Edge of the Ice

Reactive Publishing

In the early years of the twentieth century, Antarctica remained the last great blank space on the map of the world. What followed was one of the most dramatic chapters in the history of exploration, a fierce contest of endurance, ambition, and national pride now known as the Heroic Age.

Edge of the Ice tells the full story of that era. From the early voyages that first forced their way through the pack ice to the polar race that pitted Roald Amundsen against Robert Falcon Scott, and from Ernest Shackleton's extraordinary survival after the crushing of the Endurance to the lesser-known expeditions that mapped the continent's remaining secrets, this book follows the men, the ships, and the decisions that defined an age.

Drawing on expedition journals, official reports, and the stark realities of life at the edge of the world, Winters examines not only the triumphs and tragedies but the larger forces at work: the science that drove the explorers, the nationalism that funded them, and the thin margin between glory and catastrophe on the ice.

Clear-eyed and carefully researched, Edge of the Ice is a complete narrative of the Heroic Age, its greatest achievements, its bitter rivalries, and the human cost of reaching the ends of the Earth.