Welcome to the Goddamn Ice Cube

Chasing Fear and Finding Home in the Great White North

By: Blair Braverman

Narrated by: Blair Braverman

Length: 9 hrs and 8 mins

Publisher's summary

A rich and revelatory memoir of a young woman confronting her fears and finding home in the North.

Blair Braverman fell in love with the North at an early age: By the time she was 19, she had left her home in California, moved to Norway to learn how to drive sled dogs, and worked as a tour guide on a glacier in Alaska.

By turns funny and sobering, bold and tender, Welcome to the Goddamn Ice Cube charts Blair's endeavor to become a "tough girl" - someone who courts danger in an attempt to become fearless. As she ventures into a ruthless arctic landscape, Blair faces down physical exhaustion - while being buried alive in an ice cave and driving a dogsled across the tundra through a whiteout blizzard in order to avoid corrupt police - and grapples with both love and violence as she negotiates the complex demands of being a young woman in a man's land.

Brilliantly original and bracingly honest, Welcome to the Goddamn Ice Cube captures the triumphs and the perils of the journey to self-discovery and independence in a landscape that is as beautiful as it is unforgiving.

©2016 Blair Braverman (P)2016 HarperCollins Publishers

Beautiful tale of finding oneself

For those who love the north, this memoir off fi ding one's strength, home and purpose is powerful.

A beautiful look into the life of a female musher

Blair put into words what many female mushers experience. An excellent story of pure grit.

Unique and compelling…

I really enjoyed listening to this book. It’s a deeper story than just the title infers. Blaire’s call to the north and to dog mushing is only half of the tale. Her experiences as a young woman thrown into a world of predatory men, as well as her life in the far north country, and the healing time amongst a small, complex Norwegian community that became extended family kept me intrigued and riveted. I especially liked hearing it in Blaire’s voice. I recommend this book whole heartedly!

Okay Read

This memoir was good for what it was; my problem with it was that it was marketed as an adventure narrative, and it turned out to be more about coming-of-age and sexuality. I wanted more about the dogs and dogsledding and living on the ice and the people of Norway (those parts were great) and less about the men in Blair's life and their sexual tensions.

Blair Braverman read the account herself, and I do enjoy that. She is a somewhat flat reader, but still, I like the story in the writer's own voice.

wonderful story, and narration

Incredible story of a brave young woman, and her life in the Artic. I cannot wait to download another. I feel her love for her dogs. She writes with such honesty about her doubts, her relationships, and conviction. Thank you, Blair, for taking readers on a great adventure.

Wonderfully Raw, Wild, and Unapologetic

Absolutely loved this. Blair told an artistically woven coming of age story that wows you. It is raw, wild, and unapologetic, like the North itself. She has a true gift for storytelling, and she leaves you excited for her next adventure in life.

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Compelling story, and I loved to hear it in the authors own voice. Gorgeous storytelling.

Beautiful harrowing inspiring

Blair’s memoir interlaces timeframes and juxtaposes her different selves in a way that feels like memory itself, how the past wells up in the present sometimes, triggered by a smell, or something seen. Her story is of becomings: Becoming a Norwegian speaker, a Northlander, an expert lover of dogs, a better lover of people and most of all a Braver Woman.

Nice story but little too long

I think if edited to more coherent story may be good read. I found this a little rambling about things that didn’t add much to the story. I learned some about life and people in Norway

Not what I expected

I listened to an interview with the author and was expecting more of a story about her experience mushing and participating in the Iditarod. Instead this was a coming of age story and how her relationships were influenced by her time in Norway. It is a lovely story but not what I expected from the title or her Interview. The afterward was the only part of the book I felt lived up to my expectations