In the Zone: Epic Survival Stories from the Mountaineering World

When I was in college, one of my dear friends became paralyzed after a mountain climbing accident. It was a shocking experience because I was very unfamiliar with the sport at the time. I suppose my friend's accident spurred my curiosity but I believe that my early interest in the sport was initiated by fear and wonder. I am fascinated by the mountains that attract those individuals who feel compelled to conquer them. The entire sport enthralls and repells me. I seek to understand it but abhor the senseless loss when something goes wrong and claims the lives of these magnificent men and women, leaving in their wake their loved ones and friends to forever try and rationalize their death.While those of you felt this book lacked accountability and content, I lack the experience in mountain climbing to be so critical of the stories projected by the author. I was able to experience through my imagination what it must have felt like to live through these mountaineering challenges. I feel no need to ask too many questions in respect to faults, for I know so very little about the sport. I simply held the stories in my mind, reflected on their enormity and danger, and appreciated the skills of rescuers and the drive of certain people to climb to the highest mountain and breathe the thinest of air. For that, I enjoyed this book. Quite simply, I appreciated reading the stories with my feet planted firmly on my floor.

This book is made up of stories where "what's the worst that can happen?" does. The first, an Alaskan mountaineering epic, leaves the reader amazed that the lone survivor made it; the second, about Scott Fischer on K2, leaves the reader amazed at Fischer's having survived as long as he did; and the third, Potterfield's own story, spawned much heated discussion and controversy among climbers. Clearly, Potterfield fell because he lost his grip on the rock, but why did he fall to the end of the rope? Did his belayer drop him...? That would certainly explain why he doesn't analyze the accident in more detail. In any case, the last story is the best, not only because it explodes those dearly-held beliefs in fainting before impact, but because it gives a detailed chronicle of a difficult high-angle rescue. Unfortunately, Potterfield does not write very well, but I suspect most readers will hardly notice.

Reviews of In the Zone In The Zone chronicles some of the greatest mountaineering survival stories ever told. Like a great novel, we emerge from our experience transformed, with a new reverence for the limits of human endeavor and will. Potterfield takes us to a place climbers hope never to visit, where the hold on survival is tenuous. --Rock & Ice Magazine Forget the hype about the new "extreme" sports; mountaineering has been around for centuries and is clearly the most extreme of all. It's hard to beat Peter Potterfield's harrowing In the Zone, an account of three deadly climbs. --Men's Journal A journalist and able story teller, Potterfield recounts three harrowing tales: Colby Coombs' struggle to live after a deadly avalanche on Alaska's Mount Foraker in 1992, Scott Fischer's near-death experience on K2, and his own fall and nail-biting rescue that followed. Fischer's experience is arguably the most compelling, as Fischer is dead and the climbing world wants to understand why. Poignant, horrifying . . . . --Outside Potterfield's matter-of-fact style gets you right into the climber's head. I loved this story [Colby Coombs'] and could not put it down. Potterfield does a good job of mixing direct quotes with his own insights . . . . [He] captures the dangers of Himalayan climbing, but even more interesting are his insights into the mentality required for such extreme risk. --Climbing Magazine A compelling, troubling look at the dark side of mountaineering. --Jon Krakauer, author of Into the Wild Expertise and personal experience meet in these three harrowing tales of close calls in the mountains, from a veteran mountaineering writer. --Seattle Weekly Tense and descriptive. . . a trilogy of true accounts of near-death experiences. --Eugene Register Guard Journalist and climber Potterfield shows Scott Fischer at his courageous and athletic prime. . . that foreshadows this year's Everest deaths. For the reader, it is a mixture of fascination and agony. --Chicago Tribune/Universal Press Syndicate In the Zone is riveting reading . . . --Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph A white-knuckle volume of gruesome stories . . . Not for the squeamish, these are harrowing tales of broken survivors dangling beside corpses, of shattered bodies inching along for miles in blinding agony, of confident expeditions from which only one climber returns. --The Santa Fe New Mexican In the zone is a masterful account of three extraordinary humans and a fascinating depiction of the struggle for survival . . . a gripping trilogy. --Adventurous Traveler Three contemporary survival stories, one of renowned guide Scott Fischer who was not denied the summit of K2. Such tenacity in the face of danger typifies Potterfield's prose style, also infusing his other tales of survival. Armchair mountaineers will discover here insights into why mountaineers take such risks. --Booklist The message from these stories of human drama is clear:

This book consists of three stories of survival on harsh mountains. Each story is interesting because the people survived in extreme circumstances. I assisted in the rescue of Mr. Potterfield and was on the hasty team for Seattle Mountain Rescue. The story was well written and provided detail which, as a rescuer, I was not aware.

Because I know I will never attempt to climb a high altitiude mountain, I find myself browsing the mountaineering section of my favorite bookstore. This time I found a book that hit the nerve in my body which is so wanting of adventure, triumph and heartbreak, but only vicariously. The book, In The Zone, tells us about the all consuming desire to reach an almost unreachable goal- the top of the mountain. K2 is the second highest point on earth and the most deadly. The story is told about two men waiting and attempting for weeks to reach the summit. Why? For purely selfish reasons. Perhaps to prove to themselves that they CAN do it (even if one of them did dislocate his shoulder and was seriously compromised), or just to say they were there. In the Denali range, on a mountain called Foraker, three friends start off for what seems to be your basic quickie- 3-4 day mountain climb by 3 strong experienced climbers. It ends in tragedy. There are two other stories in this book. One is about the author himself. The mountains are not sanctuaries, those you carry on your back in the form of a tent and a few other articles of food and clothing. The mountains are a big, challenging death trap, unless one is very lucky. As a surgical RN at a busy Northwest trauma hospital, I'm intimately familiar, and rather callous, to some horribly injured bodies. Having read the stories of these expiditions I find it incredible that people sometimes survive in the face of blinding windstorms, snowstorms, freezing cold, burning sun and on and on. Most of all, these folks are an inspiration to celebrate life. A must read for those who seek adventure