by barbara theroux

photo illustration by linda thompson

This time of year, libraries, sports shops and bookstores have displays of hiking, camping, fishing and touring books. Locals and visitors look for the best, the one book to give or take to the lake or send to a friend to help explain the people and the places.

We see notes on cocktail napkins, bookmarks or random scraps of paper. Sometimes, the person has no idea what will be best, so we try to suggest the perfect Montana book for seeing and remembering this great place.

There is a wealth of material written about Montana, Montanans and issues of concern to Montanans every year. Here is a partial list of new books to add to your collection this summer:

Fire Season: Field Notes from a Wilderness Lookout by Philip Connors
A decade ago, Philip Connors left work as an editor at the Wall Street Journal and talked his way into a job far from the streets of lower Manhattan: working as one of the last fire lookouts in America. Spending nearly half the year in a seven-by-seven-foot tower, 10,000 feet above sea level in remote New Mexico, his tasks were simple: Keep watch over one of the most fire-prone forests in the country and sound the alarm at the first sign of smoke.

“Fire Season” is Connors’ remarkable reflection on work, our place in the wild and the charms of solitude. The landscape over which he keeps watch is rugged and roadless. It was the first region in the world to be officially placed off limits to industrial machines – and it typically gets hit by lightning more than 30,000 times per year.

Connors recounts his days and nights in this forbidding land, untethered from the comforts of modern life: the eerie pleasure of being alone in his glass-walled perch with only his dog Alice for company; occasional visits from smokejumpers and long-distance hikers; the strange dance of communion and wariness with bears, elk and other wild creatures; trips to visit the hidden graves of buffalo soldiers slain during the Apache wars of the 19th century; and always the majesty and might of lightning storms and untamed fire.

Peakbagging Montana: A Guide to Montana’s Major Peaks
by Cedron Jones

This book is for hikers who want to know more about mountain climbing or peakbagging. For those who need a definition: Peakbagger (n): a mountain climber whose principal goal is the attainment of a summit, or a specific set of summits. Peakbaggers are often excellent off-trail scramblers and bushwhackers, strong and tough hikers, and well-schooled at map-reading and navigation.
Here you will find basic information about the sport, plus maps and tables of popular peakbagging categories, such as the state’s highest point, mountains with the most prominence, mountain range highpoints, and even county highpoints. Also included are detailed directions to bagging more than 50 of Montana’s major peaks, with routes ranging from easy trails to bushwhacking and scrambling.

Backroads & Byways of Montana: Drives, Day Trips & Weekend Excursions
by Jeff Welsch and Sherry Moore

Montana offers the breathtaking landscapes of Glacier National Park and the Greater Yellowstone region, the mystical cowboy country of the high plains and truly spectacular river valleys. Its cities and towns provide charm, personality and hospitality, with classic eateries, quaint museums and uniquely Montana activities. Welsch and Moore, your guides to Big Sky Country, share their favorite places both on and off the beaten track.

This is the newest addition to the “Backroads & Byways” series designed to help you get away for a weekend or longer, to explore your home state or to make plans for free time in an area you don’t know well. Discover the most interesting places to visit on and off the beaten path. Destinations will appeal to foodies, history buffs, families with kids, couples, adventurers, hikers, bikers in short, everyone.

Geology Underfoot in Yellowstone National Park
by Marc S. Hendrix

Although it’s also known for wolves, bison and stunning scenery, Yellowstone National Park was established as the world’s first national park in 1872 largely because of its geological wonders. In “Geology Underfoot in Yellowstone Country,” author and geologist Marc Hendrix takes you to more than 20 sites in the park and surrounding region.

Besides covering icons such as Old Faithful and Mammoth Hot Springs, the author visits sites that are less well known, including outcrops of rock deposited by super-fast incendiary flows of hot ash, the glacially sculpted grandeur of the Beartooth and Absaroka mountains witnessed along the Beartooth Highway, and the deadly Madison landslide that killed 28 people in 1959.

The “Geology Underfoot” series encourages you to get out of your car for an up-close look at rocks and landforms. These books inform and enlighten, no matter how much – or how little – geology you already know. What’s more, they’re simply good reading, on-site or at home.

