Recommendations

Books Like Wild

Best books to read after Wild by Cheryl Strayed

Cheryl Strayed's Wild is the Pacific Crest Trail memoir of a woman recovering from loss, addiction, and grief. These recommendations continue the Strayed canon, explore the adventure and self-discovery memoir tradition, or offer companion reading in the tradition of the book about what happens when a woman goes into the wilderness to find herself.

  1. 1

    Tiny Beautiful Things

    by Cheryl Strayed

    The companion Strayed book — her collected Dear Sugar advice columns from The Rumpus, the writing that most directly shows the wisdom and compassion that Wild earned; many readers consider this Strayed's best work.

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  2. 2

    Brave Enough

    by Cheryl Strayed

    The companion Strayed collection — quotes from Strayed's work, organized thematically; for readers who want more of her voice in compact form.

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  3. 3

    Into the Wild

    by Jon Krakauer

    The essential outdoor adventure companion — Chris McCandless abandoning his conventional life for the Alaskan wilderness; where Wild is about a woman finding herself through a hike she was prepared for imperfectly, Into the Wild is about a young man who went into the wilderness unprepared and did not survive it.

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  4. 4

    Into Thin Air

    by Jon Krakauer

    The extreme outdoor risk companion — Krakauer's first-hand account of the 1996 Everest disaster; shares Wild's immersive outdoor setting and its meditation on what we risk and what we gain from pushing against our limits.

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  5. 5

    Eat Pray Love

    by Elizabeth Gilbert

    The most popular female self-discovery travel memoir companion — Gilbert's year in Italy, India, and Bali after her divorce; shares Wild's structure of a woman rebuilding herself through travel after the collapse of the life she thought she was going to have.

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  6. 6

    The Glass Castle

    by Jeannette Walls

    The chaotic childhood memoir companion — Walls's account of her nomadic, impoverished childhood and her escape; shares Wild's interest in a woman who has to construct her own stability out of almost nothing.

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  7. 7

    Educated

    by Tara Westover

    The self-education memoir companion — Westover growing up in a survivalist Idaho family and by determination earning a Cambridge PhD; shares Wild's portrait of a woman finding herself through the discipline of making something very hard work.

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  8. 8

    A Walk in the Woods

    by Bill Bryson

    The comic outdoor adventure companion — Bryson attempting to hike the Appalachian Trail with an old friend; where Wild is a solo memoir of transformation, A Walk in the Woods is a social comedy set on the parallel trail, both sharing the same idea that walking a long trail in America is something worth doing for reasons you may not fully understand until you are doing it.

    Buy

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