Laurence Gonzales

Unique among survival books . . . stunning . . . enthralling.Survivalchilling, reading. Denver Post"

Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

Deep Survival

The result of experimental breeding between a human and ape, 14-year-old Lucy is rescued from the Congo jungle where she has lived exclusively among apes and experiences stunning revelations about herself when she is relocated to a Chicago suburb. Reprint.

Lucy

On the 25th anniversary of the accident, reconstructs the crash of United Airlines Flight 232, which hit the runway in a huge fireball after experiencing engine failure and loss of all flight controls and still had 185 survivors. 20,000 first printing.

A Story of Disaster and Survival

Flight 232

The Art and Science of Resilience

Surviving Survival

"Unique among survival books... stunning... enthralling. Deep Survival makes compelling, and chilling, reading."—Penelope Purdy, Denver Post In ?Deep Survival?, Laurence Gonzalez combines hard science and powerful storytelling to illustrate the mysteries of survival, whether in the wilderness or in meeting any of life's great challenges. This gripping narrative, the first book to describe the art and science of survival, will change the way you see the world. Everyone has a mountain to climb. Everyone has a wilderness inside.

Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

Galt Airport in northern Illinois is known to the people who fly out of it as “One-Zero-Charlie” (for its FAA designation as Airport 10C). This evocative excursion into a little-known part of the heart of America takes us to a place where a love of flying draws people together, and a fascination with its sheer exhilaration keeps them that way.

Adventures in Grass Roots Aviation

One Zero Charlie

Jambeaux

"[Laurence Gonzales's] writing is not so much about a subject; it comes from within the subject. He steps out on the wire, or onto the scaffolding of a skyscraper, and grapples with the essence of the human act. Whether he is on a Coast Guard cutter hunting drug dealers off the Cuban coast, upside down in a stunt plane at three thousand feet, on an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, or landing on a heaving aircraft carrier deck in the middle of the ocean, he always becomes one with worlds that are hidden from ordinary life. And the reader becomes one with the vigorous, astonishing, and masterful prose. These essays beat with a life all their own."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Essays

The Hero's Apprentice

"Gonzales (Flight 232), a former National Geographic feature writer, proves himself a chronicler par excellence of nature—including of the human variety—in this excellent essay collection. The psychological nuance and vivid detail throughout will dazzle readers." —Publishers Weekly starred review, July 2020 In 1989, Laurence Gonzales was a young writer with his first book of essays, The Still Point, just published by the University of Arkansas Press. Imagine his surprise, one winter day, to receive a letter from none other than Kurt Vonnegut. “The excellence of your writing and the depth of your reporting saddened me, in a way,” Vonnegut wrote, “reminding me yet again what a tiny voice facts and reason have in this era of wrap-around, mega-decibel rock-and-roll.” Several books, many articles, and a growing list of awards later, Gonzales -- known for taking us to enthralling extremes – is still writing with excellence and depth. In this latest collection, we go from the top of Mount Washington and ”the worst weather in the world,” to 12,000 feet beneath the ocean, where a Naval Intelligence Officer discovers the Titanic using the government’s own spy equipment. We experience night assaults with the 82nd Airborne Division, the dynamiting of the 100-foot snowpack on Going-to-the-Sun Road in Glacier National Park, a trip to the International Space Station, the crash of an airliner to the bottom of the Everglades, and more. The University of Arkansas Press is proud to bring these stories to a new era, stories that, as with all of Gonzales’s work, “fairly sing with a voice all their own.” (Chicago Sun-Times)

The Chemistry of Fire

Laurence Gonzales began his successful publishing career in 1989 with the publication of The Still Point and later The Hero’s Apprentice (1994), both with the University of Arkansas Press. From these collections of essays he went on to write for renowned magazines in addition to publishing several books, including the best selling Deep Survival. His journalism garnered two National Magazine Awards, and his latest nonfiction book, Surviving Survival, was named by Kirkus as one of the best books of 2012. This new collection of essays shows us the sometimes hair-raising, sometimes heart-wrenching writing that Gonzales has become known for. This “compelling and trustworthy guide” (Booklist) takes us from a maximum-security prison to a cancer ward, from a mental institution to the World Trade Center. Among the essays included is “Marion Prison,” a National Magazine Award finalist, with its intimate view inside the most maximum security prison in America. “House of Pain” takes the reader into the life of a brain surgeon at Chicago’s Cook County Hospital, a grim world that few ever see. “Rites of Spring,” another National Magazine Award finalist, follows Gonzales and his wife on their journey through cancer, not once, but twice. Other stories venture above the Arctic Circle, flying deep into the Alaskan wilderness among grizzly bears and trumpeter swans; explore aerobatics in high-performance aircraft; and eulogize Memphis and Miami as American cities that mourn their fates in uniquely different ways.

New and Selected Essays

House of Pain

You have survived the crisis—trauma, disease, accident, or war—now how do you get your life back? The shark attacked while she was snorkeling, tearing through Micki Glenn’s breast and shredding her right arm. Her husband, a surgeon, saved her life on the spot, but when she was safely home she couldn’t just go on with her life. She had entered an even more profound survival journey: the aftermath. The survival experience changes everything because it invalidates all your previous adaptations, and the old rules don’t apply. In some cases survivors suffer more in the aftermath than they did during the actual crisis. In all cases, they have to work hard to reinvent themselves. Drawing on gripping cases across a wide range of life-threatening experiences, Laurence Gonzales fashions a compelling argument about fear, courage, and the adaptability of the human spirit. Micki Glenn was later moved to say: “I don’t regret that this happened to me. [It] has been . . . probably the single most positive experience I’ve ever had.”

Surviving Survival: The Art and Science of Resilience

The author of Deep Survival draws on cutting-edge science to offer additional insight into the ways human minds and bodies work, discussing how to apply lessons in evolutionary history to overcome everyday behavioral hazards. 50,000 first printing.

Laurence Gonzales

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