Jon Krakauer is a dedicated student of extreme behaviors and those who partake in them. Coincidentally, he was on Mt. Everest during the infamous disaster that occurred on May 10 - 11, 1996.

A一连串看似微不足道的不幸事件、疏忽以及值得商榷的决策，使得登山者们在超过任何合理折返时间数小时后仍继续向山上行进。在29000英尺的高度，考虑到寒冷、缺氧以及有限的补充氧气供应，情况本就已经很糟糕了，但一场从南方袭来的意外风暴将一次有问题的攀登变成了一场灾难。包括两位广受尊敬的探险队领队在内的数人不幸遇难。

Krakauer是那天较为强壮的登山者之一；他在山顶仅停留了几分钟，在风暴来袭时就已经在返回营地的路上了。他对这场灾难的描述扣人心弦、令人痛苦且充满愤怒。Krakauer毫不避讳地对探险队领队和一些同行的登山者提出批评，并且他还讨论了自己对于一位在山上遇难的向导的内疚之情。

我对登山一无所知，但我却无法放下这本书。

此外——我对这本书如此着迷，以至于我在网上查找了几乎所有我能找到的关于这场灾难的信息。我不是唯一一个这样做的人；PBS Frontline就在上个月播放了一部关于一些幸存者的特别节目。Krakauer的书激怒了他攀登之旅中的其他一些参与者；然而，他们的批评都集中在一些次要问题上（向导Anatoli Boudreev在他的客户之前下山是否负责任？其中一位夏尔巴人是否过于忙于照顾一位曼哈顿社交名媛而未能正确履行他的其他职责？Krakauer本人在下山时是否晕倒了？Krakauer是否本可以离开他在南坳的帐篷并在5月10日晚上帮助Boudreev的英勇救援行动？），而不是书中提出的主要问题。似乎大家普遍认为，Rob Hall和Scott Fischer让其他个人和商业方面的考虑优先于将他们的客户安全地带下山。此外，Fischer的判断力可能受到了一种高原疾病的严重影响。而且，珠穆朗玛峰上的死亡人数表明，有很多一开始就不应该在那里登山的人正在攀登这座山。

On my second reading of this well-known text, it dawns on me that the disparity between Jon Krakauer's perspective on mountaineering and that of other similar works lies in the fact that Krakauer approaches it as a more or less solitary activity.

Unlike in Eric Newby's "A SHORT WALK IN THE HINDU KUSH" where the focus is more on the group aspect.

The "plot" of this book mainly centers around Jon Krakauer's 1997 account of the 1996 Mount Everest disaster.

Here, bad weather, overcrowding, and in some cases, less-than-expected expert help combine to create a truly gripping narrative.

Over the past twenty-plus years, this book has faced criticism and condemnation from those who wished to rewrite reality into more favorable outcomes but have failed.

"INTO THIN AIR" rightfully earned its large readership and still merits good sales.

For me, it was almost an unputdownable read. In the 1999 paperback edition, Krakauer directly addresses the criticisms leveled against him and, in this reviewer's opinion, defends himself well.

Nevertheless, I would recommend Newby's "A SHORT WALK IN THE HINDU KUSH" over this one (maybe it's just my personal preference!).

This was an incredibly compelling and deeply heartbreaking read for me. What made it even more difficult to bear was the fact that these were real people facing tragically real circumstances. Krakauer has an amazing ability to bring the reader right into his first-hand experience of the events, without resorting to any sort of sensationalism. He presents the story in a raw and honest way, allowing the reader to truly feel the emotions that he and the other characters were going through.

For those who are interested in true life stories that take the reader on a wild roller coaster of emotions, this one will definitely do the job. It will make you laugh, cry, and everything in between. It is a powerful and moving account of a difficult time in history, and one that I would highly recommend to anyone looking for a thought-provoking and engaging read.

★★★★★

I'm just going to come out and say it: I just don't get it.

Even after reading this book, I still cannot fathom why anyone would have the desire to climb Everest. If it were a mountain that had never been conquered before, I could understand it from the perspective of exploration and new discoveries. However, this is a mountain that has been climbed so frequently that it now has a serious garbage problem. From Jon Krakauer's vivid descriptions in this book, it actually sounds like a bit of a mess (or perhaps the opposite of a pristine place).

Krakauer presents several different and contradictory statistics regarding the likelihood of dying while climbing Everest. In my opinion, they were all far too high, especially for something that seems essentially pointless. I do understand that it's impossible to live a life completely free from risk. But there's a significant difference between necessary risks and engaging in activities like playing Russian Roulette. And climbing Everest appears to me no different than pointing a gun at your head with one bullet in the chamber and pulling the trigger. It serves no greater purpose to society and is equally dangerous.

Ah, maybe I'm just a grumpy old man without a sense of adventure! Who knows? However, when reading about this horrible tragedy on the slopes of Everest, the fact that their presence there in the first place was essentially completely unnecessary only intensifies the tragedy for me.

Krakauer definitely brings the entire event to life. While reading this book, I actually felt chilled to the bone at times. It was a harrowing and powerful read. I was so moved that I actually cried at his descriptions of how his teammates lost their lives.

There were certain aspects of his writing that I wasn't overly fond of. For instance, I wish he had been more consistent in referring to people. He would sometimes use their first names, then their surnames, and in one case, even their nicknames. If he had referred to them by just one name throughout, I wouldn't have had to keep flipping to the list of participants at the front of the book to remind myself who he was talking about. Maybe the fault lies with my memory rather than his writing, but still.

I also didn't like the lengthy postscript that dealt with his feud with one of the other climbers over the authenticity of their different accounts. I can see the need to mention it, but not in such great detail! A whole tenth of the book is dedicated to this argumentative postscript! It was unattractive and left me with a sour taste in my mouth as I finished the book.

All in all, I'm glad I read this, but I highly doubt I'd ever want to read it again. Such a senseless loss of human life, and as the author himself admits, absolutely no lessons learned from it. Truly tragic.

3.5 Having completed this, I can state with utter confidence that mountain climbing is about as appealing an activity as surgery without anesthesia. And it's about as intelligent too. Now, considering that I experience anxiety just by looking over a second-story balcony, I was never going to be the person who thought climbing Mount Everest was ever a good idea. But Krakauer presents a compelling argument that perhaps no one should. The person who enjoys mountain climbing (seriously, they exist!) is perhaps now at a greater risk of being dead due to how commercialized and expensive it has become to climb it. It pushes people to continue despite their bodies clearly telling them not to. So, upon reading this, you can see that it's a disaster just waiting to occur. When a climber has a long line of people ahead of them waiting to ascend, then surely they must realize they're not really achieving anything unique or amazing. So why do they do it? After reading the book, I'm no closer to understanding why anyone would risk their life in such a way.

I will say that for the first few chapters, I was not getting along well with this book. There was an excessive amount of detail, more than I thought was necessary, to be honest. I seriously considered giving up on it, but I persevered. Towards the second half of the book, I was able to engage with the narrative. Krakauer takes great care in trying to get the story right and to remain objective despite the sense of culpability he feels in the deaths of some of the members of his team. I think that in his eagerness to understand and share his story, it loses some of its focus in the beginning with a lot of information that seemed to weigh the book down. It was a curious reading experience to read a dispassionate, objective account of a subject that the author was involved in and clearly felt so passionately about. I'll be interested to see if the reading experience is similar or different with "Into the Wild".

I am rating this based upon Krakauer’s writing style, not based on the book subject. I am too close to the subject to give it an accurate review.

Just like the other books by Krakauer that I have read, this one also attempts to be extremely descriptive and offer points of view from many of the book's subjects.

Krakauer's writing style is engaging and detailed, which makes the reading experience quite immersive. He has a knack for bringing the story to life and making the reader feel as if they are right there with the characters.

After reading this memoir, I am now eager to read his memoir about the Eiger. I am curious to see how he will describe that particular adventure and what insights he will offer.

I have no doubt that it will be just as captivating as this one.

If Krakauer's intention was to shatter all of our romantic conceptions about mountain climbing with this book, he has without a doubt achieved his goal.

Whatever idealistic ideas I held regarding bravery, athleticism, adventure, and brotherhood in this so-called "sport" have now vanished forever.

Krakauer presents instead a brutally harsh portrayal of individuals who are willing to endanger their own lives and the lives of those around them (guides, Sherpas, rescue workers) in order to fulfill some masochistic macho desires or, even worse, to gain some cheap notoriety.

I now understand that there is no sportsmanship, athleticism, or fitness involved in these expeditions to the summit of Everest. People sacrifice their brain cells, lose body parts to frostbite, go blind, and even die, all for the privilege of standing on the top of the world for a few fleeting seconds.

I never truly comprehended this "achievement" before, and now, knowing the代价, I understand it even less. Moreover, what kind of an achievement is it when everything is done for you - Sherpas build your camps, prepare your food, carry your luggage (including laptops, TVs, gourmet foods, and magazines), fix ropes for you to hold onto, and even haul you to the top if necessary?

But enough of my ranting. It's time to discuss the book itself. I believe Krakauer is an outstanding non-fiction writer who has the ability to draw you into any story. The same holds true for "Into Thin Air." It is a captivating book, with the latter part being more engaging than the beginning. (Once you pass the 150-page mark, the book becomes virtually impossible to put down.)

Personally, I would have preferred him to focus more on the actual trip and its difficulties rather than recounting everyone's backstories. However, in the end, I must admit that it does add a certain level of relatability to the narrative. I was also concerned that he would spend a great deal of time apportioning blame to various parties (including himself), but I was pleased to see that he had learned from his "Outsider" article and reached the correct conclusion that the Everest disaster was no one's fault.

Overall, it is a very interesting and in many ways eye-opening story that, despite being outside the scope of my interests, managed to maintain my attention.

Reading challenge: #10

Several authors and editors I hold in high regard counselled me against writing the book as hastily as I did. They firmly urged me to wait for two or three years and create some distance between myself and the expedition. This, they believed, would enable me to gain a crucial perspective. Their advice was undoubtedly sound, yet in the end, I chose to ignore it. Mostly because what had transpired on the mountain was eating away at my very being. I naively thought that penning the book might somehow expunge Everest from my life. Of course, it hasn't.

But this is precisely the way it reads. Jon Krakauer, a client of Rob Hall's Adventure Consultants Guided Expedition, leads us step by brutal step up that formidable mountain in the spring of 1996. And then back down again! Clearly, it is the account of a tormented man desperately attempting to make sense of it all by revealing every single detail. It is far from an easy task.

The Everest climb had shaken my life to its very core, and it became of utmost importance for me to record the events with complete precision. However, the staggering unreliability of the human mind at high altitude posed a significant problem for my research. To avoid relying overly on my own perceptions, I conducted in-depth interviews with most of the protagonists on multiple occasions. Whenever possible, I also cross-checked details with the radio logs maintained by those at base camp, where clear thinking wasn't in such short supply.

Chances are, I would not have picked up this book had it not been for my daughter's unbridled enthusiasm when discussing it with me one Saturday morning over coffee. When I left that day, "Into Thin Air" left with me. Without a doubt, it is the greatest adventure and survivor story I have ever read. How could it not be? The author's visceral honesty in depicting his own role in this tragedy took my breath away and lends an undeniable credibility to this account.

The plain truth is that I knew better, yet I went to Everest anyway. And in doing so, I was complicit in the death of good people, something that is likely to haunt my conscience for a very long time.

Jon Krakauer is standing on the summit of Mt. Everest.

Straddling the top of the world, with one foot in China and the other in Nepal, he clears the ice out of his oxygen mask. He hunches a shoulder against the wind and stares down into the vastness of Tibet.

As the saying goes, "truth is stranger than fiction." In this case, the truth is not only more frightening but also more compelling than fiction. This is a first-hand account of the 1996 tragedy on Mt. Everest that took the lives of 12 mountaineers, many of them highly skilled and well-trained professional guides. It is told by Jon Krakauer, a journalist and an accomplished mountaineer himself. The very fact that he survived to tell the story is astonishing. How and why it happened, and who, if anyone, was to blame, are matters of debate and interpretation. The truth is that Mt. Everest is a deadly place, especially in the upper region known as the death zone, where the air is thin and brutally cold, exacerbated by the force of the jet stream winds. If you are caught in this region in an unexpected storm, as this group was, then your chances of getting back down and surviving are at best problematic. This is a story of human accomplishment, bravery, suffering, and determination. It is an adventure of the highest order because it is not fiction; it really happened.

Whoops,

definitely forgot to update my reading status over the past few days! It's probably a good thing, though,

because I needed to take a little time after this one to think my rating through.

This is a very well-written account of the author's part in a deadly Mt. Everest expedition back in the '90s.

He observes right from the start that he wrote this book too soon after the incident;

he knew he didn't have enough distance from the events to have good enough perspective,

but he pushed through to write it anyway because he was having trouble making sense of the experience

but was simultaneously deeply haunted by it. He claims he needed to put it down on the page right then and there.

I respect that he acknowledged that,

but it still was my biggest complaint about the book:

the whole thing felt confused and rushed.

A small handful of people in the comments of my Booktube channel have recommended The Climb: Tragic Ambitions on Everest (another climber's account of the disaster)

as a follow up and for another angle on the incident which I'm considering picking up here soon

because I was just...a little let down by this extremely popular nonfiction book.

Mal de Altura

A book about a 1996 ascent to Mount Everest that ended in tragedy. The author himself participated in it and was a direct witness of what happened.

Since the highest peak of the earth was finally crowned in 1953, expeditions to repeat the feat did not stop until the route to follow upwards became a very busy path with a large number of successes but also deaths.

In the 1990s, seeing that the ascent route was quite controlled, companies appeared that offered professional guides to help mountain enthusiasts climb who otherwise would not have the possibility to do so.

The conditions to access this select group were economic. One had to pay a good sum and have an optimal physical condition to not be a burden for the guide and a danger for the others.

The author of this book, Jon Krakauer, a journalist and alpinist, was invited to the 1996 expedition by two of the companies that provided this service. His mission was to do a report on the growing commercial exploitation of Everest.

Queueing up during the ascent of Everest.

The guides and teams that made up the expeditions were full of experience in climbing eight-thousand-meter peaks, with the Everest several times. What could go wrong with this very professional group? Well, a mix of excessive confidence and the weather that can turn against them.

Krakauer wrote this book the same year, a few months after the tragedy that had already made headlines around the world. He needed to tell what had happened, his own ordeal and that of the others, with whom he had conversations to reconstruct what had occurred.

Not without controversy as he himself well explains and clarifies at the end. In the hell that the mountain became, the most important thing was the struggle for the survival of each one.

It is not exactly a novel, but it reads like one. Krakauer, after presenting the members of the expeditions with whom he came to have a very good relationship, tells the story as a great adventure with a great dose of suspense when the critical moment arrives. To fully immerse oneself in this suspense, it is better not to read the beginning of the book because the author tells the end of the adventure in the first pages.

It must be taken into account that what happened in this fatal trip was very well known at the time and did not surprise anyone.

When reading it so many years later without knowing what happened, it becomes an adventure novel with a suspense that surprises due to certain twists of events.

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4.3