K2: Life and Death on the World's Most Dangerous Mountain

I was introduced to Ed Viesturs in Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air. That was the first mountaineering book I ever read and it wasn't my last (obviously). I also have seen the IMAX film Everest about 5 times which features Mr. Viesturs and is a wonderful film for anyone to see. I am a middle-age suburban homemaker who is in total admiration of people who push themselves physically beyond what most people do. I enjoy books on through-hiking the Appalachian Trail, running the Iditarod, and high mountain climbing as I sit on my comfortable family room sofa, all warm and toasty. This book is an excellent summary of the major expeditions to attempt to summit K2, the world's second highest mountain. While Everest gets most of the publicity, according to Viesturs, K2 is technically more difficult and challenging. He backs his claim up with the statistics around the number of attempts versus deaths on the two mountains as well as the number of climbers attempting it more than once (very few). The reader is given a wide range of information from the history of the mountain's expeditions, analysis of what has gone wrong (including the disaster of the summer of 2008), and the politics of the countries and within the expeditions themselves that influence the success or failures of the attempts. Mr. Viesturs has definite opinions on the events that transpired over the years, but appears to make every attempt to view them via a position of fairness -- no mudslinging here unlike other places. I loved this book and would recommend it highly to anyone interested in this subject. It is not quite as "readable" as Into Thin Air in my opinion and is more geared toward someone with some understanding of and interest in the subject. Another book I read on the subject and enjoyed is High Exposure by David Breashears who is a friend of Ed Viesturs. Both were involved in the Everest disaster of 1996 and I have the utmost respect for both of these men. One final note: Since I received an advanced reading copy of the book, it didn't have any pictures and very few diagrams - this has been mentioned by other reviewers. Just to clarify, the final publication has 16 black-and-white photos and 12 color photos.

I was a bit reluctant to read this book because most of the books I have read about mountaineering have been self-serving, self-promoting, rather childish accounts of the never less than heroic acts of the author and the seemingly lack of ability of the other participants. Not so this book. This is a well-written, highly readable, seemingly fair account of the history of K2, the world's second-tallest and arguably most challenging mountain in the world and the major expeditions, including the author's, that have attempted to reach the summit of what is called the "World's most dangerous mountain." The author is well suited to write such a book. He was the first American to summit all 14 8,000ers and has 30 climbing expeditions to his credit. He manages to write an exciting history of the attempts to climb K2 in a non-technical, highly readable manner that discusses the achievements and possible errors of the various expeditions, including his own, in a way that is non-judgmental or self serving yet gives the reader a sense of what occured during the ascent attempts and the motives and actions of the various participants. Viesturs has managed to write a page turner narrative that provides the reader with perhaps the most honest, unbiased account of what it takes to climb the world's highest mountains and why most of the earlier accounts are, to say the least, questionable at best. This is highly recommended for any reader remotely interested in a first rate account of what the author says is a way of life, not a sport...Mountaineering.

This is the first book by Ed Viesturs that I sat down and read, and I liked it a lot. Viesturs is a mountaineering legend whom I admire, and I have skimmed some of his earlier books in the past. I also happen to have a small fascination with K2, as a more difficult and less crowded peer to Everest. So there, I am a bit biased. Viesturs has done an outstanding job describing the climbing history of K2, from its "discovery" by the West, through some of the early attempts and tragedies, including Ed's own epic climb. There is plenty of drama and colorful characters, and the narrative pulls you in. If you are familiar with mountaineering, you know that it consists mostly of sitting around camp or trudging slowly up and down the mountain, often in nasty weather, so producing such an interesting book is no mean feat :) Although the book is accessible to anyone, it helps if you are familiar with mountaineering, and terms like fixed line, ice screw, jumar are not completely foreign to you. The author does a good job explaining a lot of the climbing concepts and maneuvers, but it helps to be more familiar beforehand. There is also a fair bit of conflict of personalities on the big mountain, a little ego here and there, but just enough to give flavor to the story, not to overpower it. Mountaineering is largely about ego, conquering a big challenge, doing it your way. These elements were so realistic here that they had me smiling and thinking of similar situations and characters from my own mountaineering experience (which of course pales in comparison to Ed Viesturs' achievements). Which is not to say that Ed Viesturs in any way seeks to aggrandize himself - quite on the contrary, his tone is usually humble, and full of respect for other climbers and the mountain itself. Overall, it is a very well written personal account of what makes Ed Viesturs and other climbers tick, interesting history of multiple epic expeditions, and "you're there" view of K2 that most of us would not otherwise experience.

David Roberts' name on a mountain climbing book is a guarantee of a good read, and this one is no exception. The first chapter grabbed me, and I ended up spending most of the weekend reading this book instead of doing other things I'd planned! Roberts has the knack of making you able to visualize what's going on during a climb, even if you've never read or seen anything else about the terrain. Do we need another book about K2? The unique feature of this one is that it gives Ed Viesturs' slant on what went wrong (and right) in the expeditions to this dangerous mountain. There's no shortage of armchair mountaineers, but Viesturs has the credentials to make his analysis stick. His own 1992 climb doesn't get a chapter (I guess you'll have to get his other book for that), but he covers the most important years in which climbers attempted the mountain. The book is also the most up-to-date summary of the astonishing scandal behind the 1954 Italian climb, which has fully come to light only in the last couple of years. A previous reviewer complained about lack of pictures. Actually, according to the rear jacket, the final version of the book includes 28 pages of color and B & W photos (absent, alas, from the pre-publication freebie copies).