Johnson’s savagely funny [book] is a grunt’s-eye view of fear and loathing, arrogance and insanity in a dysfunctional, dystopian closed community. It’s like M*A*S*H on ice, a bleak, black comedy.”—The Times of London Read more

Travelogue, cultural meditation, and love story, On the Ice casts a panoramic view on one of the oddest communities in one of the most extreme places on earth. Negative 70-degree weather. Canned food that dates back at least a decade. Wind storms powerful enough to lift a human off the ground. Extremely unfashionable clothing. Welcome to Antarctica, the farthest-away place in the world.Hoping to get away from the complexities of her life, Gretchen Legler arrives at McMurdo Station with the intention of researching the landscape; what she finds, instead, is a zany population of misfits and dreamers. Populated by people from all walks of life—bankers, MBAs, therapists, carpenters, scientists, laborers, and military brass—the individuals that Legler meets have gone to Antarctica to escape everything from parking tickets to angry spouses.Part sociological study, part historiography, and part love story, On the Ice is an exploration of one of the most unexplored places on earth and the people who are drawn to it. Read more

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"A joyful celebration" (NPR) that shows us why silence is essential to our sanity and happiness—and how it can open doors to wonder and gratitude—from a renowned explorer and acclaimed author. In this astonishing and transformative meditation, Erling Kagge, famed Norwegian explorer and the first person to reach the South Pole alone, explores the silence around us, the silence within us, and the silence we must create. By recounting his own experiences and discussing the observations of poets, artists, and explorers, Kagge shows us what silence is, where it can be found, and why it is now more important than ever. Read more

NATIONAL BEST SELLER • A riveting account of Shackleton's famed Antarctic expedition, recounting one of the last great adventures in the Heroic Age of exploration—perhaps the greatest of them all—the shipwreck that stranded the crew for twenty months. Including never-before published photographs.In August 1914, days before the outbreak of the First World War, the renowned explorer Ernest Shackleton and a crew of twenty-seven set sail in their ship, Endurance, for the South Atlantic in pursuit of the last unclaimed prize in the history of exploration: the first crossing on foot of the Antarctic continent. Weaving a treacherous path through the freezing Weddell Sea, they had come within eighty-five miles of their destination when Endurance, was trapped fast in the ice pack. Soon the ship was crushed like matchwood, leaving the crew stranded on the floes. Their ordeal would last for twenty months, and they would make two near-fatal attempts to escape by open boat before their final rescue.Drawing upon previously unavailable sources, Caroline Alexander gives us an enthralling account of Endurance and Shackleton's expedition—one of history's greatest epics of survival. And she presents the astonishing work of Frank Hurley, the Australian photographer whose visual record of the adventure has never before been published comprehensively. Together, text and image re-create the terrible beauty of Antarctica, the awful destruction of the ship, and the crew's heroic daily struggle to stay alive, a miracle achieved largely through Shackleton's inspiring leadership. The survival of Hurley's remarkable images is scarcely less miraculous: The original glass plate negatives, from which most of the book's illustrations are superbly reproduced, were stored in hermetically sealed cannisters that survived months on the ice floes, a week in an open boat on the polar seas, and several more months buried in the snows of a rocky outcrop called Elephant Island. Finally Hurley was forced to abandon his professional equipment; he captured some of the most unforgettable images of the struggle with a pocket camera and three rolls of Kodak film.Published in conjunction with the American Museum of Natural History's landmark exhibition on Shackleton's journey. Read more

