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Favorite Books on Climbing


EWolfe

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Will second "The White Spider" by harrer, but I'm a bit obsessed with the Eiger, "The Climb up to Hell" (famous rescue on the Eiger)

 

"Ascent" biography of Willi Unsoeld (teton guide, FA west ridge of Everest with Hornbein, teacher, very cool inspiring book)

 

"Feeding the Rat", Antonio Alvarez.

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A strong second to Savage Arena, by the late Joe Tasker.

(IMHO, British writers generally have superior writing skills compared to us Yanks.)

 

For nonfiction how-to, I am a new big fan of The Mountaineering Handbook, by Craig Connally. I see it as an opinionated, well researched and more advanced version of Freedom of the Hills. No, you will not agree with everything in it, but you sure will learn a few new cool tricks, I guarantee it.

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Thanks for the suggestions for a newbie.

 

Into Thin Air by Krakauer

Touch the Top of the World by Weinmeyer

 

If you absolutely have to read Krakauer's book then you kind of owe it to yourself to read "Climb High" by Lene Gammelgaard, "High Exposure" By David Breashears and "The Climb" by Anatoly Boukreev to perhaps get a little different perspective on Everest "96". After reading all four accounts I came away with the feeling that if I was ever on a climb that went bad I would seriously hope that Krakauer wasn't the one who was there to write about it.

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My favorite book on climbing is

 

"How to Rock Climb"

 

by the god of all things rock climbable and my personal hugest crush in the whole universe...

John Long

 

*sigh* :blush:

 

for reals he has written a bunch of stuff and everything i have read has his unique flavor of story telling and gritty sense of humor. LOVE HIM!!!

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Between a rock and a hard place-Aron Ralston

Ok, so its about canyoneering, rather than mountaineering or climbing-but the guy's a climber-and he writes pretty well.

 

Also on the written by, but not about list-rick ridgeway's "The Shadow of Kilimanjaro" and Krakauer's "Into the Wild"

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Has anyone mentioned Angels Four by David Nott?

Old school, trad, epic!

One incident involved running out of gear to rappel with. They resorted to using shoe laces. At the bottom of one rappel they went to pull the rope and it broke right through the lace!

When they finally completed their descent from the climb exhausted and starved, they lay on the bank of a river waiting to die.

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Anything by Greg Child.

Thin Air is my favorite but Mixed Emotions is good too.

In the Throne Room of the Gods by Galen Rowell. Great read about a failed attmept on K2 and what can go wrong on with personality conflicts on large expeditions.

Two books by John Roskelly are good reads, Stories Off the Wall and Nanda Devi. He's somewhat contraversial but climbed some hard stuff and lived to tell about it.

Mountains of My Life by Bonnati, frickin serious hardman.

Sherman Exposed by John Sherman is funny, spoof on Twight is hilarious, and serious at times.

Eiger Dreams by Krakauer has some good short stories.

30 Years of Climbing Magazine has a lot of good short stories.

John Long is usually pretty funny.

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Minus 148 by Art Davidson (only because it was the first climbing book I ever read as a lad back in AK in 70's)

The Mountain of My Fear by David Roberts (also written a fine book on the Anasazi)

K2, The Savage Mountain

All the afore mentioned Joe Simpson books

The Climb, Anatoly Boukreev

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Boukreev's book was may favorite of the bunch that I read too (krauauer, Boukreev, Gammelgard). I for one believed his story and think he was a real hero.

 

Oddly, there aren't and climbing books I've read yet that I didn't enjoy (Gammelgards (sp?) was the worst so far).

 

Some stand outs:

 

The White Spider

The Climb Up To Hell (Another Eiger bit)

Brashear's Book

Burgess Book of Lies

Most of Simpson's stuff I've read

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Boukreev's book was may favorite of the bunch that I read too (krauauer, Boukreev, Gammelgard). I for one believed his story and think he was a real hero.

 

Oddly, there aren't and climbing books I've read yet that I didn't enjoy (Gammelgards (sp?) was the worst so far).

 

Some stand outs:

 

The White Spider

The Climb Up To Hell (Another Eiger bit)

Brashear's Book

Burgess Book of Lies

Most of Simpson's stuff I've read

I did think that Gammelgaard did a good job of supporting Boukreeves side of the story. I thought Krakauer tended to try to scapegoat Boukreeve in his "Thin Air" book. Most accounts that I have read support that Boukreeve was a hero on that climb.

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