I’ve Never Met an Idiot on the River: Reflections on Family, Photography, and Fly Fishing
by Henry Winkler

This is a great book to share the passion of fishing, words to live by, or at least learn something about dry flies and woolly buggers. “I've Never Meet an Idiot on the River” is Henry Winkler’s collection of everyday wisdom learned from fatherhood, family and fly-fishing.

A veteran of showbiz and a television legend, Winkler’s paramount pastime has always been fishing. It takes him to the outdoors, returning him to nature where he can be away from the busy-ness of everyday life – a “washing machine for your brain,” as Winkler calls it. Standing in the river is a different way of being that allows intuition to rule and important life lessons to make themselves apparent.

Spending time with family on these trips has taught him to be a better father and husband, and gain more out of everyday life. Being in nature has reminded him of how to really see the world, as well as how to understand the importance and value of simplicity.

Courting fish with flies has made him more self-reliant, patient ... and funnier. Through wading in the waters and casting his line, some might say Henry Winkler has grown a bit wiser, while others might say: “You’ll never meet an idiot on the river.”

The Bitterroot & Mr. Brandborg
by Fredrick H. Swanson
Fredrick Swanson tells the story of Guy M. Brandborg and his impact on the practices of the U.S. Forest Service. As supervisor of the Bitterroot National Forest from 1935 to 1955, Brandborg engaged in a management style that promoted not only the well-being of the forest community, but also the social and economic welfare of the local people.

By relying on selective cutting, his goal was to protect the watersheds and wildlife habitats that are devastated by clear-cutting, and to prevent the job losses that follow such practices. Following his retirement, he became concerned that his agency was deviating from the practice of sustained-yield management of the forest’s timberlands, and led a highly visible public outcry that became known as “the Bitterroot controversy.”

Brandborg’s behind-the-scenes lobbying contributed materially to the passage of the National Forest Management Act of 1976, the single most important law affecting public forestry since the creation of the Forest Service.

Evel: The High-Flying Life of Evel Knievel: American Showman, Daredevil, and Legend
by Leigh Montville

Evel Knievel was a high-flying daredevil, the father of extreme sports, the personification of excitement and danger and showmanship ... and in the 1970s, Knievel represented a unique slice of American culture and patriotism. His jump over the fountains at Caesar’s Palace led to a crash unlike anything ever seen on television, and his attempt to rocket over the Snake River Canyon in Idaho was something only P.T. Barnum could have orchestrated.

The dazzling motorcycles and red, white and blue outfits became an integral part of an American decade. Knievel looked like Elvis ... but on any given Saturday afternoon, millions tuned in to the small screen to see this real-life action hero tempt death.

Behind the flash and the frenzy, who was the man? Best-selling author Leigh Montville masterfully explores the life of the complicated man from Butte. He delves into Knievel’s amazing place in pop culture, as well as his notorious dark side – and his complex and often contradictory relationships with his image, the media, his own family and his many demons.

Climb Glacier National Park
by Blake Passmore

This guidebook weighs less than 1 pound and has rounded corners to allow it to slide in and out of a backpack. Climbers are guided by the use of photographs marked with red lines from the trails to the summits of 16 peaks. Included are in-depth descriptions of on-trail and off-trail routes to summits near Logan Pass in Glacier National Park.

There are more than 300 full-color photographs, 16 full-color maps, GPS waypoints and elevation profiles for each route, and written descriptions are used to relay information to help beginning and intermediate climbers safely reach – as well as return – from these lofty summits.

The peaks featured in this volume include Mount Oberlin, Clements Mountain, Mount Cannon, Bearhat Mountain, The Dragon’s Tail, Reynolds Mountain, Heavy Runner Mountain, Piegan Mountain, Pollock Mountain, Bishops Cap, Haystack Butte, Mount Gould, Going-to-the-Sun Mountain, Matahpi Peak, Mount Siyeh and Cataract Mountain.

Barbara Theroux is manager of Fact & Fiction bookstore in downtown Missoulian. She writes a monthly column for the Missoulian and a quarterly column for Missoula magazine. Linda Thompson is a Missoulian photographer. She can be reached at (406) 523-5270 or by email at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .