‍Tracking Giants: Big Trees, Tiny Triumphs, and Misadventures in the Forest by Amanda Lewis (Greystone Books) is an entertaining nature memoir about finding community in the forest. Burned out from working in the publishing industry, Lewis sets out from her East Van apartment with an ambitious goal: to visit every Champion tree in BC. Champion trees are the largest known tree of their species—the title can transfer to a different tree if the Champion is damaged or dies, or if a larger tree is discovered. As she works her way through the BC Big Tree Registry and meets with other enthusiasts, Lewis realizes she is putting too much pressure on herself to be the best tree-tracker, and that her goal is unachievable due to the shifting nature of Champion status. She reshapes her project, giving up the completist mindset to focus instead on understanding Champion trees in the context of the forests where they reside. This change allows Lewis to enjoy gaining new skills and learning about the interconnectedness of the forest while “reveling in insignificance and the community [she] found along the way.” Throughout, Lewis details the historical context of BC’s forests, from Indigenous uses to settler deforestation to modern forestry practices. Despite growing up in BC and living here as an adult, much of this information was new to me, such as the efforts of some logging companies, First Nations, and the BC government to protect old-growth groves with a certain number of acres of buffer space. I appreciated her calling out the colonialist mindset of “discovering” big trees, and her conflicting feelings about naming Champion trees, which can draw attention to the tree for preservation but also create an influx of visitors who may damage the tree and its surroundings, as is the case with Big Lonely Doug. And as a fellow completist, it was refreshing to see Lewis reframe the project to something that would be more enjoyable to her, instead of needing to achieve the biggest or best. The descriptions of different local plants and trees made me realize that my own identification skills are not up to scratch, and inspired me to learn to recognize the plants I encounter in the forest. Lewis creates a compelling argument for creating your own path instead of following the one laid out by others. —Kelsea O’Connor