Wildfire Days

”[A] vivid debut memoir … Arresting prose, plenty of action, and a strong emotional undercurrent make this sing.” –Publishers Weekly“Readable and compelling, Ramsey’s memoir will appeal to fans of Cheryl Strayed.” –Booklist“A frank, funny, fast-paced, and heartfelt portrait of the grueling work of wildland firefighting and the people who love it, and a deeply moving account of what it means to love someone consumed by the flames of addiction without being sucked into the fire yourself. An uplifting story about pushing your own limits that will make you want to shoulder a pack and head for the mountains.” –Ash Davidson, author of Damnation Spring“Well-written and compelling, I read it cover to cover. Kelly Ramsey is that great combination of a badass and a great writer that we all strive for. I was on several huge Western fires as a young journalist, and Ramsey’s descriptions of the sheer herculean effort required by these young people is spot-on. The only other people I’ve seen work this hard are combat infantry. She describes a riveting and wildly dangerous world that many readers will find irresistible.” –Sebastian Junger, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Tribe“Start looking, and fire is connected to everything in a landscape. But fire is also a relationship and that, as Kelly Ramsey dramatizes, can be connected to everything in a life. A lively after-action report from the swelling literature of young women and fire.” –Stephen J. Pyne, author of The Pyrocene“Nobody has captured the violent dualities of wildfire, its destruction, and its visceral, almost inexplicable allure quite like Kelly Ramsey has in Wildfire Days. Her words will transport you to the hottest, smokiest, dustiest edges of some of the biggest wildfires in recent years, providing an intimate look at the devastation not only of wildfire, but of witnessing the places and people you love change before your eyes. This book is a captivating, detailed exploration of the culture of fighting fire in the American West, but beyond that it is a truly masterful rumination on growing and learning amidst–and in spite of–the scorched earth around us. I was left in awe.” –Amanda Monthei, former wildland firefighter and host of Life with Fire podcast

Kelly Ramsey was born in Frankfort, Kentucky. She studied poetry at the University of Virginia and fiction writing at the University of Pittsburgh. She cofounded The Lighthouse Works, an artists’ residency program, and later moved to Northern California, where she worked for the US Forest Service as a trail maintenance worker, wilderness ranger, and wildland firefighter. Her writing has appeared in The Washington Post, Sierra, Electric Literature, and the anthology Letter to a Stranger. She lives in Redding, California, with her partner and their dog, Rookie.