Young Men and Fire

Young Men and Fire
by Norman Maclean

Young Men and Fire
List Price: $16.00
Our Price: $2.90
You Save: $13.10 (82%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions


(Click here)
Buy this book at online book store in your country
Canada | UK | Germany | France

Book Summary Information

Author: Norman Maclean
Edition: Paperback
Published: 1993-11-15
ISBN: 0226500624
Number of pages: 316
Publisher: University Of Chicago Press

Book Reviews of Young Men and Fire

Book Review: A Must Have
Summary: 5 Stars

This is the quintessential non-fiction account of Mann Gulch. It creates the foundation of our study of wild fire behavior. I could not turn the pages fast enough. Many quotable descriptions and observations about the firefighting industry is timelessly captured in this book.

Summary of Young Men and Fire

On August 5, 1949, lightning came crashing down in the vast spruce forest above Seeley Lake, Montana, and touched off a roaring blaze. As every Westerner knows, lightning means fire, but the fire that raged through Mann Gulch that day was huge--the sort that occurs only every few decades. A battery of paratrooper-firefighters, many of them fresh veterans of World War II, had been anticipating it, and even looking forward to the chance to fight a great fire. Before the day ended thirteen of those smokejumpers lay dead, their charred remains evidence that something had gone terribly wrong. Norman Maclean gives a thorough account of the incident in language not meant for the squeamish: "Burning to death on a mountainside is dying at least three times ... first, considerably ahead of the fire, you reach the verge of death in your boots and your legs; next, as you fail, you sink back in the region of strange gases and red and blue darts where there is no oxygen and here you die in your lungs; then you sink in prayer into the main fire that consumes." After August 1949, he notes, the Forest Service came to recognize that not all fires need to be fought and that fire benefits most forest ecosystems.
On August 5, 1949, a crew of fifteen of the United States Forest Service's elite airborne firefighters, the Smokejumpers, stepped into the sky above a remote forest fire in the Montana wilderness. Two hours after their jump, all but three of these men were dead or mortally burned. Haunted by these deaths for forty years, Norman Maclean puts back together the scattered pieces of the Mann Gulch tragedy.

Young Men and Fire won the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1992.

"A magnificent drama of writing, a tragedy that pays tribute to the dead and offers rescue to the living.... Maclean's search for the truth, which becomes an exploration of his own mortality, is more compelling even than his journey into the heart of the fire. His description of the conflagration terrifies, but it is his battle with words, his effort to turn the story of the 13 men into tragedy that makes this book a classic."—from New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice, Best Books of 1992

"A treasure: part detective story, part western, part tragedy, part elegy and wholly eloquent ghost story in which the dead and the living join ranks cheerfully, if sometimes eerily, in a search for truth and the rest it brings."—Joseph Coates, Chicago Tribune

"An astonishing book. In compelling language, both homely and elegant, Young Men and Fire miraculously combines a fascinating primer on fires and firefighting, a powerful, breathtakingly real reconstruction of a tragedy, and a meditation on writing, grief and human character.... Maclean's last book will stir your heart and haunt your memory."—Timothy Foote, USA Today

"Beautiful.... A dark American idyll of which the language can be proud."—Robert M. Adams, The New York Review of Books

"Young Men and Fire is redolent of Melville. Just as the reader of Moby Dick comes to comprehend the monstrous entirety of the great white whale, so the reader of Young Men and Fire goes into the heart of the great red fire and comes out thoroughly informed. Don't hesitate to take the plunge."—Dennis Drabelle, Washington Post Book World

"Young Men and Fire is a somber and poetic retelling of a tragic event. It is the pinnacle of smokejumping literature and a classic work of 20th-century nonfiction."—John Holkeboer, The Wall Street Journal

"Maclean is always with the brave young dead. . . . They could not have found a storyteller with a better claim to represent their honor. . . . A great book."—James R. Kincaid, New York Times Book Review

