"The wardens climbed into their truck, ready to leave. 'You'll need about seven cords of firewood. Concentrate on that. You'll have to get it all in before the snow grounds your truck.'"

"Though I didn't want to ask, it seemed important. 'What's a cord?'"

So begins Pete Fromm's seven winter months alone in a tent in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness guarding salmon eggs. After blundering into this forbidding errand as a college lark, Fromm gradually come face to face with the blunt realities of life as a contemporary mountain man. Brutal cold, isolation, and fearful risks balance against the satisfaction of living a unique existence in modern America.

This award-winning narrative is a gripping story of adventure, a rousing tale of self-sufficiency, and modern-day Walden. From either perspective, Fromm lives up to his reputation as one of the West's strongest new voices.