About the Author

Peter Stark is an adventurer and historian. He is the author of Astoria: Astor and Jefferson's Lost Pacific Empire, a New York Times bestseller and a PEN USA Literary Award finalist. A former correspondent for Outside magazine, Stark has also been published in Smithsonian, The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, and Men's Journal. His other books include Young Washington: How Wilderness and War Forged America's Founding Father, a finalist for the George Washington Book Prize; and Gallop Toward the Sun: Tecumseh and William Henry Harrison's Struggle for the Destiny of a Nation. Based in Montana, he and his family have also lived in Mozambique and Brazil.

Reviews

"Peter Stark's Astoria picks up where the Lewis and Clark Expedition leaves off, providing a fascinating and sometimes terrifying window into the brutal and acquisitive essence of not only America but of the human condition. It's also a great and ... an ennobling tale of survival. Highly recommended." - Nathaniel Philbrick, author of Bunker Hill, and In the Heart of the Sea
"A splendid account of the man and men who had the audacity, passion, and courage to dream of an American Empire. Peter Stark's Astoria is a must read for anyone wanting to understand the power of leadership in its purest form." - Stephenie Ambrose-Tubbs, author of The Lewis and Clark Companion
"A valuable book . . .but more importantly for my perspective, it's really good reading." - Nancy Pearl on NPR's "Morning Edition"
"In his book Astoria, Peter Stark has written a riveting account of one of the most important, but largely forgotten, turning points in the history of the United States, and he does this with great skill, crafting the story from many sources. . . . The book Astoria brings to life the people and circumstances of John Jacob Astor's attempt to extend American control west of the Rocky Mountains. Stark keeps you reading, even though you think you already know how the story of Astoria ends. I recommend this to everyone who is interested in the development of the West and the Columbia River Basin in particular. Well researched and historically accurate, it reads much like an adventure novel, engaging you from start to finish." - Coast Weekend
"Well researched and historically accurate, [Astoria] reads much like an adventure novel, engaging you from start to finish." - Coast Weekend
"A truly great adventure story, filled with high drama and hardship that would put 'Survivor' cast members into a tailspin of humility." - BookReporter.com
"Peter Stark does readers a very large service in reminding us about this extraordinary and important piece of North American history. I can't recommend Astoria highly enough for anyone interested in the colonization of the American West." - BookBrowse.com
"Astoria is ultimately worth reading not just because it's about Oregon history, but because it contextualizes Oregon's past within American history. Stark does a very good job of explaining exactly why Astor bothered with such a dangerous and expensive mission, why his employees had the problems that they did, and what it meant for the U.S. as a whole and Oregon in particular. The book is a welcome departure from romanticized tales of Lewis and Clark or of later pioneers. Settling Oregon didn't happen because Americans are self-starting pioneers. No, it happened because a rich man in New York had a lot of money, a lot of ambition and, most importantly, a whole lot of hubris." - Portland Mercury
"Astoria is ultimately worth reading not just because it's about Oregon history, but because it contextualizes Oregon's past within American history. . . . The book is a welcome departure from romanticized tales of Lewis and Clark or of later pioneers." - Portland Mercury
"Stark's delightful narrative is proof that even though Astor didn't leave the legacy he intended, his grand failure certainly deserves its own place in history." - New York Times Book Review
"For better or worse, the precedents set by Astor and his expeditions created a tangible American legacy of entrepreneurship, risk-taking, and manifest destiny. Carefully researched and splendidly written--an utterly spellbinding account." - Bellingham Herald
"A great yarn set in our own corner of the continent." - Inlander
"Stark's compelling, contextual account of Astoria's founding--at one time documented by none other than author Washington Irving - casts this early venture as a pivotal point in the development of the Pacific Northwest and the nation." - Crosscut (Seattle)
"Author Peter Stark retraces the journey in spellbinding detail, making use of journals to get inside the minds of these explorers who set out just two years after Lewis and Clark successfully crossed the continent. . . . Astoria brings to life a harrowing era of American exploration." - Bookpage
"Stark tells their grim story well . . . 'Astoria' is a well-written . . . account of John Jacob Astor's attempt to found a commercial empire in the Pacific Northwest. It illuminates the cultural limits of the American approach to frontier expansion." - Portland Oregonian
"Peter Stark's Astoria is a vivid recreation of an era when the Pacific Northwest was a vast unexploited wilderness, with Astoria as its main American colony. . . . Stark is particularly strong in describing the wilderness and its effects on human psychology." - Seattle Times
