Ranger Confidential

Living, Working, and Dying in the National Parks

By: Andrea Lankford

Narrated by: Julia Motyka

Length: 9 hrs and 28 mins

Publisher's summary

The real stories behind the scenery of America’s national parks.

For 12 years, Andrea Lankford lived in the biggest, most impressive national parks in the world, working a job she loved. She chaperoned baby sea turtles on their journey to sea. She pursued bad guys on her galloping patrol horse. She jumped into rescue helicopters bound for the heart of the Grand Canyon. She won arguments with bears. She slept with a few too many rattlesnakes.

Hell yeah, it was the best job in the world! Fortunately, Andrea survived it.

In this graphic and yet surprisingly funny account of her and others’ extraordinary careers, Lankford unveils a world in which park rangers struggle to maintain their idealism in the face of death, disillusionment, and the loss of a comrade killed while holding that thin green line between protecting the park from the people, the people from the park, and the people from each other. Ranger Confidential is the story behind the scenery of the nation’s crown jewels - Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Great Smokies, Denali. In these iconic landscapes, where nature and humanity constantly collide, scenery can be as cruel as it is redemptive.

©2010 Andrea Lankford (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

breath taking

this book was harsher than I expected but the truth and honesty was welcome in the end.

Should have read the book.

If you could sum up Ranger Confidential in three words, what would they be?

I liked it.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Ranger Confidential?

All of the stories she tells are memorable, moving, and interesting. I was captivated by the stories themselves.

Would you be willing to try another one of Julia Motyka’s performances?

Absolutely not. This narrator was by far the worst that I have heard. She sounds like she should be making overhead announcements in an airport. She made exciting, captivating stories seem bland. The author of the book swears, uses slang, and is sarcastic. The narrator, by contrast, is stiff and over-enunciates. Her tone and dictation detracted from enjoyment of the book significantly.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The ending, certainly. But I really enjoyed hearing most of the rescue stories and even some of the sillier ranger moments.

Exciting backstory

I really like the inside story of the Park Rangers life. There is so much more than you think about as you wander around
the National Parks seeing the good looking Ranges in their neat uniforms, smiling at you. They do keep the underbelly of
the parks out of the news. Nice to visit thinking it is so serene, but also a disservice to the visitor when they don't know to be on guard. Dangers lurk everywhere, just like walking through any downtown big city late at night.
I found the reader to have an odd inflection, that left me not hearing all the words as she raised and lowered the tone of her voice while reading.

awesome book

great stories, some parts were hard to follow overall I enjoyed reading about the different experiences

Don’t listen to the negative especially if you work in a park system

I’ve lived on many park properties, private and public as part of care or education teams. What she writes about is true. I’m glad she found a way to craft a story to be able to process all she saw and did. Yes, it’s blunt. Yes, there’s death. Yes, there’s cursing. If you aren’t wanting to hear what we hide from you so your vacations stay happy. Find another book. But for those of us that understand or those that want to. Kudos and thank you for everything you, your teams and your friends have done.

Truthful accounts

Sometimes when listening to people describe their experiences, I feel they try & focus on mostly the positives omitting the trials/negatives. This book goes there. None of the difficulties of being a ranger were avoided or omitted to make it more palatable for the audience. Others have complained that this made the book difficult to enjoy, but I feel the opposite. It was refreshing to hear the truth of this ranger’s experiences (& that of her friends). I have been in the backcountry of some of the places described to conduct research & I can’t imagine working there daily like they do. When I tell people about Alaska all they want to talk about was how cool my experiences must’ve been, but the reality is that it’s a truly wild place with real threats all around (and I hope it stays that way for the record). Hearing about the life & work of Ranger Kale Schaffer was incredible and I think the author did a great job telling his (& Mary’s) stories. I truly felt like I knew them myself by the end of the book. I would highly recommend this to anyone, but especially to anyone considering a career in the NPS.

A great glimpse into Park Rangers

I truly loved how they didn’t sugarcoat anything. This book was raw and didn’t hide any of the dark side of being a park ranger.

Loved it!

Powerful, compelling stories that expand the reader’s understanding of what it means to be a park ranger.

NPS Ranger life

Great book. The story was an intimate look inside the overworked, underpaid and under appreciated NPS Rangers.

beautifully tragic truths

incredibly written stories with perfectly timed transitions, narrated to perfection for ultimate impact. disheartening truths regarding lack of benefits for dedicated employees, while millions of dollars are squandered. thank you NPS Rangers.