Book excerpt: “This remarkable book is a testament to human perseverance, both personal and professional. It’s also a testament to the healing powers of America’s wild places. Above all, it’s a call to live life on your terms and to savor every bit of it.” —Slaton L. White, Field & Stream contributing editor What’s it like being the only woman in the woods? As a young girl, Kris Millgate was afraid of everything and everyone, but especially strangers with beards. She grew up hiking Utah’s Wasatch Mountains with her father—endless wanders through peppercorn speckled granite crawling up one canyon and red-brown blend spilling down another. Every trek was a lesson in endurance and persistence, two traits that have propelled her journey as a trailblazing wildlife journalist both behind the desk and in the field. Through her career as a voice for the outdoors, she spent countless days in the uncomfortable, challenging—and at times, unbearable—wilderness, learning to overcome all that had held her back. In her memoir, Millgate offers an authoritative and balanced look at history-making environmental stories while lending emotional insight into an industry dominated by men in a time when the shift toward outdoor exploration for all is catching fire. My Place Among Men is the story of how one young woman, brought up in the schoolhouse of the wild, becomes an ultimate force to be reckoned with—a mother, a wife, a journalist whose work leads her to the ultimate discovery: finding her place among men is truly about finding her place in the wild.