Book review: River Selby’s ‘Hotshot’ is much more than about fighting wildfires

“Hotshot, A Life on Fire” by River Selby is enlightening and painful, and not just because of fighting wildfires.

Selby’s life fighting wildfires is harrowing enough, but it’s what’s burning below the surface of her life that makes this memoir memorable.

First, let’s deal with Selby’s identity. Their given name was Ana. The time of their life in “Hotshot,” when they were “she,” was a time before they had discovered their nonbinary self. This story is about a woman trying to put out fires in a world dominated by men.

In most ways, Ana’s story is similar to other women’s in the work place, of discriminatory expectations and harassing realities. But it’s heightened by the sheer lack of women fighting wildfires and the lack of support Ana receives from her colleagues.

From the moment of her first introduction on the hotshot crew, the ones who are among the first to tackle a fire, Ana realizes she has a perception of inferiority. They don’t expect her to be as strong, although she’s stronger than some of the men. And they expect her to have to work twice as hard to keep up.

“But he’d singled me out as other,” Selby writes of her supervisor. “Special, but less capable. I didn’t ask myself if what he’d said was true; I was grateful he’d acknowledge me at all, and given me a benchmark. All I had to do was work twice as hard. It didn’t occur to me that was not a measurable criterion.”

Amid battling blazes ravaging the Northwest U.S., Selby has to deal with a past that included physical and sexual abuse, drug and alcohol abuse, and an eating disorder – which pose as great a risk to her life as any fire.

But “Hotshot” is full of adventure in the flames.

“In many ways a wildfire is like an animal running from a predator, swerving unpredictably with changes in wind, fuel type and/or topography,” Selby writes. “The fire’s head is like its front legs; its flanks usually less volatile, run parallel to the head; but if the wind shifts, a fire’s flank can easily become the head, driving the fire in a new direction. This happens sometimes without warning.”

Selby manages to weave into their debut memoir an environmental story of fire management. How Native tribes had controlled fire, only to have colonization and development destroy the safeguards.

This is a complex book that juggles layers of grueling physical dangers of the job, emotional life trauma and environmental responsibilities.

Pick it up for the firefighting, and stay for the real story of Selby’s life path.