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What to expect

In the tradition of Young Men and Fire and Fire on the Mountain, Stuart Palley’s memoir Into the Inferno documents eight years of devastating wildfire in California, showing how fire can transform a landscape as well as a soul …

For nearly a decade, Palley has been on the front line of fire. He has witnessed homeowners on the worst day of their lives. He’s seen puddles of aluminum where cars were once parked. He’s watched as 150-foot walls of flame cascaded down mountainsides and crashed into the Pacific Ocean. And he’s captured, time and again, the tireless commitment of firefighters as they work to save lives and homes, in terrain where fire always seems to have the upper hand.

In this memoir, Palley recalls how he went from learning to be safe on the fire line to a fire-savvy documentarian of wildfire and climate change. He covers some of California’s largest, most destructive, and deadliest fires between 2012 and 2020, lugging his gear from the Wine Country Fire Siege to the Thomas Fire and ultimately to the Woolsey Fire in Malibu. And he shows how, in a relatively short span of time, fire season in California has grown into a perpetual crisis, requiring billions of dollars and thousands of firefighters each year.

Ultimately, the experiences, the voices, and the science shared in the memoir form an urgent call for climate action. Into the Inferno stands alongside Palley’s photography to show just what kind of environmental tragedy we can expect if we do nothing.

Critics Review

  • “A thrilling tale that persuades its reader to mind the devastating consequences of climate change. Aspiring photographers and wildfire fetishists will be eager for the bountiful details of Palley’s routines and training, as well as the litany of his dances with ‘the gods of fire.’ More relevant to a broader audience is Palley’s rousing argument about human responsibility for the crescendo of megafires that are rendering his home state increasingly uninhabitable.”

    New York Times Book Review

  • “Compelling.”

    San Francisco Chronicle

  • “Very few photographers understand the nuances of fire like Stuart Palley. With Into the Inferno, Palley takes the reader on his journey to the heart of some of the most historic and destructive fires in the United States, and provides compelling insight into the complexities of photographing wildfires while trying to stay safe, and ultimately making one of the most poignant and important photographic records of the effects of climate change to date. This book is essential reading for anyone looking for insight into the treacherous journey of those covering and fighting fires.”

    Lynsey Addario, Pulitzer Prize–winning photojournalist and author of It's What I Do and Of Love & War

  • “Here, in this gripping memoir, [Palley] records his fascination with his views of the burning vistas, his heroic attempts to photograph the spectacular power that the consuming flames discharge.”

    San Francisco Book Review (5 stars)

  • “Into the Inferno is a nature book, a disaster-chasing book, a California book. It’s the story of a man mesmerized by the seasonal fires that sweep the American West grappling with what it does to a person to face something so large, so powerful, so destructive…Poetic.”

    Washington Independent Review of Books

  • “Stuart is a much needed and powerful voice in the face of the climate emergency. Like his photos, his writing viscerally captures the unique and haunting experience each fire has on ecosystems, survivors, and the communities impacted. Into the Inferno captures the frontlines of each megafire and translates each experience into urgency, loss, and a sobering foreshadowing of our future in an age of fire.”

    Julia Jackson, founder and CEO, Grounded Summit and Foundation

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