“An epic story, elegantly told and full of mystery.” — Maggie Shipstead, author of Great CircleA rediscovered classic memoir – the mesmerizingly beautiful account of one woman's year spent living in a remote hut in the Arctic“A refreshing voice in the canon of Arctic literature. . . charms its reader with its simple candor. Readers will delight in Ritter’s frank impressions and candid remarks. – The Wall Street JournalThis rediscovered classic memoir tells the incredible tale of a woman defying society's expectations to find freedom and peace in the adventure of a lifetime.In 1934, the painter Christiane Ritter leaves her comfortable life in Austria and travels to the remote Arctic island of Spitsbergen, to spend a year there with her husband. She thinks it will be a relaxing trip, a chance to 'read thick books in the remote quiet and, not least, sleep to my heart's content', but when Christiane arrives she is shocked to realize that they are to live in a tiny ramshackle hut on the shores of a lonely fjord, hundreds of miles from the nearest settlement, battling the elements every day, just to survive.At first, Christiane is horrified by the freezing cold, the bleak landscape the lack of equipment and supplies... But as time passes, after encounters with bears and seals, long treks over the ice and months on end of perpetual night, she finds herself falling in love with the Arctic's harsh, otherworldly beauty, gaining a great sense of inner peace and a new appreciation for the sanctity of life. Read more

An acclaimed photographic guide to these marvelous and enigmatic birds―now in a new, updated editionPenguins are perhaps the most beloved birds. On land, their behavior appears so humorous and expressive that we can be excused for attributing to them moods and foibles similar to our own. Few realize how complex and mysterious their private lives truly are, as most of their existence takes place far from our prying eyes, hidden beneath the ocean waves. Now in a new, updated edition, this stunningly illustrated book provides a unique look at these extraordinary creatures and the cutting-edge science that is helping us to better understand them. Featuring more than 400 breathtaking photos, this is the ultimate guide to all 18 species of penguins, including those with retiring personalities or nocturnal habits that tend to be overlooked and rarely photographed. This revised second edition features updated scientific information and some spectacular new photographs.Penguins is the most ambitious book to date by Tui De Roy, Mark Jones, and Julie Cornthwaite. Their travels, spanning more than two decades, have seen them crisscross the southern hemisphere to virtually everywhere that penguins are found, from the sun-baked lava shores of the Galápagos to some of the remotest subantarctic islands, as well as all around the Antarctic continent, where Emperor penguins breed on the deep-frozen sea.A book that no bird enthusiast or armchair naturalist should do without, Penguins includes discussions of penguin conservation, informative species profiles, fascinating penguin facts, and tips on where to see penguins in the wild.Covers all 18 species of the world’s penguinsFeatures more than 400 stunning photosExplores the latest science on penguins and their conservationIncludes informative species profiles and fascinating penguin facts Read more

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The #1 bestselling chapter book series of all time celebrates 25 years with new covers and a new, easy-to-use numbering system! Jack and Annie arrive on the one continent they haven’t visited before: Antarctica! What can they hope to learn about happiness in such a barren place? Only the penguins know for sure…Jack and Annie are about to find out!Formerly numbered as Magic Tree House #40, the title of this book is now Magic Tree House Merlin Mission #12: Eve of the Emperor Penguin. Did you know that there’s a Magic Tree House book for every kid? Magic Tree House: Adventures with Jack and Annie, perfect for readers who are just beginning chapter books Merlin Missions: More challenging adventures for the experienced reader Super Edition: A longer and more dangerous adventure Fact Trackers: Nonfiction companions to your favorite Magic Tree House adventures Read more

