The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of the Donner Party

by Daniel James Brown

Book Overview

From the #1 bestselling author of The Boys in the Boat comes an unforgettable epic of family, tragedy, and survival on the American frontier

"An ideal pairing of talent and material. ... Engrossing. ... A deft and ambitious storyteller." -- Mary Roach, New York Times Book Review

In April of 1846, twenty-one-year-old Sarah Graves, intent on a better future, set out west from Illinois with her new husband,...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0061348112
• ISBN13: 9780061348112
• Release Date: September 2015
• Publisher: Mariner Books
• Length: 384 Pages
• Weight: 0.73 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.3" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Outstanding

Beautifully written, I couldn’t put it down. Author added so many interesting facts that made it all the more gripping. Without a doubt one of the best books I’ve read to date. Cannot recommend it enough.

Incredible

I haven’t stopped thinking about this book at least once a day since I finished it.

Loved this account of the Donner Party

A well-researched account of this harrowing and often overlooked story

Amazing

This is one of the best nonfiction books I have read- it completely sucks you in to the Donner party stories with stunning detail. If you are even remotely interested in the Donner party story, this is the book for you!

Indifferent stars above

Without a doubt one of the best historical non fictions I have ever read!

Amazing Story of the Capabilities of Human Survival

I think almost every child in school learns about the Donner Party to a greater or lesser extent. I had learned a little bit about them in school, but the details remained rather clouded over. It was as if the teachers wanted us to know about it, but not know too much about what really happened. I became much more interested in the history of the group after I moved to California. I have visited the memorial park a number of times, and seen the remainders of the horrendous conditions that these people endured. And, although there is an excellent museum in the park, I learned more about this ill fated party in this one book than I have from numerous other sources. While I will admit that the book is a little gruesome, I think that may be a necessary tool to truly portray how badly off the people of this group were. In fact, had I not visited the park previously, I would have found some of the material hard to believe. (It is hard to imagine 20 foot deep snow unless you have seen the sawed off tree stumps with your own eyes.) This book, more than others I have read, portrayed the misery, suffering and desperation of the group in detail. It also provided an interesting window into the mind and reminded me of how much people are capable of if the need arises. And, as I read, I kept wondering how many people today would have survived the first few nights. Not too many, I imagine. The book is well written and reads like a novel. It captures the interest and keeps the story moving well. My only complaint, if it could be called that, is the lack of maps of the region where the group stayed. It is hard to imagine in your mind exactly where the different cabins were and where the group was in relation to the lake and mountains. Otherwise, a superb treatment of this tragic story.

Brilliant historical storytelling

This book is a triumph: it's rare to find a painstakingly-researched history that is also a brilliantly written story -- one that reads like the best kind of page-turner novel. Like all good stories, it has a strong central character, the 22-year-old recently married Sarah Graves. Traveling with her parents and farm hands, they set out from Illinois for the promised land of California using the travel guide of its time -- unfortunately, one written by a shyster and fraud. The author delivers an engaging story that brings to life the dry facts and accounts of the Donner party's progress by fleshing out the characters, and blending in his own experience following the route. The American landscape also has a starring role in this tale. And when it comes to the deprivations of hypothermia and hunger, he explains the underlying physiology and psychology based on modern research. The author also makes it clear how a cascading series of bad decisions led to the human disaster in the California Sierras, and examines the causes -- a classic case of commitment escalation. These include setting off three weeks late and choosing a new untried path through the Wasatch mountains. Had any one of these many decisions gone a different way, disaster would most likely have been averted. I was riveted by the narrative and found it fascinating, harrowing and illuminating. It reminded me in terms of its engaging-yet-factual approach of The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Vintage)

