My Side Of The Mountain by Jean Craighead George took me to a different world. It’s about a boy who runs away to the woods. But unlike most kids, he stays out there. He does not return an hour later or stay out the next day. He makes his own home and learns to survive by hunting and collecting plants and fruits.
The style of writing is from Sam’s point of view. The first chapter is a flash-forward of something that happens way ahead. But then, in the second chapter, we return to the first time he decides to go to the woods. There are a few drawings now and then by the author himself. You are on the right track if you want to read books like My Side Of The Mountain!
10 Books Like My Side Of The Mountain (Travel & Survival)
After reading the book “My Side Of The Mountain,” I was fascinated by adventure in jungle life. The book’s main character tells me many things about life and survival alone.
As a travel and adventure lover, you also like this and want to read more similar books. So I will discuss ten books similar to My Side Of The Mountain that make you feel you are on the journey. Let’s start our self-discovery journey!
1. Into the Wild
Into The Wild is the story of Christopher Johnson McCandless, who runs away from home after college and doesn’t tell any of his family members. He goes on spiritual and soul-searching excursions across the country. It means that in April 1992, Chris was found dead in a bus in Alaska.
So the story is told through interviews with people who knew Chris and met him along the way. Also, it tells the story through the eyes of the people Chris met and through journals that he wrote and thought he wrote in the passages of his books.
One of the fascinating things about this book is that it’s not written in chronological order. It starts with Chris’s death, then jumps back and forth from different periods in this journey. The author does that because he wants to reveal Chris to you in his way. He starts revealing little bits and pieces of Chris painting him as a second trick but an intellectual person.
Then slowly get deeper and deeper into Chris’s psyche and understand more of them because John reveals him. Another great thing about this book is the maps at some of the beginning of the chapters. A lot of the time, it shows you the places that Krakauer is talking about.
Chris was such an avid reader, and almost all the books he read were of a transcendentalist nature, like My Side Of The Mountain. While the book romanticizes it, it also points out the lifestyle’s contradictions, fallacies, and inconsistencies. It opened my eyes to wanting to live a trans and, nonetheless, lifestyle in a different form.
Chris isn’t exactly trained to handle the situations he puts himself in. Some people think he didn’t get what he deserved when he went into Alaska, but he shouldn’t have expected it to be that easy because it’s the wilderness. Chris goes out unprepared because he wants to be unprepared.
Author: Jon Krakauer
Average Rating: 4.5/5
Category: Expeditions & Discoveries World History, Pacific West United States Travel Books (Best Seller)
Available: Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Audio CD
2. Hatchet
This book does involve death, heart attack, divorce, and adultery. There is a brief discussion of a suicide attempt. So you should discern whether your child is ready for this content, and you might even want to read it yourself first. The book short is under four hours on audiobook, so it would be a pretty quick read if you want to read it yourself first. Scholastic does recommend this book for grades six and up.
Hatchet did win a Newbery Honor and is considered a young adult wilderness survival novel. It can be difficult to find good books for boys of high interest. It’s pretty action-packed from the very beginning. The book starts with a plane crash within the first few pages. It brings in some science content when the main character remembers what he learned in his science class. To survive, he remembers some of the lessons he learned, so that’s interesting and not something you get in many fiction novels.
This is the story of how Brian, the main character, survives a plane crash in the wilderness. It reads like a non-fiction book, which boys do to like non-fiction better. Also, it is very adventure-packed similar to My Side Of The Mountain. Many of the events in Hatchet were inspired by the real-life events of the author.
So it looks pretty realistic because it’s based on some of the events in his life. In fact, the author wrote another book about the adventures that inspired Hatchet, and that book is called Guts. It is also the first of five books in the series.
Author: Gary Paulsen
Average Rating: 4.7/5
Category: Teen & Young Adult Survival Stories (Best Seller)
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
3. The Stranger In The Woods
The Stranger In The Woods centers around a guy named Christopher Knight. When he was 20 years old, he decided to abandon all people. He hopped in his car, parked on the side of the primary woods, and walked in, and for 30-something-odd years, he never came out. He managed to find a way to survive throughout these without talking, making human contact with a single human being the entire time. He was alone by himself, his design and desire for these years.
Now, one of the ways that he survived, and it’s debatable whether he was a true hermit because of this, is he would steal from people who had this summer and winter vacation homes nearby his campsite. He would find these crazy ways to break into people’s houses. He could pick locks, walk through windows, and come undetected in many ways. Also, he would steal from people and steal food, magazines books.
This guy was almost like Bigfoot or an urban legend because many people didn’t believe that he could survive in the Maine woods during this icy and brutal winter climate that they’re in. The author talked to many of these locals who felt violated and felt like he was very polarizing, so some felt violated. Some felt he was kept to himself, and they were happy to help him with food. But he was very polarizing, and these people didn’t believe he was real. They thought it was maybe a gang of kids playing pranks.
It was true that this was the person, and he was doing it all by himself without any help. Remarkably, he was even able to survive this guy. He had almost a methodical, precise way that he went about walking. It was pretty cool to read the story and read a straightforward story about a guy living his life on his terms. After reading it, you will find similarities with My Side Of The Mountain.
