How to Suffer Outside: A Beginner’s Guide to Hiking and Backpacking

National Outdoor Book Award Winner in Instructional Outdoor Adventure Guide
Named a Backpacker Magazine "50 Best Hiking Books of All Time"

• Refreshingly approachable guide for aspiring backpackers and casual hikers of all stripes
• Colorful and humorous illustrations throughout
• Relatable, rising female voice in outdoor literature

Part critique of modern hiking culture and part how-to guide, How to Suffer Outside is for anyone who wants to hit the trail without breaking the bank. Diana Helmuth offers real advice, opinionated but accessible and based on in-the-field experiences. She wins readers’ hearts and trust through a blend of self-deprecating humor and good-natured heckling of both seasoned backpackers and urbanites who romanticize being outdoorsy, plus a helpful dose of the actual advice a novice needs to get started.

Featuring illustrations by artist Latasha Dunston, each chapter focuses on a critical topic: gear, food, hygiene, clothing, and more, along with useful checklists and resources. Humorous, philosophical, and practical, How to Suffer Outside teaches casual walkers, hikers, and campers of all stripes how to venture outdoors with confidence.

Diana Helmuth has hiked extensively throughout the western US, Europe, and Chile. She studied cultural anthropology at University of California–Berkeley and the American University in Cairo. When she’s not on the trail or writing, she builds things in startup land and produces the occasional podcast. Helmuth lives in Oakland.

An illustrator and painter, Latasha Dunston Greene earned her BFA from Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts. Her clients include Otterbox, Range magazine, Craghoppers, SNEWs, and the Denver Art Museum. Dunston is based in Denver.