Audiobook - Into Thin Air - Jon Krakauer
Every few years, if you're lucky, you find a book that captivates you. a book that takes over your brain and your soul and makes you look at the world differently. Usually for me these books are works of fantasy, dystopian fiction or literary fiction. This might be the first non-fiction book to do this for me.
My family are sick to death of Everest facts and my husband is scarred for life since watching the movie, but I could read this book over another 20 times. I might even have joined the mountain climbing subreddit to get more mountainous stories!
Krakauer tells the story of the 1996 Everest expedition, one of the early 'pay to play' trips for ordinary people (not professional mountain climbers). Two main groups are involved - the Adventure Consultants team, led by Rob Hall, and the Mountain Madness team, led by Scott Fischer. I don't think I'm giving any spoilers since it was widely reported in the media, but the trip ended in disaster with 8 climbers loosing their lives. Krakauer was one of the few who made it down the mountain alive that night.
Krakauer toes the balance of detail just right in this first-hand account, clearly giving all the context we need to understand what happened that fateful night. He doesn't take the easy way out regarding his own decisions, there is a unremitting tang of remorse throughout the book, while somehow managing to avoid turning it into a survivors-guilt pity party.