Bookshelf

Let’s be clear from the start. Reading one of these books will fall far down the list of activities to enjoy on a Midwestern summer weekend. These are the days we dream about on frigid February days when the days are short. Come July, we take every opportunity to get outside to (insert your favorite outdoor pursuit here) and stay out until you turn on a headlamp to load the car for the trip home.

Still, publishers don’t wait for us to get back into reading mode before sending new titles to bookstores. These titles are worthy of a place on your “to read” book lists. Even if you can’t get to them until November.

This Is Not About Running

Mary Cain

Few women have ever run 800 meters in under two minutes. Even fewer people have taken on running’s abusive training culture and won. Mary Cain has done both.

At 16, Alberto Salazar called to invite her to train with the famed Nike Oregon Project. For years, she excelled, setting records against elite runners twice her age. The Olympics were in her sights.

But off the track, Cain was crumbling. Finally, she left the Oregon Project, telling herself she just needed a break. A chorus rang out across the running community: What happened to Mary Cain?

Now, with her suit against Nike resolved, Cain is ready to share her side of the story—and to flip the script on abuse in youth sports. She draws on her diaries from this wrenching period of abuse to show, with clarity we rarely see, how young minds respond to the win-at-all-costs culture that pervades youth sports today. This Is Not About Running is a fierce memoir of the damage wrought by prioritizing competition over mental health. https://www.harpercollins.com/products/this-is-not-about-running-mary-cain?variant=43897601589282

Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness Eastern Region

Louis Dzierzak

Since 1979, this classic guide—and its companion volume covering the western region—has been the trusted resource for navigating the BWCAW, which offers more than 1,000 lakes, 1,200 miles of canoe routes, and 154 miles of portage trails. This updated 2026 edition presents detailed information for 28 entry points near Grand Marais, Minnesota, via the Sawbill and Gunflint Trails. For each entry point, you’ll find route options for both short and extended trips, with detailed planning information to help you make the most of your time in the wilderness.

https://shop.adventurewithkeen.com/product/boundary-waters-canoe-area-wilderness-eastern-region/

In Praise of Floods

James Scott

Scott expands our understanding of rivers to encompass their entirety—tributaries, wetlands, floodplains, backwaters, eddies, periodic marshlands, and the assemblage of life forms dependent on rivers for their existence and well-being. The book explores the consequences of human intervention in attempts to control and domesticate a natural process whose complexity and variability we barely understand. Order your copy at https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300278491/in-praise-of-floods/

American Rambler

Isaac Fitzgerald

In American Rambler, 
Fitzgerald sets out on a year-long journey to follow Appleseed’s path, from Massachusetts to Indiana. On this journey, Fitzgerald turns a childhood fascination into a profound reckoning of loss and grief, ritual and faith, grimy gas station bathrooms, and scenic apple picking.

A moving blend of memoir, history, and travelogue, American Rambler is at once an ode to the American heartland, a meditation on escaping the breakneck pace of modern life, and a clear-eyed look at the myths—often violent, sometimes hopeful, frequently romanticized—at the very core of American identity and history. Here’s a link to order the book: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/736787/american-rambler-by-isaac-fitzgerald/

For the Love of the Grind

Sara Hall

Sara Hall has been a fixture atop American distance running for more than two decades: first as a national high school champion, then as an NCAA star at Stanford University, and later as the only pro runner ever to win U.S. titles in the mile and the marathon. She’s held the American record in the half-marathon, clocked the fastest marathon in the U.S. by a woman aged 40 or older, and represented her country in ​multiple World Championships.
But success has never come easy. Fear of failure set in during high school. In college, Sara competed through a results-obsessed culture that carried into her professional career. She battled anxiety and imposter syndrome, alongside outside pressure to quit the sport and instead devote herself to supporting her husband, Olympic marathoner Ryan Hall, and later, her kids.

For the Love of the Grind is a love letter to running, and the story of Sara’s growth as an athlete, wife, and mom. Through her unflinching honesty and keen introspection, readers will be inspired to chase their dreams, to reimagine what might still be possible, and to embrace their own love of the grind. https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250404282/fortheloveofthegrind/