This is a really great book and a must read for everyone!!
Now I'm no mountaineer [1] so don't think it's a book purely for people who are into that game.
The book describes what happened during an assent of Everest in 1996. The author of the book was initially there to write a magazine article for a climbing magazine. The magazine wanted to show that climbing Everest had become far too commercial and as a result there were too many people trekking up to be safe. They also suspected that many of the people shouldn't really have been there as they were not experienced enough for such a climb. So why would they be encouraged to climb it they were no good? Well, perhaps because the "tour operators" charge people around US$70000 to climb, so there's an incentive to get more, not fewer people to go.
Anyway, the magazine got quite a scoop. There were too many people on the mountain this particular May and there were inexperienced climbers making it dangerous and unfortunately people died.
The book is rather controversial. Many climbers don't like it, they disagree with Krakauer's account of the events. There are other books written about the incident that's supposed to give an alternative view, maybe I should take a look at those too.
I could go on for hours about this book, but your time would be better spent just reading the book itself.
One last thing: don't bother with the movie version, it really doesn't do the book any justice.
[1] OK, so I like to rock climb occasionally, but ask anyone, the two are totally different things.
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