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Killers of the Flower Moon and The Wager, a thrilling and powerful true story of adventure and obsession in the Antarctic, lavishly illustrated with color photographs. "[Grann is] one of the preeminent adventure and true-crime writers working today."—New York Magazine Henry Worsley was a devoted husband and father and a decorated British special forces officer who believed in honor and sacrifice. He was also a man obsessed. He spent his life idolizing Ernest Shackleton, the nineteenth-century polar explorer, who tried to become the first person to reach the South Pole, and later sought to cross Antarctica on foot. Shackleton never completed his journeys, but he repeatedly rescued his men from certain death, and emerged as one of the greatest leaders in history. Worsley felt an overpowering connection to those expeditions. He was related to one of Shackleton's men, Frank Worsley, and spent a fortune collecting artifacts from their epic treks across the continent. He modeled his military command on Shackleton's legendary skills and was determined to measure his own powers of endurance against them. He would succeed where Shackleton had failed, in the most brutal landscape in the world. In 2008, Worsley set out across Antarctica with two other descendants of Shackleton's crew, battling the freezing, desolate landscape, life-threatening physical exhaustion, and hidden crevasses. Yet when he returned home he felt compelled to go back. On November 13, 2015, at age 55, Worsley bid farewell to his family and embarked on his most perilous quest: to walk across Antarctica alone. David Grann tells Worsley's remarkable story with the intensity and power that have led him to be called "simply the best narrative nonfiction writer working today." Illustrated with more than fifty stunning photographs from Worsley's and Shackleton's journeys, The White Darkness is both a gorgeous keepsake volume and a spellbinding story of courage, love, and a man pushing himself to the extremes of human capacity. Look for David Grann’s latest bestselling book, The Wager! Read more

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At the beginning of the twentieth century, the South Pole was the most coveted prize in the fiercely nationalistic modern age of exploration. In the brilliant dual biography, the award-winning writer Roland Huntford re-examines every detail of the great race to the South Pole between Britain's Robert Scott and Norway's Roald Amundsen. Scott, who dies along with four of his men only eleven miles from his next cache of supplies, became Britain's beloved failure, while Amundsen, who not only beat Scott to the Pole but returned alive, was largely forgotten. This account of their race is a gripping, highly readable history that captures the driving ambitions of the era and the complex, often deeply flawed men who were charged with carrying them out. THE LAST PLACE ON EARTH is the first of Huntford's masterly trilogy of polar biographies. It is also the only work on the subject in the English language based on the original Norwegian sources, to which Huntford returned to revise and update this edition. Read more

In 1910, hoping that the study of penguin eggs would provide an evolutionary link between birds and reptiles, a group of explorers left Cardiff by boat on Robert Falcon Scott’s expedition to Antarctica. Not all of them would return. Written by one of its survivors, The Worst Journey in the World tells the moving and dramatic story of the disastrous Scott expedition. Driven by an obsession for scientific knowledge, these brave polar explorers embarked on a journey into the unknown, testing their endurance by pushing themselves to the ultimate physical and mental limits as they surveyed the striking and mammoth land that lay far to the south. Their goal was to discover as much as was scientifically possible about the terrain and habitat of Antarctica, and to be the first to reach the South Pole. The party was plagued by bad luck, weather conditions of unanticipated ferocity, and the physical deterioration of the party itself on the last part of the journey.The youngest member of the team and its sole survivor, Apsley Cherry-Garrard gives a gripping account of Scott’s last expedition. The author was also part of the rescue team that eventually found the frozen bodies of Scott and the three men who had accompanied him on the final push to the Pole. These deaths would haunt him for the rest of his life as he questioned the decisions he had made and the actions he had taken in the days leading up to the Polar Party’s demise.Prior to this sad denouement, Cherry-Garrard’s account is filled with details of scientific discovery and anecdotes of human resilience in a harsh environment. Each participant in the expedition is brought fully to life. The author’s recollections are supported by diary excerpts and accounts from other teammates. Read more

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"Alexander has done a fine job. . . allowing the cat's (and her own) sense of humor to have full run." —New York Times Book ReviewWhen Sir Ernest Shackleton's ship Endurance became trapped in the Antarctic ice, all twenty-nine members of the crew were pushed to their limits of survival, including Mrs. Chippy, the ship's estimable cat. Fortunately for posterity, Mrs. Chippy left a diary of the ordeal.Closely based on the true events of Shackleton's heroic journey, and illustrated with authentic photographs taken by Frank Hurley, expedition photographer, Mrs. Chippy's Last Expedition is a firsthand account of one of the greatest adventures in history—from a unique point of view. Read more

