Synopses & Reviews
A riveting narrative of love and loss, grief and joy, as one woman embarks on a quest for a fastest known time on the Pacific Crest Trail.
When Emily Halnon lost her beloved mother to a rare uterine cancer at just 66 years old, she wanted to do something epic to honor the person her mother had been: adventurous, courageous, inspiring. Emily's mom had taken up running in her late 40s; she ran her first marathon at 50. She learned to swim at 60 so she could do triathlons, and she did long bike rides even after she was diagnosed, still going for walks as she could in the short months from diagnosis to her death. Emily's mom had even once jumped out of a plane. It was going to take something special to pay tribute to such a remarkable, life-loving spirit. Emily, an already accomplished ultrarunner (inspired to start running by her mother), decided to try to break the record for the Fastest Known Time by a woman, running the Pacific Crest Trail's 460 miles across Oregon. As she laid out plans for her run she began to wonder: Could she also break the men's record?
To the Gorge takes the reader through those 7 days, 19 hours, and 23 minutes, covering nearly 60 miles a day on foot over mountainous terrain, and battling all the issues that could arise during such a monstrous undertaking: hammered muscles, golf ball-sized blisters, sleep deprivation, hallucinations, cougar encounters. The hardest run of her life while she simultaneously battled through the profound grief of losing her living inspiration and best friend. Interwoven with Halnon's eight-day effort are her remembrances from her mother's life and death, exploring the complicated experience of grief — and what shines through it.
To the Gorge resonates with anyone whom life has hit with a hardball and has had to dig deep as they wonder how they will get through it. Filled with adventure and heart, To the Gorge invites readers to consider what our greatest losses have to teach us about how to live the one life we get.
Review
"To the Gorge is both the story of a gripping physical feat and also a deep reflection on the nature of grief and survival. We grieve because we love and this is a book about how the power of love can nourish us through even the greatest challenges. A book you can't put down and one you never want to end." Claire Bidwell Smith, author of Conscious Grieving
Review
"This book is a beautiful tribute to the spiritual anatomy of the human heart, and the power of the wilderness to break us down and shape us into something far wilder and more tender. Every runner knows, or eventually learns, that running and grief can come together to reshape the dissonance of a broken heart into something like peace. Very few can put this experience into words. Halnon's story invites us to look at our own broken hearts, erode the walls between our protected self and our essence, and at the end of it all, jump up and cheer." Lauren Fleshman, New York Times bestselling author of Good for a Girl
Review
"To the Gorge is so much more than a book about running, or even grief and loss. It's about how to live, and how to make your time in this world count and mean something. No book has ever made me cry more than this one — the kind of cathartic, full-body sobs that will leave you feeling inspired, grateful, and likely pondering how to create a legacy as powerful as Andrea Halnon's. A must-read for endurance athletes, aspiring endurance athletes, and anyone who is or has ever navigated a world-shattering loss of their own. This book will make you feel all of your biggest feelings, and invite you to think about how you want to live." Ali Feller, Host of the Ali on the Run Show podcast
Review
"They say that pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional. Emily learns that lesson the hard way, when her mother is diagnosed with cancer. Then she learns it again, on her 460-mile run across Oregon in pursuit of a goal that is impossibly hard. But she confronts the pain. And transcends the suffering. As a result, her amazing badass mother, whose northstar was 'possibility' and who embrases the motto 'stay brave, ' lives on in her words forever." Kenneth Posner, ultra-runner, peak-bagger, thru-hiker, and author of Running the Long Path: A Journey of Discovery in New York's Hudson Valley
Review
"This is nothing like that old notion The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner — title of a popular novel from a lifetime ago. Emily Halnon's book recounts how a real-life, record-breaking long-distance run she undertook was made possible through the collaboration of a whole support crew of talented and dedicated fellow runners — good friends and family providing heroic encouragement in a way that is now common practice in the booming sport of ultrarunning. There's much to be learned from this gritty demonstration of how talented small groups can sometimes transform seemingly quixotic goals into life-changing accomplishments." Ed Ayres, Founding Editor of Running Times Magazine and former winner of the JFK 50-Mile
About the Author
Emily Halnon is a writer, trail runner, and mountain athlete out of Eugene, Oregon. In addition to her Pacific Crest Trail run, she has placed in the top-10 at the Hardrock 100 Mile Endurance Run, and won or earned podium finishes at several races including the Siskiyou Outback 50-miler and the JFK 50 miler, and finished 100-milers including Cascade Crest Endurance Run, Pine to Palm, and Javalina Jundred. Her writings have been published in the Washington Post, Runner's World, the Guardian, Salon, CNN, Women's Running Magazine, Trail Runner Magazine, Adventure Journal, UltraSignup News, and has her own newsletter, Trail Mix.