Alaska
James Michener, 1988
★ 4.18 from 17.9k ratings on Goodreads
A vast historical novel that starts with drifting tectonic plates and builds Alaska from rock, ice, animals and the peoples who crossed into it. This novel feels like a slow, lyrical journey through immense geological time, filled with a sense of wonder and epic scope.
Feels like awe, wonder and joy. About adventure and nature.
Who it’s for
You may like it if you enjoy sprawling historical narratives that blend deep natural history with human migration. Be prepared for its substantial length, as some readers found the characters thin or the dialogue overly textbook-like.
Why read it
Read this to grasp the incredible scale of Alaskan history, from its tectonic origins to the diverse peoples who shaped it.
A page from the book
Two rock formations an ocean apart remember the same vanished island.
In one of the far wastes of the South Pacific Ocean a long-vanished island-studded landmass of some magnitude arose, now given the name Wrangellia, and had it stayed put, it might have produced another assembly of islands like the Tahiti group or the Samoan. Instead, for reasons not known, it fragmented, and its two halves moved with a part of the Pacific Plate in a northerly direction, with the eastern half ending up along the Snake River in Idaho and the western as a part of the Alaskan peninsula. We can make this statement with certainty because scientists have compared the structure of the two segments in minute detail, and one layer after another of the terrane which landed in Idaho matches perfectly the one which wandered to Alaska. What readers say
Readers describe an epic, immersive history that teaches a great deal about Alaska and sparks travel interest, while its length is often daunting and some find characters thin or dialogue textbook-like.
James Michener.Michener's Alaska (1988) opens with hundreds of millions of years of geology before any human character appears—a signature of his historical novels.
Books that feel like this
More by James Michener
Hawaii
James Michener, 1959
Michener follows Hawaii from undersea geology to plantation politics, asking who gets to call the islands home.
Centennial
James Michener, 1956
A scholar’s journey through the massive changes of a rapidly modernizing America, tracking ambition, history, and the sheer scale of cultural transformation.
The Covenant
James Michener, 1980
A sweeping novel of South Africa, from a prehistoric clan beside a dying lake to the modern state, told through the people who claimed the land.
Where to get it
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Questions readers ask
- Is Alaska for me?
- You may like it if you enjoy sprawling historical narratives that blend deep natural history with human migration. Be prepared for its substantial length, as some readers found the characters thin or the dialogue overly textbook-like.
- What is Alaska like?
- This novel feels like a slow, lyrical journey through immense geological time, filled with a sense of wonder and epic scope. Feels like awe, wonder and joy. About adventure and nature.
- What should I read after Alaska?
- If you liked Alaska, try Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea (Jules Verne), A Wizard of Earthsea (Ursula K. Le Guin) and The Hobbit (J.R.R. Tolkien).
A taste of the feed
The oldest rule of magic is a warning about unintended consequences.
You must not change one thing, one pebble, one grain of sand, until you know what good and evil will follow on that act. The world is in balance, in Equilibrium. A wizard’s power of Changing and Summoning can shake the balance of the world. It is dangerous, that power. It is most perilous. It must follow knowledge, and serve need. To light a candle is to cast a shadow.
A Wizard of Earthsea · Ursula K. Le Guin
A creature speaks in magnificent, terrible grandeur, asserting a dominion that defies all reason.
“The King under the Mountain is dead, and where are his kin that dare seek revenge? Girion Lord of Dale is dead, and I have eaten his people like a wolf among sheep, and where are his sons’ sons that dare approach me? I kill where I wish, and none dare resist. I laid low the warriors of old and their like is not in the world today. Then I was but young and tender. Now I am old and strong, strong, strong, Thief in the Shadows!” he gloated. “My armour is like tenfold shields, my teeth are swords, my claws spears, the shock of my tail a thunderbolt, my wings a hurricane, and my breath death!”
The Hobbit · J.R.R. Tolkien
The calm island inside you, and the ocean waiting around it.
Consider all this; and then turn to this green, gentle, and most docile earth; consider them both, the sea and the land; and do you not find a strange analogy to something in yourself? For as this appalling ocean surrounds the verdant land, so in the soul of man there lies one insular Tahiti, full of peace and joy, but encompassed by all the horrors of the half known life. God keep thee! Push not off from that isle, thou canst never return!
Moby Dick · Herman Melville
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