"[Descriptive] passages . . . make Stark's fine book truly distinctive. They raise Astoria above the level of a well-done historical adventure and help the reader get into a scene and understand the context or see relationships between participants and between then and now. . . . In Astoria, Stark tells a great American story. By adding such passages filled with insight and perspective, especially when they link his tale to other cultures and geographies, he tells a great human story." - Chicago Tribune
"[Descriptive] passages . . . make Stark's fine book truly distinctive. They raise Astoria above the level of a well-done historical adventure and help the reader get into a scene and understand the context or see relationships between participants and between then and now." - Chicago Tribune
"In this harrowing historical tale of adventure and hardship, journalist Peter Stark re-creates a largely forgotten 19th-century expedition-during which one group crossed the Rockies and another sailed around Cape Horn-to establish America's first colony on the Pacific Northwest coast." - Parade Magazine
"The story of its founders is harshly inspiring, a deeply researched look into the irresistible drive to explore the unknown and the capacity of people to survive, not only the elements, but one another." - Minneapolis Star Tribune
"Peter Stark weaves a spellbinding tale from this lost chapter of American history. Astoria gave me the sense all readers long for: that nothing exists but the riveting narrative unfolding in your head." - Laurence Gonzalez, author of Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why and Surviving Survival: The Art and Science of Resilience
"Stark vividly writes of fur trader John Jacob Astor's capitalist quest ... [a] fascinating account... that never loses its focus." - Library Journal
"Who knew? Astoria is more than just a burgeoning neighborhood in Queens. Montana writer Stark tells us it was also the first American settlement on the West Coast. New York businessman Astor, with support from President Jefferson, launched two expeditions in 1810 - overland and by ship. Astor envisioned a trade outpost, while Jefferson was thinking of a democracy from sea to shining sea. And Stark recounts the perilous journeys." - New York Post
"New York businessman Astor, with support from President Jefferson, launched two expeditions in 1810 - overland and by ship ... and Stark recounts the perilous journeys." - New York Post
"Stark offers a thrilling true-adventure tale filled with unforgettable characters, clashes of culture, ambition, and physical hardships from starvation to Indian attacks to cruel weather. A breathtaking account of an expedition that changed the geography of a young nation and its place in global commerce and politics." - Booklist
"... a thrilling true-adventure tale ... A breathtaking account of an expedition that changed the geography of a young nation and its place in global commerce and politics." - Booklist
"In Astoria, Peter Stark recounts the colony's history as a fast-paced, enjoyable adventure tale." - Wall Street Journal
"With so much infighting, paranoia, double-crossing, madness, and starvation, the two expeditions supply plenty of narrative action to fuel Stark's dueling narratives." - Outside
"In his new book, Astoria, veteran journalist Peter Stark tells the story of how that primordial Astor tried to make good on a dream that might have gone far beyond simple money-making. . . . Stark moves skillfully back and forth from one segment of the splintered expedition to another. He also raises a tantalizing question about the enterprise as a whole." - Washington Post
"In his new book, Astoria ... Stark moves skillfully back and forth from one segment of the splintered expedition to another. He also raises a tantalizing question about the enterprise as a whole." - Washington Post
"Peter Stark leaps aboard at the very beginning of John Jacob Astor's Pacific Northwest enterprise, then clings tenaciously to witness every twist, by land and by sea, along the entire desperate ride." - Jack Nisbet, author of Sources of the River and The Collector
"This saga of ambition and adventure and courage is vividly told and thoroughly researched, a not very well known story of ambition confounded. Shipwrecks, bloodiness, and starve-to-death treks through drifted snow in the Rockies-Astoria is a hard-edged beauty." - William Kittredge, author of A Hole in the Sky
Astoria is a scintillating corrective to the "guts and glory" school of American history and economics. [...] Grandiose visions ... have consequences, and Peter Stark's depiction of the body count that results from this one unfolds with the inevitability of a fine tragedy and comedic zing of a good action flick. - David James Duncan, author of The Brothers K and The River Why
"A fast-paced, riveting account of exploration and settlement, suffering and survival, treachery and death. [Stark] recovers a remarkable piece of history: the story of America's first colony on the continent's West coast." - Kirkus (Starred Review)
"A page-turning tale of ambition, greed, politics, survival, and loss." - Publishers Weekly