This month's Shelf pick is Endurance by Alfred Lansing: the 1914 Shackleton expedition, the ship crushed in the ice, and the two-year walk and sail home that killed nobody. Page count pending. Shackleton loses the ship and saves every man. The best book about leadership that never uses the word.
July 2026 pick. Last updated 19 August 2026.
Why this one
Lansing built it out of the men's own diaries, so it reads cold and plain and never sells you the moral. What comes through is that Shackleton spends less time navigating than he spends managing morale, sleeping arrangements, and who bunks next to the complainer. July is a good month to read about somebody keeping a group together.
Shackleton's first job every morning was the mood of twenty-seven men. That is the job most of us actually have.
The pace planner
Work out when you finish
Set your start date and your honest nightly minutes. It saves in this browser only.
- Per night
- 12 pages
- Per week
- 84 pages
- You finish
- Saturday, October 1025 nights, about 4 weeks
We have not verified a page count for this edition, so the planner starts from your own copy. Change the number to match the book in your hand.
How long will it take at twenty minutes a night?
Page count pending for the edition we link, so we are not guessing the number of nights. and the pace picks up hard once the ship goes down, which is earlier than most dads expect. The twenty minutes a night system.
The discussion sheet
Dad's Book Club
Discussion sheet
Endurance by Alfred Lansing
The Shelf. July 2026.
If you only ask one
Shackleton spends most of his day managing mood, not ice. What does that say about the job you actually have?
- He keeps the troublemakers close to his own tent on purpose. Would you have that instinct, or would you push them away?
- The expedition fails completely at its stated goal. Is it still a success? By whose measure?
- Lansing lets the diaries argue with each other. Which crew member did you trust most as a narrator?
- The men keep routines going on the ice: football, haircuts, a banjo. Why does that work, and where have you seen it work?
- Shackleton takes five men and leaves twenty-two behind on Elephant Island. Was that leadership or abandonment?
- The boat journey to South Georgia is the most dangerous thing in the book, and he does it himself. When should the boss take the worst job?
- Nobody dies. How much of that was judgment and how much was luck? Be specific.
- The men go straight back to a world war. What do you make of the way the book handles that in a paragraph?
- Name a moment in your own life that needed a Shackleton and did not have one.
dadsbookclub.com · July 2026
If you liked this
The Wild Robot
Peter Brown · The Kitchen Table
The same month at the kitchen table, sized for a kid. A robot washes up on an island and learns to be a parent. Short chapters, big questions.
What to read after it
In the Heart of the Sea by Nathaniel Philbrick
For the dad who wants the same ocean with a darker ending.
The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard
For the dad who finished this and wanted the Scott side of the story.
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