I usually know exactly when I’ve reached a point in a book when the writer has me in captivity, and I’ve learned to be more patient before rejecting an author who imbeds that turning point deeper in a work. This phenomenon is out the window when a writer hooks you on the first sentence, as Paul Watkins did to me with his outstanding memoir of traveling in Norway. I can be nostalgic and even a bit melancholy at times, but I don’t think of myself as an overly emotional person. Nevertheless, when I got to the end of his book I wept. Paul Watkins is an extraordinary writer—and a very dangerous man. He makes me want to go climb a mountain.