Thank you, Mr. Brown

I have read every book I know about on the Donner Party, but this one is exceptional. Mr. Brown's story is not focused primarily on the Donner family and he makes a familiar story entirely new. The book is beautifully written, every page suggesting the author's heartfelt compassion and admiration for this group of people, most of whom lost their lives valiantly trying to triumph over adversities which at this point in time most of can barely believe, even when they are so powerfully described. The remarkable characteristic of these westward-bound men and women is their bravery. Many Americans today live in fear of terrorism, disease, devastating weather phenomena, etc. Those who headed west over the Great Salt Lake and started late in the season over the Sierra Nevada knew they were facing danger and hardship of an unimaginable degree. But even in extremis, surrounded by 20 or more feet of snow and without heat or nourishment, their creativity and their will to survive was miraculous, their general willingness to try to care for each other indomitable. Cannibalism has too often overshadowed many of the other dramatic human elements of this story. Mr. Brown puts that issue into perspective when he describes someone heating and ingesting leather shoelaces. Could there be a more powerful definition of starvation? It's just such nuggets that make this history a gold mine of new information, a suspense story of the most riveting kind, and a thrilling portrait of the human spirit, painted with words by a very gifted artist.

Horror and Heroism on the California Trail

Virtually everyone is familiar with the Donner party, the wagon train that was snowed in over the winter of 1846-1847 in the mountains in eastern California as it made its way to the rich lands of the San Francisco Bay area. Reduced to cannibalism to survive, the experiences of the overlanders served as an object lesson for so much that we Americans think important about our national experience. It bespeaks hardship and disaster, but also perseverance and commitment to the task at hand. It also exemplifies some negatives: ruinous pride, greed, and brutality. So why do we need another book on the Donner party? In part, it is a timeless tale that never ceases to engage. But more than that, Daniel James Brown has taken a new slant on this well-worn subject. He focuses on the experience of newlyweds Sarah Graves and Jay Fosdick, and follows them as they seek the promise of a new and presumably better life in California. Communicating through the experiences of Sarah Graves, more than any other, Brown brings the harrowing tale to life as I have never seen before. It is a captivating book, reading like a mystery even though we all know how it is going to end. This is a compelling read and one that deserves serious consideration by anyone interested in this subject.

Magnificient!

This history of the (in)famous Donner party alternately reads like a thriller, a horror story, a nature study and pure poetry. Author Daniel James Brown really did his homework, actually tracing the route taken by a young woman named Sarah Graves Fosdick as she trekked across the American West with her new husband, seeking a homestead in California. Taken in by an opportunist named Lansford Hastings, who wanted to make a name for himself (not to mention some quick cash) by routing Westward-heading emigrants through what he called his "shortcut," the several families of the Donner party made a fateful decision to heed Hastings' advice and follow his unproven route through the Sierra Nevada mountains. This was, as history shows, their undoing, as they became stranded throughout the winter in 20+ feet of snow, with no food and minimal shelter. After several failed attempts, Sarah Graves and some of her companions managed to escape through what is now called the Donner Pass, but not until many members of the party had died and the survivors had been reduced to cannibalizing the bodies of their relatives and friends. Brown relates the whole story, beginning with the departure of Sarah and her family from their home in Illinois through her death at the age of 46 in what is now known as California's Napa Valley. In doing so, he writes with sensitivity and compassion, inviting readers to imagine both Sarah's joy during the first half of her journey and the deep grief she must have felt throughout the remainder of her life once she finally reached California. At no point does Brown stoop to judging the people whose story he relates, nor does he sugar-coat the events of their tragic situation. Thus, some portions of the book are difficult to read, but for me the revulsion I occasionally felt was worth the reward of coming to a better understanding of the grit and heroism displayed by our ancestors who crossed the continent at a time when life on the road often meant living the equivalent of a stone age existence. I admire the fact that Brown himself visited places along Sarah's route, walking through chest-high prairie grass (loaded with ticks), climbing a "slope" in the Wasatch Mountains (7,500 feet above sea level) and slogging a mile across Utah's salt flats ("My God, I thought, those people were tough!") Brown writes beautifully and portions of the book read like poetry. Take, for example, this passage -- "To really understand [Sarah's] story, I knew I would have to travel farther than just the sixteen hundred miles that lay between me and California. I would have to travel into the heart of a girl who was a product of a vanished world...a girl who encountered in her life challenges more daunting and tragedies more profound than I have ever begun to confront in my own." And that is, for me, exactly what Brown has managed to do in The Indifferent Stars Above. Read this book.