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In the Footsteps of Henry David Thoreau
by Ben Shattuck
On an autumn morning in 1849, Henry David Thoreau stepped out his front door to walk the beaches of Cape Cod. Over a century and a half later, Ben Shattuck does the same.
With little more than a loaf of bread, brick of cheese, and a notebook, Shattuck sets out to retrace Thoreau's path through the Cape's outer beaches, from the elbow to Provincetown's fingertip.
This is the first of six journeys taken by Shattuck, each one inspired by a walk once taken by Henry David Thoreau. After the Cape, Shattuck goes up Mount Katahdin and Mount Wachusett, down the coastline of his hometown, and then through the Allagash. Along the way, Shattuck encounters unexpected characters, landscapes, and stories, seeing for himself the restorative effects that walking can have on a dampened spirit. Over years of following Thoreau, Shattuck finds himself uncovering new insights about family, love, friendship, and fatherhood, and understanding more deeply the lessons walking can offer through life's changing seasons.
Intimate, entertaining, and beautifully crafted, Six Walks is a resounding tribute to the ways walking in nature can inspire us all.
"In this resplendent debut, Pushcart Prize winner Shattuck traipses from quiet elegy to compassionate celebration through a series of jaunts patterned after Henry David Thoreau's rambles...Echoing Thoreau's brilliant reflections with his own, Shattuck distills the healing power of nature into a narrative that's a pure pleasure to wander through. Fans of Annie Dillard will find this mesmerizing." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Shattuck, artist and director of Maine's Cuttyhunk Island Writers' Residency program, channels the writings of Thoreau in this reflective foray into the oft-traveled world of walking...Wistful and meditative, sparked by lovely prose." - Kirkus Reviews
"What a very beautiful book. Every page is a pleasure. Charming, insightful, and full of humanity, this gem reminded me how profound it can feel to simply walk the earth." - Karen Thompson Walker, author of The Dreamers
"A beautiful and thought-provoking journey of discovery, which will leave you very glad that you walked a while with Ben Shattuck." - Eric Jay Dolin, author of Rebels at Sea
"Ben Shattuck asks of Thoreau 'Why was it so comforting to read this antique account of winter and loss?'―and I felt the same about Shattuck's book. A beautiful account of wandering through a season of illness and loss, and walking with Thoreau into the light." - Casey Walker, author of Last Days in Shanghai
This information about Six Walks was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Ben Shattuck, a former Teaching-Writing Fellow and graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, is a recipient of the PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize and a 2019 Pushcart Prize. He is the director of the Cuttyhunk Island Writers' Residency and curator of the Dedee Shattuck Gallery. His writing can be found in the Harvard Review, The Common, the Paris Review Daily, Lit Hub, and Kinfolk Magazine. He lives with his wife, actress Jenny Slate, and daughter on the coast of Massachusetts, where he owns and runs a general store built in 1793.
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