#44 Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
One of the assignments for my Collection Development class is to read a work of non-fiction. If you’ve ever checked out my blog you’ll 
realize that I don’t read that much non-fiction. I can’t help it. I just love novels. So when I got this assignment, I pulled out a stack of the nonfiction sitting on my shelf, which included recent read The Opposite of Fate. One of those books was Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, which tells the story of a disastrous Everest expedition in 1996. As someone who has no urge to climb Mt. Everest (or even nearby giant, Mt. Washington), this book isn’t something I’d normally pick up. In fact, I really don’t know how it got on my shelf in the fist place. In convinced that books just appear there sometimes (or in the case of my Stephen King selection, disappear). Fortunately, the author is such a solid reporter that I ended up liking it a lot more than I thought I would.
In 1996 John Krakauer was sent to climb Mt. Everest. The overt reason for climbing the largest mountain in the world was to do an article for Outside Magazine about the commercialization of Everest. The other reason for the trip was Jon, who already enjoyed climbing mountains, had always wanted to reach the roof of the world. The journey described here is a long and difficult one that Jon describes in great detail. He gives us the name and back story of many of the people who climbed the mountain with him, and tells how quite a few of them died. I was impressed with Krakauer’s reporting skills. He does a great job in presenting the situation factually, even though his survivor’s guilt makes it seem painful for him. I liked that I was able to learn a lot about a subject that I admittedly knew very little about. Although I entered this book only knowing that Everest was the largest mountain in the world, I exited with a good portion of its history (these sections were my favorite parts in the book), as well as its current state.
Into Thin Air, although not normally a book that I would read, is an informative tale of Everest and a hallowing description of a journey that, thanks to both bad luck and bad judgment, went very, very wrong. When I put down this book, I still felt that you would have to be a crazy to want to climb Mt. Everest, but I appreciated the knowledge that was shared with me.
Rating: four stars
Length: 378 pages
Source: shelf
TBR Pile: 144 books
Similar Books: Again, this is a really different book for me so I don’t have any similar ones to recommend.
Other books I've read by this author: This is my first
xposted to bookish and bookish andbookish
realize that I don’t read that much non-fiction. I can’t help it. I just love novels. So when I got this assignment, I pulled out a stack of the nonfiction sitting on my shelf, which included recent read The Opposite of Fate. One of those books was Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, which tells the story of a disastrous Everest expedition in 1996. As someone who has no urge to climb Mt. Everest (or even nearby giant, Mt. Washington), this book isn’t something I’d normally pick up. In fact, I really don’t know how it got on my shelf in the fist place. In convinced that books just appear there sometimes (or in the case of my Stephen King selection, disappear). Fortunately, the author is such a solid reporter that I ended up liking it a lot more than I thought I would.
In 1996 John Krakauer was sent to climb Mt. Everest. The overt reason for climbing the largest mountain in the world was to do an article for Outside Magazine about the commercialization of Everest. The other reason for the trip was Jon, who already enjoyed climbing mountains, had always wanted to reach the roof of the world. The journey described here is a long and difficult one that Jon describes in great detail. He gives us the name and back story of many of the people who climbed the mountain with him, and tells how quite a few of them died. I was impressed with Krakauer’s reporting skills. He does a great job in presenting the situation factually, even though his survivor’s guilt makes it seem painful for him. I liked that I was able to learn a lot about a subject that I admittedly knew very little about. Although I entered this book only knowing that Everest was the largest mountain in the world, I exited with a good portion of its history (these sections were my favorite parts in the book), as well as its current state.
Into Thin Air, although not normally a book that I would read, is an informative tale of Everest and a hallowing description of a journey that, thanks to both bad luck and bad judgment, went very, very wrong. When I put down this book, I still felt that you would have to be a crazy to want to climb Mt. Everest, but I appreciated the knowledge that was shared with me.
Rating: four stars
Length: 378 pages
Source: shelf
TBR Pile: 144 books
Similar Books: Again, this is a really different book for me so I don’t have any similar ones to recommend.
Other books I've read by this author: This is my first
xposted to bookish and bookish andbookish