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A Touching Story that Hit Me Right in the Heart. I haven't used the word "touching" in years, but it's the word that came to mind as I read the last sentence of this book last night. Sam Keith's bio states that writing came hard to him. Well, Mr. Keith, I'd say you made it. You and Dick Proenneke did a masterful job of leaving behind a manuscript that will touch generations to come. You penned a book with staying power. The works of few authors will be remembered, but I will always remember your book. This book connected with me. I left the wilderness of the Rockies four years ago. I cut my teeth in those rugged mountains. It's where I spent most of my time growing up. It's where I earned my living until four years ago. And I've yearned for those rugged, beautiful places since I left. This book took me back to a place I long to be. Geographically, Dick Proenneke and I lived in two different places, but through this book, I walked in his shoes back to the ruggedness I so dearly love and miss. This is not a mountain man book. This is not a book about a man who lost his marbles, withdrew from society, and inched his way to savage lunacy. This is a story about a man who was big inside, a man who wouldn't settle for insignificance in his life. It's about a man with dreams who decided dreams are given to us so that we might pursue them and find the satisfaction of achieving them. Dick Proenneke was a smart man, an educated man, well-written and well-spoken. Not the kind of guy you'd expect to stumble across in a remote piece of Alaska. He was a very civilized man. He had a big heart and believed in life's capacity to be bigger than what most of us allow it to be. That much is obvious from his writings. Like Proenneke, I too am a dreamer. Always have been. His book reminded me not to let go of those dreams and to keep working to attain them. This book is largely the edited writings from Proenneke's diary over the course of his first year at his Alaskan outpost. I found his closing reflections at the end of the book to be some of the most powerful writing I've read in quite a while. No bitterness, no anger. He writes like a man released, liberated from the shackles of small thinking and unnecessary societal limitations. I don't know how else to summarize this book than to state it was a touching story that connected with the man deep inside me - the man God made me to be, the man who often gets buried by all the baggage of my comfortable, efficient, "time-saving" lifestyle here in Music City. I rarely run across a book that compels me to grab another copy for my 12 year-old nephew, but this one did. From my experience, Proenneke's adventures capture the longing inside virtually every young boy's heart. I don't know if this book will connect with women as much as it will with men. It might, but I'm not sure. The book is written from the perspective of a man seeking to be a man instead of the emasculated remnant of a man that society has been working long and hard to make of all men. From his writings, it's obvious that Proenneke was a gentle man. He was tough as a nail, but gentle at the same time. Seems like he became tougher and more gentle the longer he stayed in his wilderness. This book reminded me just how different men and women are and that regardless of what radical feminists scream, regardless of what any of the radical shapers in our society try to indoctrinate us with, God made men and women different and that we should celebrate and embrace those differences for the blessings they are. This book inspired me to be more of a better breed of man.