If you are an outdoors-person, then this is a must read. Anyone involved in any outdoor groups should read this and have members read this! Newcomers and old pros alike may love this literature, for its leasons are timeless! Thank you, Laura and Guy Waterman!

This title and "Wilderness Ethics" are pioneering works forming 'a code that we can live by'. Guy chose to climg the high ridge one last time, on a trail, 'beyond the ranges'. His true farewell will be publication of his collected works forthcoming.See also books by the late Scott Nearing & his wife.

This book was one of the originals in this subject, not to mention one of the best. What is great about this book is that not only is it a how-to manual for leave no trace camping, but it also explores the multi-faceted issue of "what are we trying to preserve" with our remaining wild lands. As someone who works in the field of backcountry land management, I couldn't recommend this book more highly to both hikers and land managers alike. Check out the companion book, Wilderness Ethics as well. Pete Ketcham, Green Mountain Club, Vermont.

A friend turned me on to this book. I had passed on it a few times due in part to it's huge size. However I found that it was everything I ever wanted to know about the mountains and forests of New England. It's written in a very accesible manner that never leaves the reader without a smile for long. It's very obvious that the text contained in this book was researched with an artists attention to detail. And it shows in the nearly 200 pages of appendix!

To those in the North East the name Guy Waterman and his wife Laura have long been synonymis with hiking and climbing in the the region. A lot of hulabaloo was made over his death and the poetic yet puzzling statement it makes. In any case, after reading this book it becomes easy to see why he was so well loved, respected, and admired by so many of his peers.

If this book was $100.00 it would still be worth it. The amount of labor that went into this book is priceless. It was very obviously a labor of love. Buy it and read it.

This book is a great indepth look at mountainiering in the northeastern United States. It has to be the most complete history of the northeast mountains. It starts back when Darby Fields and many others started to explore the area, and runs through the nineteen eighties. Laura and Guy Waterman researched for ten years in order to put this book together. They are both acomplished writers and have a way of making a history exciting and humorous. It is a great tribute to the early settlers of the area and how hearty they were. I recomend this book to anyone who has done some hiking in the northeastern United States or are just interested in the history of the land. This is a must buy for all serious northeastern mountainiers.

Guy, age 67 climbed his favorite mountain ridge near his home in Vermont,one last time. A forthcoming collection of their writings,some of which supplement this book, will be published soon.

"Yankee Rock & Ice" is the best climbing history I have ever read for any region or era. The authors went to great lengths to get the history from primary sources. Straight from the horse's mouth as it were. They talked to dozens of old-time climbers to record their memories before they pasted-on. Sadly, many have, but their reminiscences are recorded here. This is a history in the true sense of the word. Many climbing histories give simple narratives of when, by whom, and how climbs were done. "Camp 4" by Steve Roper and "Defying Gravity" by Gary Arce are two that come to mind. The authors of "Yankee Rock & Ice" don't simply give a account of when classic climbs were done, they also scrutinize the history according to the times. They examine the past by the current customs, techniques and technology available. But, this isn't a stuffy history text you read in school, the stories are lively and extremely funny. I was laughing as loud as when I read John Long's stuff.

This book introduces the basic values of preserving "wild" places. Good for any person who loves the outdoors, especially young people and students who may need a lesson in values.

I had read an article about Guy Waterman some time ago and was anxious to know more about him. So, when I learned of Chip Brown's book, I was eager to read it. At the end, I was frustrated. I wanted to know how Waterman LIVED his life; Brown was intent on focusing entirely on why he chose to DIE. Brown makes clear that Waterman was enormously respected and loved by many people. But he fails to explore his relationships with anyone other than his family. Waterman was the legendary man of the mountains in New Hampshire, but Brown tells us very little of why that was true - other than telling us how many times he climbed all the 4,000'+ peaks and writing some books about them, books he describes only very cursorily.
Waterman and his second wife, Laura, chose to live, like Helen and Scott Nearing, a very basic, really primitive lifestyle back in the woods in Vermont, but again Brown describes their lives only minimally.
I love mountains and forests. I love hard physical effort (I was a serious, competitive long distance runner for more than 40 years until arthritis stopped me.) Like the Watermans, I hate the materialistic way of life favored by almost all Americans. And, like Guy Waterman, I completely believe that a person should have the choice of when to exit this world, if old age and decreptitude make life not worth living.
In short, this should have been a made-to-order book for me. But I became weary of Brown's endless psycho-analyzing of Waterman, and in time I skimmed the psycho-babble, looking for the occasional passages which provided information about how he - and Laura - actually lived.
Ironically, Brown failed in the one task he assigned himself - to give a clear explanation for Waterman's suicide. Yes, he couldn't do all he had once done, but he still was very fit, fit enough to climb to the top of that mountain in brutal winter cold to end his life. And he left behind - DESERTED - a woman he seemed clearly to love greatly. Why did so many love such a man?

I heard the end of a review of this book on National Public Radio. It inspired me to rent it out of the library...

Guy Waterman's life is worth studying. He traveled to the beat of his own drum. His life was a series of conflicts about depression, alcoholism, heroicism verses self-preservation. Guy Waterman, an extermely gifted individual faught a successful battle with alcoholism. To defeat this deamon Waterman moved to the mountains and insulated himself with nature.

Waterman was not as successful with his battle against depression, however. He refused medical intervention. "I would rather be a free man in hell than a prisoner in heaven."
Waterman ultimately took his own life by freezing to death on top of a favorite mountain. Waterman was 67 when he committed suicide. The reactions of friends and relatives to he suicide make up a good portion of the book. The author tries to sort out the roots of Waterman's depression and creates parrallels between his death and the tragic Mountaineering deaths of two of his sons.

What I didn't care for in this book is all the literary referencing. Much of this was lost to me. Several times I almost stopped reading this book because I was not privy to poetry from Milton's Paradise Lost.

I am glad that I perservered, however. This biography gives thought to the idea of choosing the manner of ones death. Waterman choose his own path with the knowledge of his wife and some close friends. This final trail and their reactions to it make Guy Waterman's life worth reading.

Stuart Don Levy MD

I thought this book was very well done. It was always interesting and presents its subjects (the Watermans) in a decent light. I think that as an author of a subject like this it would be easy to cast judgement on Guy Waterman, but Chip Brown lets the reader come to thier own conclusions. I really enjoyed this book, and I believe that C. Brown did a good job in showing the complexity of the situations the Watermans encountered.