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I am fascinated by people who undertake extreme mountain expeditions such as Everest and K2. Knowing that one person in every four who summits K2 will ultimately loose their life in the process (one in every 20 for Everest), the risks are immense. The author has climbed all 14 8000 meter mountains so is certainly an authority on high altitude mountaineering. However I found his writing jarring. He reviews his own K2 attempts and critiques those of others with a healthy dose of superiority and American exceptionalism which I found irritating. A good portion of the book chronicles the attempts on K2 back to 1902 when expeditions mirrored the society of the day with Shaibs (aka white masters) and Sherpas(Nepalese porters who doubled as servants for their Shaibs). Sherpas got no recognition for the significant contributions they played in expeditions with historical accounts failing to even record their names and this took some time to change. While this is interesting, it’s far too technical and detailed for non climbers to appreciate. I know a lot more about willow wands than I need to and we delved into the details of multiple expeditions to see what lessons could be extrapolated by the author who wasn’t there and relied upon third party accounts.
If I took anything from this book it’s that the best laid plans are meaningless at that altitude and nature has the ultimate say. The combination of hypoxia, altitude sickness, sleep deprivation and extreme conditions result in such differing recollections and narratives that it’s impossible to have a clear picture of events and rationale for decisions that were made.