Bestselling author of Into Thin Air and Into the Wild, Jon Krakuer, will publish his next book in April. Doubleday, his publisher, said the new nonfiction work, Missoula: Rape and the Justice System In a College Town, will be released on the 21st of the month with a first announced printing of 500,000 copies.
Editor-in-chief of the Penguin Random House imprint, William Thomas, took world rights to the book, which explores the issue of sexual assault on college campuses through the stories of various women at the University of Montana, Missoula. Doubleday called book a "stark, powerful, meticulously reported narrative" that delves into a string of sexual assaults at the school, which is in Karakauer's home state.
The stories of the women profiled begin with the details of their attacks, and continue through to how they were treated by the police, the school and, finally, the courts. Doubleday said the book reveals "a justice system that is clearly broken, and cuts through the abstract ideological debate to instead illuminate the human drama behind the national plague of campus rape."
Krakauer said he was inspired to write the book after learning about the trauma experienced by someone he knew. "I was angry with myself for being so uninformed, not only about her ordeal but about non-stranger rape in general. I responded by doing a lot of reading, and seeking out rape survivors who were willing to share their stories. The more I listened to these women, the more disturbed I became.”
