crest Trail as she rediscovers the person she wants to be. Strayed is a beautiful writer. On a side note – the movie (recently released with Reese Witherspoon playing the lead role) doesn’t do the book justice. Strayed’s is a story best told in the written word. It’s just too deep and rich to be consolidated into a 2.5 hour movie. It’s a quick read and is sure to stir up a yearning to travel for anyone who has a little wanderlust within.