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Review Quotes:
Praise for Fierce Country
"In
Fierce Country, Heather Hansman explores humanity's relationships with wilderness, ecology and our changing environment through the fascinating lives of three pioneers who pushed the limits of their own place in the natural world. That these pioneers are women is both incidental and central. Their fights to find their sense of self and place are archetypes of the human condition. However, their struggles to establish themselves in male dominated worlds like rafting and backcountry skiing give particular and important insights into perceptions of femininity and feminism. Hansman's prose is both personal and expansive, spiritual and unsettling, timeless and urgent and captures so many different aspects of what it is to look up and love the world around us."--
Professor Tamsin Mather, geochemist and author of Adventures in Volcanoland
"Heather Hansman's questing spirit binds together three vivid portraits of the women who sparked a nation's obsession with skiing, whitewater river rafting, and homesteading. Long-neglected heroines of outdoor adventure leap from the pages of
Fierce Country. Profound and passionate, this book is a hymn to the power of wild nature and an homage to those who have gone before."--
Melissa L. Sevigny, author of Brave the Wild River
"A thoroughly enjoyable read. On the surface,
Fierce Country is the story of an unlikely trio--a daredevil, a hermit, and a philosopher--but it's also the story of the essential tension between conservation and recreation, and the intense pain of watching a place you love change and be changed. Like Georgie on the river and Dolores on the slopes, Hansman chooses her line and navigates it skillfully, in spare, muscular prose. Marvelously written, meaningful, and entertaining."--
Ash Davidson, author of Damnation Spring
"
Fierce Country is a gorgeous and powerful portrait of three outdoorswomen who unapologetically blew the roof off what the world thought women were capable of, and showed the rest of us how to love and protect the natural world in the process. But rather than a one-dimensional canonization, Hansman honors them by refusing to shy from the reality that these were also women who lied and drank, were obsessed and cocky and problematic. The most propulsive thread of the narrative is Hansman's excavation of her own place in this lineage of outdoorswomen: a beautiful search for complicated heroines in a space that's long left them unacknowledged."--
Cassidy Randall, prize-winning author of Thirty Below
"Like many women writing the land, Heather Hansman understands the importance of seeing ourselves reflected in the stories that rise from it. This book not only reframes the contribution of these badass pioneering adventurers and their fierce love of landscape as part of
our national legacy but also paints in the too often missing story of women in wild places."--
Karen Auvinen, author of Rough Beauty: Forty Seasons of Mountain Living
"A nuanced and vivid portrait of pioneering outdoorswomen." -
Publishers Weekly
"Hansman weaves history, biography, science and memoir as she crafts thoughtful, nuanced portraits of these women and contemplates her own 'visceral desire' to be in nature. It's a compelling, often thrilling read perfect for fans of Melissa L. Sevigny's
Brave the Wild River and Pam Houston's
Deep Creek."--
BookPage
"Three women who made significant contributions to the appreciation and protection of nature in the U.S. are explored with wit and verve in this fascinating mix of biography and memoir. ... With her clear-eyed view of her subjects and flinty prose, Hansman offers a new twist on American adventure and conservation. This shrewd and complex group portrait should not be missed." -
Booklist,
STARRED review
Praise for Powder Days
"A sparkling account of one woman's passion and enduring love of powder."--
Wall Street Journal
"A riveting plunge into ski culture... [
Powder Days] is as exhilarating as the act of skiing itself."--
Publishers Weekly STARRED review
"An entertaining and eye-opening look at the history and economics of skiing and ski resorts in the United States."--
Library Journal
"Superbly reported and lyrical."--
Outside Magazine
"Entertaining...blade-sharp...[Hansman's] passion for the sport shimmers on every page, with prose as smooth as a turn in dry powder."--
San Francisco Chronicle
An in-depth look at a fascinating sports culture from a respected ski journalist."--
New York Post, Best Books of the Week
"A love letter to the freedom seekers, the fun hogs, the dirt bags--the ones our culture hasn't yet managed to tame. This is a timely, sharply observed, and beautifully written story of wildness and obsession."--
Susan Casey, New York Times bestselling author of The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean
"An enchantingly lyrical ode to the peculiar allure of the cold, the steep, the remote, the hard, the fast, and the fallen. I was never a ski bum, but this book makes me wish I had been."--
Robert
Moor, New York Times bestselling author of On Trails: An Exploration
Publisher Marketing:
The inspiring, untold story of three incredible women who spearheaded recreation, conservation and resilience in America's most beloved landscapes, for readers of Pam Houston and David Grann
Throughout the 20th century Georgie White, Anne LaBastille, and Dolores LaChapelle did more to inspire our love of the great outdoors than just about anyone.
- Georgie devoted her life to the Grand Canyon, kickstarting the river running craze in the 40s and igniting the recreation industry
- Anne, a wilderness guide and bestselling author, protected endangered species and predicted the impacts of climate change from her isolated, off-grid cabin in the Adirondacks.
- And deep powder skier Dolores developed an environmental philosophy that shaped everything from the radical environmental movement of the '70s to modern conservation ethics.
Now, for the first time, outdoor journalist and bestselling author of
Powder Days Heather Hansman goes deep into multiple rugged American landscapes to bring three fascinating lives to the forefront of the outdoor movement, affirming their rightful place in the larger story of an evolving American wild.
Review Citations:
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Publishers Weekly 06/15/2026 (EAN 9781335013439, Hardcover)
Contributor Bio:Hansman, Heather
HEATHER HANSMAN is an award-winning freelance writer and the celebrated author of
Powder Days: Ski Bums, Ski Towns and the Future of Chasing Snow and
Downriver: Into the Future of Water in the West. Her work has appeared in
The New York Times, The Atlantic, Outside, among others. She lives in Durango, Colorado, right by the river.
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