Book review of Walking on Thin Air: A Life’s Journey in 99 Steps by Geoff Nicholson, 2024

I read this book right on the heels of reading Geoff Nicholson’s earlier book about walking, “The Lost Art of Walking.” (See my review on Amazon.) If you wish to choose between the two, I recommend this one, “Walking on Thin Air.”

As a walker, Nicholson, recently deceased, was privileged to have meandered all over the globe. As a writer, he meanders all over the page, but less so here than in “Lost Art.”

Throughout this book’s 99 chapters (really “sections,” as the “chapters” are only 2 or 3 pages each, and sometimes only 1 page) written in a conversational style, the patient reader will find many insightful and eloquent passages. But the worthwhile sections sometimes are interspersed with needless digressive sections, though not as often as in his earlier walking book. Thankfully, the digressive passages are outnumbered by the relevant passages one to ten.

For example, when the author walks past Joan Didion’s Los Angeles home, he gets sidetracked writing extensively about Didion’s writings and her cars. Same for when he walks by John Cage’s LA home and for Andy Warhol’s New York City studio. Fine if you’re interested about these three celebrities, but disappointing if you’re more interested in the subject of walking.

As a prolific writer of some 23 books, he could be accused of having written too darn much. Aware that he was suffering from cancer that could cut his life short while writing this book, he did not dilly dally. This brevity elevates this book above “The Lost Art of Walking.”

Throughout the book, to spare myself the useless ennui, I was compelled to skim passages. Do buy this book. It provides much food for thought and is much fun to read. Just don't read the whole dang thing. Be prepared to skip some sections and you will find this book well worth your time.

One last gripe from me. While at work on this book, the author was diagnosed with an incurable cancer. The first sentence of section 1 states: “This is a short book about walking and mortality.” Not really. Only a single page of section 4 is about his imminent demise, and only the final five sections are about cancer, but more about other people’s cancers than about his own. Yet the front cover lauds this book as about “walking and mortality.” And on the back cover, of its five paragraphs one of them again advertises the mortality ploy. So of its 225 pages, a total of 14 are about cancer, but hardly about death. This mortality theme is false advertising. Yet successful advertising. Because without this deception, I would have neither bought nor read this book.