1945 - Present Books

Book Subjects
Most talked about in Nonfiction
My War Gone By, I Miss It So ImageMy War Gone By, I Miss It So
by Anthony Loyd
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 2001-02-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.99
Price in other shops: $15.00
Young Men and Fire ImageYoung Men and Fire
by Norman Maclean
University Of Chicago Press; Published: 1993-11-15; Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.89
Price in other shops: $16.00
Blood Relation ImageBlood Relation
by Eric Konigsberg
HarperCollins; Published: 2005-10-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $1.56
Price in other shops: $25.95
Serpentine ImageSerpentine
by Thomas Thompson
Running Press; Published: 2000-03-08; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.79
Price in other shops: $16.00
Chickenhawk ImageChickenhawk
by Robert Mason
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 2005-03-29; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.03
Price in other shops: $16.00
Jarhead: A Marine's Chronicle of the Gulf War and Other Battles ImageJarhead: A Marine's Chronicle of the Gulf War and Other Battles
by Anthony Swofford
Scribner; Published: 2005-10-18; Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.74
Price in other shops: $15.00
Sniper: Inside the Hunt for the Killers Who Terrorized the Nation ImageSniper: Inside the Hunt for the Killers Who Terrorized the Nation
by Sari Horwitz, Michael Ruane
Ballantine Books; Published: 2004-09-28; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.49
Price in other shops: $7.50
Blind Eye: The Terrifying Story Of A Doctor Who Got Away With Murder ImageBlind Eye: The Terrifying Story Of A Doctor Who Got Away With Murder
by James B. Stewart
Simon & Schuster; Published: 2000-06-15; Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.98
Price in other shops: $15.00
Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley ImageLast Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley
by Peter Guralnick
Back Bay Books; Published: 1995-09-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.01
Price in other shops: $17.95
The Kingfish and His Realm: The Life and Times of Huey P. Long ImageThe Kingfish and His Realm: The Life and Times of Huey P. Long
by William Ivy Hair
Louisiana State University Press; Published: 1997-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.00
Price in other shops: $23.95
Similar Books and other products
A River Runs Through It ImageA River Runs Through It
Sony; Release date: 1999-11-23; DVD
Best price: $2.32
Price in other shops: $14.94
The Accountable Juggler: The Art of Leadership in a Federal Agency (part of the Public Affairs and Policy Administration Series) (Public Affairs and Political Education Series) ImageThe Accountable Juggler: The Art of Leadership in a Federal Agency (part of the Public Affairs and Policy Administration Series) (Public Affairs and Political Education Series)
by Beryl A. Radin
CQ Press; Published: 2002-03; Paperback; Book
Best price: $29.95
The Functions of the Executive: 30th Anniversary Edition ImageThe Functions of the Executive: 30th Anniversary Edition
by Chester I. Barnard
Harvard University Press; Published: 2007-08-23; Paperback; Book
Best price: $21.00
Price in other shops: $25.50
The Ultimate Advantage ImageThe Ultimate Advantage
by Edward E., III Lawler
Jossey-Bass; Published: 1992-01-15; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $12.25
Price in other shops: $52.00
Fire in Their Eyes: Wildfires and the People Who Fight Them ImageFire in Their Eyes: Wildfires and the People Who Fight Them
Harcourt Paperbacks; Published: 1999-03-31; Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.83
Price in other shops: $11.00
A Great Day to Fight Fire: Mann Gulch, 1949 ImageA Great Day to Fight Fire: Mann Gulch, 1949
by Mark Matthews
University of Oklahoma Press; Published: 2007-10-30; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $15.44
Price in other shops: $24.95
Jumping Fire: A Smokejumper's Memoir of Fighting Wildfire ImageJumping Fire: A Smokejumper's Memoir of Fighting Wildfire
by Murry A. Taylor
Harvest/HBJ Book; Published: 2001-06-14; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.49
Price in other shops: $14.00
The Thirtymile Fire: A Chronicle of Bravery and Betrayal ImageThe Thirtymile Fire: A Chronicle of Bravery and Betrayal
by John N. Maclean
Holt Paperbacks; Published: 2008-05-27; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.06
Price in other shops: $14.00
A River Runs through It and Other Stories, Twenty-fifth Anniversary Edition ImageA River Runs through It and Other Stories, Twenty-fifth Anniversary Edition
by Norman Maclean
University Of Chicago Press; Published: 2001-10-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.89
Price in other shops: $12.00
Fire on the Mountain: The True Story of the South Canyon Fire ImageFire on the Mountain: The True Story of the South Canyon Fire
by John N. Maclean
Published: 1999-10-06; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $22.97
Price in other shops: $24.00
Book store. Illustrated catalog of books on different categories