While a life of adventure has traditionally been reserved for the rich and the sponsored, to the dirtbag, it's a birthright for the masses. Partly a celebration of an underappreciated subculture of hiker trash, ski bums, and vagabonds, and partly a 'how to' guide for adventure on the cheap, The Dirtbag's Guide to Life is the first solid attempt to define an outdoor movement that has taken root in backpacker hostels, long trails, and climbing crags around the world.

The ultimate guide to going on the road. For generations people have abandoned the grind to go travel and live out of cars and backpacks. This book tells you how.

"Following in the prose of the beatniks, the athletic counterculture of the dirtbags is carrying the torch with the belief that a simple, rewarding life, close to nature, is still possible in this modern world. In The great American dirtbags, these people and their wild stories come alive..." -- BACK COVER.

The victories and failures of millennial socialism, as told by the writer who lived it. Amber A'Lee Frost came to New York City from her home state of Indiana as a working class activist (and member of then-unknown Cold War hold-out, Democratic Socialists of America), just before the first major movement for economic justice of the millennium, Occupy Wall Street. Of course, Occupy went bust, then Bernie Sanders went boom, and she threw herself into the campaign with everything she had. Frost has been one of the foremost evangelists of labor and socialist politics ever since, as a writer, activist, former staff and lifetime member of DSA, and cohost of the wildly popular Chapo Trap House podcast. Dirtbag is the much-anticipated debut from one of the most engaging and insightful writers of her generation. This book is more than a political memoir; it is a chapter in the story of the only movement that has a chance to reshape our world into something better. It captures an electric time of thrilling triumphs, stupid decisions, friendships and rivalries new and old, struggle, joy, setbacks, and heartbreak, all with magnetic prose, remarkable candor, and unflappable humor. Throughout it all, Frost burned the candle at both ends, relentlessly campaigning for socialism and the labor movement, from the American Midwest to the British rust belt, and rallying the troops with her brothers-in-arms as a self-described propagandist for the glorious cause of the workers movement (and somehow, always finding moments for plenty of reckless adventuring). The time was a brutal calamity of work and play, with all of the late nights, hard fights, and joyous camaraderie powered by the hope and the faith that maybe, somehow, this time, socialism could actually win.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER USA TODAY BESTSELLER Winner of the New England Book Award for Nonfiction Winner of the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association Nonfiction Book of the Year “The best of what memoir can accomplish... pulling no punches on the path to truth, but it always finds the capacity for grace and joy.” –Esquire, "Best Memoirs of the Year" A TIME Must-Read Book of the Year * A Rolling Stone Top Culture Pick * A Publishers Weekly Best Memoir of the Season * A Buzzfeed Book Pick * A Goodreads Readers' Most Anticipated Book * A Chicago Tribune Book Pick * A Boston.com Book You Should Read * A Los Angeles Times Book to Add to Your Reading List Isaac Fitzgerald has lived many lives. He's been an altar boy, a bartender, a fat kid, a smuggler, a biker, a prince of New England. But before all that, he was a bomb that exploded his parents' lives-or so he was told. In Dirtbag, Massachusetts, Fitzgerald, with warmth and humor, recounts his ongoing search for forgiveness, a more far-reaching vision of masculinity, and a more expansive definition of family and self. Fitzgerald's memoir-in-essays begins with a childhood that moves at breakneck speed from safety to violence, recounting an extraordinary pilgrimage through trauma to self-understanding and, ultimately, acceptance. From growing up in a Boston homeless shelter to bartending in San Francisco, from smuggling medical supplies into Burma to his lifelong struggle to make peace with his body, Fitzgerald strives to take control of his own story: one that aims to put aside anger, isolation, and entitlement to embrace the idea that one can be generous to oneself by being generous to others. Gritty and clear-eyed, loud-hearted and beautiful, Dirtbag, Massachusetts is a rollicking book that might also be a lifeline.

Climbing Out of Bed is a collection of rock climbing and mountain town stories, written over the last 13 years. The muses of Mehall's pieces are the people who make up the rock climbing and mountain town culture. Originally hailing from Illinois, Mehall moved to Colorado in 1999 to attend Western State College, in Gunnison. He describes the experience as being a lost soul who floated to the mountains, and then discovered his true self. Many of the stories in Climbing Out of Bed are coming of age tales, especially when the author embarks into the unknown of the rock climbing world. There are 25 pieces in Climbing Out of Bed, and topics for essays include: friendship, hitchhiking, couch surfing, buildering (climbing buildings), road tripping, dumpster diving, extended camping experiences, dirtbag living, love, loss, wanderlust, and Zen dishwashing Mehall lived in the Gunnison Valley, Colorado for 11 years, and now resides in Durango, Colorado, where he is a freelance writer. He is also the publisher of The Climbing Zine, an independent rock climbing publication. His work has been published in Crested Butte Magazine, Rock and Ice, Climbing, Mountain Gazette, foxsports.com, and Patagonia's blog, The Cleanest Line. He also worked at his alma mater, Western State College of Colorado, for three years, as the assistant director of public relations and communications. George Sibley, author of Dragons in Paradise and senior correspondent to the Mountain Gazette, says that Mehall's writing makes him think of Jack Kerouac, on a good day. "I don't know anyone who writes with more enthusiasm, joy and honest about a life that ranges from pearl diving in restaurant kitchen sinks all winter, to climbing the big walls and spires of North America all summer and fall," Sibley said.

The Desert is Luke Mehall's fifth and final offering in his series of dirtbag climbing books. The book begins with Mehall's first trip to The Desert, a visit to Indian Creek in 1999, and chronicles nearly two decades of experiences. Over time the author grows from thinking that the red rock desert of the Colorado Plateau is just another stop along the way, to finding himself more and more at home there. Ultimately the author's passion for first ascents with his best friends fuels his desire to get to know the area in an intimate way. At the same time that this transformation occurs the Bears Ears National Monument is created by the Obama administration, and then ultimately dismantled. While the ultimate decision by the courts is awaited Mehall contemplates the importance of public lands for the soul of America. The Desert is a definitive, independently published account of a dirtbag climber searching for love, passion, fresh air, and, ultimately an escape from the hyper-connectedness of the modern world.