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Rating: 
Summary: Huecool book!
Review: In this book John Sherman has produced the quintessential guidebook for climbers wanting to go to the pinnacle of climbing - Hueco Tanks. The descriptions and topos make it possible to find even the most remote climbs. The only problem might be when one area is referenced in its relationship to a previous area of which the reader might not be familiar.
But with a little patience and understanding of how the book is laid out I can't think of a better way to get around Hueco and make the most of your climbing experience. Maneuvering through the book brings me to the introduction. While most people might skip the introduction to a book, this one is a must read to understanding Mr. Sherman's approach to the content of the book. Playing especially close attention to pages 16-20 will make navigating through the book much easier, saving the reader a lot of time and frustration. The index or indexes are another plus. There are three - one is a typical alphabet type where one can find a climb by its name. But there are two others, one just for rope climbs and the other for bouldering problems. They are indexed according to difficulty, so if you're a 5.10 climbers can look up all the 5.10 climbs, or 5.9 or . . . . Not every climb in the park is in the book, but then that would have taken an encyclopedia that no one would have been able to afford. With more than 300 roped climbs and nearly 700 bouldering problems there is enough in this book to keep a climber busy for a lifetime. There is also enough room within the pages (what we call white space in the publishing business) that will allow a climber to write in new climbs as they develop over time. In the editorial department Mr. Sherman moves from railing at those who would ruin the climbing experience or ethic, to a funny (but useful) rating of plants (cactus) according to their texture: Heinous, Jingus or Casual. This is how I would rate the following areas of the book:
Topos - Outstanding
Maps - Outstanding
Indexes - Outstanding
Photos - Excellent
Descriptions - Excellent
Editorial Writing - Excellent In short, Mr. Sherman did an extraordinary job of opening this climbing mecca to those of us who do our hiking in the vertical mode. He has brought order to what were previously hand-me-down, word-of-mouth descriptions that, in the world of climbing, could prove dangerous to ones health.
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