Kimberly Anne. Surviving the Wild: an Untamed Woman Opens Her Cage. Awaken Village Press, 2026.
Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I sometimes get to review fun books. this is one such book.
Kimberly Anne wants her memoir to come with instruction. My takeaways were to not be afraid to take chances, find ways to travel the world, and if you do, bring nice underwear. Kimberly begins her story twelve years earlier on a farm in Wisconsin, divorcing her husband of fifteen years. On impulse she and a girlfriend travel to Belize for a little getaway. Unexpectedly, she meets a beautiful and sexy stranger. On impulse she returns to Belize to live with him. Thus begins Kimberly’s love affair with the Caribbean, if not the man. After Belize came Costa Rica, Panama, and Puerto Rico. And more men.
In truth I would have liked to have gotten to know Kimberly Anne a little better as a traveler instead of Kimberly the horn dog with a libido the size of Alaska. Towards the end of Surviving the Wild Kimberly turns a little didactic about her personal and spiritual growth, but I still didn’t get the sense of who she was before or after her personal transformation. I know way more about her underwear situation than was necessary. She called herself “wild” and “feral” but what exactly did she mean by that? In my mind, feral is living off the land without a single modern convenience. No running water. No cooked meals. No comfy roof overhead. No dependence on anyone or anything.
One cannot help but make comparisons to Elizabeth Gilbert, intentionally or not.
As an aside, when Kimberly talked about a “tiny island” with less than 1,000 residents I thought to myself she should try an island with less than 60 people. You want to talk about knowing everybody and their business!
As another aside, Kimberly reminds me of Kathleen Edwards. Someone once told her she had the face of angel and the mouth of a sailor. I cannot confirm the angel part as there are no photographs or full names in Surviving the Wild but I can confirm the sailor bit.
Confessional: I just spent eight weeks training for a run. My trainer filmed her sessions in Costa Rica and talked about the pura vida spirit of the island. I was surprised Kimberly Anne didn’t mention this during her time on the island.
Playlist: Burna Boy, Snoop Dogg, Romeo Santos, and Taylor Swift.
~*LunaSea*~ 