Sunday, September 21, 2008

Three sentence book review: Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer

We're about a decade late on this one, but that's what graduate school will do to your personal reading list. In any case, Suzy and I both just read Into Thin Air, and for anyone who is even further behind than we were, here is our three sentence book review:

Into Thin Air is the story of the 1996 Mt. Everest expeditions and the tragedies that marked that climbing season, as told by one climber on the mountain, Jon Krakauer. The book is a really simple, easy read (as are most books that make "best seller" lists) and each chapter reads like a magazine article (Krakauer writes for periodicals). Having said that, Suzanne and I both found Into Thin Air to be surprisingly engaging and would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in an Everest adventure (without being crazy enough to actually try to climb it).

Suzy adds a sentence: "It's like when you pass an accident on the highway and you don't want to look but you can't help yourself."

2 comments:

Holly said...

Hello Jer and Suzy. Jason and I both read "Into Thin Air" quite a few years ago. If you're up to it, we would also recommend reading the book "The Climb" written about the same experience but from the Russian guide's (Anatoli Boukreev) perspective. It's amazing how different the story can be from two different authors. Jason and I both liked "The Climb" better than "Into Thin Air". If you read it, you'll have to let us know what you think.

Lanes said...

Hey you crazy kids. So glad you found me and now I can stalk you. I loved this book too. Have you read Touching the Void. Another amazing mountain read, it is a crazy story, plus a fast short read.