Lost and Found in Alaska

Joel Rudinger takes us to Alaska when statehood was brand new, its frontier breathtaking—and dangerous. His is a physical and cultural journey where life, without exaggeration, is lived on the edge. Growing up middle class in Ohio, Rudinger wills himself towards the extraordinary. First, with going to Alaska—of all places—for graduate school. Then taking on jobs for which he had no training or visible aptitude. Later he's hitchhiking the Alcan Highway with a lover, pushing himself repeatedly to physical and spiritual limits. Rudinger tells his story in striking first-person detail. Events six decades old are told as though they happened just last summer, raw, not romanticized. Having left Ohio in 1960 a man-child, he returns four years later deeply experienced in all the ways of the world. "Lost and Found in Alaska" is a must-read. For its history. For its exquisite capturing of frontier life. For the sheer courage of its author. ~Kurt Landefeld, author of Jack's Memoirs: Off the Road