BUY THIS BOOK. The Sun Is a Compass: A 4,000-Mile Journey into the Alaskan Wilds Caroline Van Hemert. Little, Brown Spark, $28 (320p) ISBN 978-0-316-41442-5.

The Sun Is a Compass By Caroline Van Hemert. (Little, Brown and Co., ... Her book is both a fascinating and poetic narrative of a daunting journey in a land of "no soft edges" ...