Experience a book about Antarctica that reveals the continent’s fascinating secrets, from its earliest myths to modern discoveries. The History of Antarctica brings you face-to-face with courageous explorers, dramatic survival stories, and the grand sweep of polar history. Whether you are new to Antarctica books or an avid fan of cold-weather tales, this voyage will change how you see the southernmost part of our planet.Discover how Antarctic expeditions evolved from daring voyages to well-coordinated missions of polar research. Learn about the often-overlooked ties to the Franklin expedition—a landmark event in polar exploration—and explore how the continent’s harsh environment tested human limits. Along the way, you will gain fresh insight into Antarctic wildlife and the formidable Antarctic climate that shaped every historic landing and outpost.Here’s what you can expect from The History of Antarctica:Vivid storytelling that captures the danger and excitement of each voyageRich details on key explorers, including their triumphs and tragediesIn-depth exploration of polar science and evolving expedition methodsClear explanations of how climate, wildlife, and geography intersectMemorable facts that reveal why Antarctica remains a global treasureIf you’re looking for a comprehensive book about Antarctica or want to expand your knowledge of Antarctica books, you will find endless value in these pages. Buy your copy now to explore icy frontiers, trace heroic footsteps, and join the ranks of those captivated by our planet’s most extreme continent! Read more

This volume is the key outcome of the Arctic Crashes project, “Arctic People and Animal Crashes: Human, Climate and Habitat Agency in the Anthropocene.” This project was implemented during 2014–2016 by a team of scholars at the Smithsonian Institution’s Arctic Studies Center in collaboration with their colleagues and indigenous partners from the U.S., Canada, Denmark, Greenland, and the Netherlands, and was supported by the Smithsonian Grand Challenges Consortia grant. The Arctic Crashes team introduced a new vision to explore human–animal–climate interactions, including rapid animal declines (“crashes”) in the North that—unlike earlier top-down models that tied changes in species’ abundance and ranges to alternating warmer and cooler, or high ice/low sea-ice regimes across the polar zone—analyzed such relations primarily at regional and local scale. This approach is closer to the Arctic peoples’ traditional view that animals, like people, live in “tribes” and they could “come and go” according to their relations with the local human societies. As Arctic climate changes and climate/sea-ice/ecotone boundaries shift, we increasingly observe diverse responses by people and animals to environmental stress. In some species we can also document the sustained effects of commercial overexploitation during the seventeenth to twentieth centuries, which varied across subpopulations. The emerging record may be best approached as a series of localized human–animal disequilibria (“crashes”) interpreted from different angles by population biologists, Arctic indigenous people, and anthropologists, rather than top-down climate-induced collapses. This new understanding also highlights varying rates of change—in the physical, animal, and human domains. Besides six keystone polar game species (the Pacific and Atlantic walrus, harbor seal, harp seal, bowhead whale, and caribou) the volume examines the status of polar bear and narwhal in the Canadian Arctic, Pribilof Island fur seal, and Atlantic cod in Greenland, presenting a diversity of historical, archaeological, evolutionary, and cultural/spiritual perspectives on Arctic “crashes.” Read more

• Waterproof • Tear-Resistant • Reference MapExpertly researched and designed, National Geographic's South America and Antarctica Flags & Facts Map is the authoritative map of South America by which other reference maps are measured. The map side includeds a political map showing countries, cities and other landmarks and a physical map shows the landforms such as mountain ranges and rivers. The Flags & Facts side includes a combined political and physical map of Antarctica.Clearly defined boundaries, major cities, and physical featuresHundreds of place names carefully placed to maintain legibility in heavily populated areasIncludes South America and Antarctica and adjacent regions within North AmericaDetailed physical map of South America with mountain ranges, plains, lakes, and riversFlags and facts with detailed information about cultural and physcial attributesPrinted in the U.S.A. on extremely durable, waterproof, and tear-resistant materialThis Reference Map is printed on durable synthetic paper, making it waterproof, tear-resistant and tough — capable of withstanding the rigors of any kind of use in the home or classroom.Sheet Size = 18.5" x 25.25"Folded Size = 4.25" x 9.25" Read more