Author: Michael Finkel
Average Rating: 4.6/5
Category: New England US Travel, Forests & Rainforests
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Audio CD
4. Wild
Like My Side Of The Mountain, Wild is a memoir from the author’s point of view. The story took place in 1995, so it’s been a bit since she’s done what she does in this book. But there’s a hiking boot on there because she hikes the Pacific Crest Trail, or at least most of it by herself. She is pretty ambitious, and she has no backpacking experience whatsoever.
So she even decided to do this because it was a hard time in her life. Her mother had died from cancer in her forties. She was married for a bit, her mother dying made her marriage crumble, and her family split apart. So her life was going down the drain.
One day, she was in a store and saw a guide for hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. She casually picked it up, looking at it. She was hearty in that she could do serious camping, but she was not prepared at all for carrying a huge pack on her back and hiking thousands of miles on a trail.
The Sierra Nevadas are snowed in some parts, and she can’t hike it. So she has to take a considerable detour and take all these buses and roads. Then she hitchhiked plenty of times and hitched hikes with guys that could be bad men. It jumps between how she’s doing on the trail and when she was little.
It’ll talk about her and Paul. Or how she’s Paul being her ex-husband or how she was doing heroin with this other guy, and she was living from paycheck to paycheck. You get a vast amount of her backstory. As you get farther and farther on in the book, it is based on the trial because it becomes an integral part of her life.
Author: Cheryl Strayed
Average Rating: 4.5/5
Category: North America Travel & Tourism, Travel Writing & Commentary
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
5. Island of the Blue Dolphins
Island of the Blue Dolphins is realistic fiction, and it takes place on an island and is told from the perspective of Karana, a young girl who lives in an indigenous tribe. Karana has a younger brother named Ramos, and her father is the chief of their tribe.
One day, a boat full of men and women comes vast to their island and demands that they allow them to hunt on the island. The tribe deals with the elites that they must give a portion of their gathering if they are hunting on the island. Also, they should give it to the tribe to allow them to hunt there.
So the elites make the home their make camp there and start to hunt when the elites decide that it’s time for them to go. They get ready to pack up and leave. But instead of making good on the payment they promised, a war breaks out on the island, and people in her tribe are killed.
So the tribe worries that the elites will return after they leave and decide it’s time for them to pack their stuff and go. The tribes gathered all their things, went onto the ships, and started to sail off onto the ocean. Karana realizes that Ramos is not on the boats.
Karana asks them to turn the ships around. But if the ships turned around, they would crash. They wouldn’t be able to turn around without it being devastating. Karana needs to make sure that her brother is safe. So she jumps off the ship and swims back to the island to save her little brother. They have to figure out, as a young girl and an even younger little boy, how to survive on their own when she is a woman.
So she never was taught how to hunt, and her little brother is too young to hunt the way that the older men were able to. They have to make do with what they have in each other. The surviving plots and character relations are similar to My Side Of The Mountain.
Author: Scott O’Dell
Average Rating: 4.7/5
Category: Historical Fiction, Adventure & Survival
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
6. The Sign of the Beaver by Elizabeth George Speare
The Sign of the Beaver is a historical novel set in 18th-century Maine. It tells the story of a young boy left alone to guard his family’s cabin while his father returns to Massachusetts to get the rest of the family. A Native American boy befriends him, and the two boys learn from each other and form a strong bond. Like “My Side of the Mountain,” it’s a story of survival, self-reliance, friendship, and cultural differences.
7. Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
Julie of the Wolves is the story of a young Eskimo girl who becomes lost in the tundra of Alaska. She is forced to survive independently and learns to communicate with a pack of wolves. This survival story shows self-reliance and a beautiful relationship between humans and animals. The lyrical writing makes it an excellent choice for readers who enjoy nature writing.
8. The Call of the Wild by Jack London
The Call of the Wild is a classic novel about a dog stolen from his comfortable life in California and forced to become a sled dog in Alaska. The book contains descriptions of the Alaskan wilderness and the harsh realities of life as a sled dog. It’s also a powerful exploration of the relationship between humans and animals.
9. Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls
Where the Red Fern Grows is a heartwarming and poignant novel about a young boy who saves up to buy two coonhounds. Together, they go on hunting adventures and form a deep bond. Like “My Side of the Mountain” is a story of human and animal relationships. However, it’s also a story of love, loss, perseverance, and determination.
10. The Incredible Journey by Sheila Burnford
The Incredible Journey is the story of three pets, a cat and two dogs. They embarked on a perilous journey through the Canadian wilderness to find their way home. This survival story represents the natural world and is a heartwarming tale of friendship and loyalty. The writing is engaging, and the characters are endearing, making it an excellent choice for readers of all ages.
These books are great options for readers who enjoyed “My Side of the Mountain.” They all explore survival, self-reliance, and the natural world while offering unique perspectives and stories.
Each book is written uniquely, ranging from lyrical to suspenseful, making them all engaging. I highly recommend these books to readers looking for more stories about the beauty and challenges of the natural world.
More Adventure Books:
Survival Books Like Into Thin Air
Adventure Survival Books Like Life of Pi
Adventurous Romance Books Like The Idea Of You
Adventurous Survival Romance Books
Adventure Books About Savannah GA
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