The Great Alone

After his father’s dramatic win of the 1978 Iditarod by a hair’s breadth, it seemed inevitable that Lance Mackey would one day mush his own dog sled team in the annual race from Anchorage to Nome, Alaska. Mackey won the grueling event — which covers remote, barren and rugged stretches of the Alaska Range and the Bering Sea Coast — in 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010. To win, he had to overcome challenges larger than mushing a team of dogs 1,000 miles across the largest state in the Union. The Great Alone chronicles Mackey’s life, from his troubled adolescence and painful health crisis to the 2013 Iditarod, his twelfth attempt at the race. But whether he wins or loses, Mackey’s love for his canine companions means he’s never truly alone in the Arctic wilderness.