'Ranger Heart: A Naturalist Learns How to Love After Loss' explores what it takes for a park ranger to get grounded after grief in a profession that encourages rootlessness. After losing her father at a young age and growing up in New York, she craved wide-open spaces and the healing embrace of nature. With determined courage and good humor, Woodland takes the reader on outdoor adventures with her colorful cohorts in some of the most stunningly beautiful places on earth including Zion, Grand Canyon, Crater Lake, Mount Rainier, and Yosemite National Parks. While she was determined to follow a career path that would lead into the heart of the wilderness, it would take years to understand that to heal from loss, her own heart would need to become as wide open as the natural world in which she sought refuge.
Ranger Heart is a collection of personal essays that consider five different themes: Advice for Women with Grit, Constraints, Love and Loss, Art and Beauty, and Connection and Community.