Rick Ridgeway’s writing has a bit of a rough-hewn, simple style that I don’t think will win many awards - and at first, that I didn’t think I liked that much. But there is also a deep, earnest sincerity to it that makes his stories just a bit larger-than-life. That, and the fact that they are just completely wild, crazy things he’s done, been all around the world and up on all the mountains and through all the forests. He writes and is a bit full of himself, as I suppose one must be to confront the extremities of the world at the risk of death, but his transparency there becomes a bit charming; his transparency makes the tragedies he faces all the more heartbreaking. There is also - I think maybe accidentally, but he presents his life in a bit of a fascinating fragmentation of time, reminiscent of Vonnegut? Recollections mostly in order, with insertions of the future and the past and sudden and unexpected jumps…product I guess of the growth of the book out of a series of instagram posts, but creating a pattern that I do appreciate. An excellent and engaging series of stories that weave together into a very good book.