Rating: 
Summary: The last River - A Journey most won't want to take
Review: "Extreme", "lantern jawed", "boulders the size of buildings". Mix these three cliches, stir in an almost incomprehensible mix of first names and some [partial] biographies and you have the essence of Todd Balf's The Last River - The Tragic Race of Shangri-La. Ostensibly the tale of a river exploration by kayak gone awry it's focus is continuously blurred by disorganized snippets of arcana and personal information about the participants and (too many) peripheral players in this tale of a grand scheme gone bad. The real tragedy of this story seems to be the fact that Balf is the self- appointed chronicler of it. Balf continuously mires the reader in minutiae that is scattered seemingly hodge-podge throughout the story. The timeline of the book wavers between serpentine and non-existent and further clouds an already confusing tale. The story itself, the story of a group of experienced paddlers seeking the ultimate challenge on one of the mightiest rivers in the far east, has unlimited potential to be engaging. Instead, Balf scrawls such a circuitous, hackneyed missive, that the weakly developed principal characters rush down a river of unpredictable, choppy and confusing prose long before they reach the river that shares those qualities. In the Author's Note Balf writes of his struggle to give shape to an original article about the topic of his book. The reader is predisposed to think that Balf underwent the same struggle with the book..and lost. Balf seems overwhelmed by the topic at hand: too much information, too much forced drama and too many characters have resulted in an unruly pastiche of a story. In the end it is the story that suffers: the clarity of the participant's vision has been lost, the essence of the experience that beckoned them left unexplored. For [the money] CAN there are more entrancing journeys for the reader to take.
Rating: 
Summary: This book makes me want to run high risk rivers
Review: A caveat -- I've never done any river running. Now, after reading Todd Balf's book, I feel like I partially understand, in a white water sense, much more of the sport. The best thing about this book is that you fully experience the running of this mad river in Tibet! The river is awesome, beautiful, and irrestible. The guys running the river were nuts but somehow believed they knew what they were doing - and that they could survive. Not true. Not only do you learn a ton about the sport of extreme river running but also about the politics, and second guessing, of putting together an expedition to a far off country. I recommend the book highly and predict a breathless reading experience. Maybe someday I will go to Tibet and experience the last river!
Rating: 
Summary: Book-on-Tape Review
Review: Although I "listened" to this book on tape, I too was lulled into thinking this is like Jon Kraukauer's "Into Thin Air" -- hardly. It is interesting and at first I didn't realize it was a true story. Balf's book does give a bit of a behind-the-scenes glance at how a trek like this is set up & the importance of the personalities of the people undergoing the trek....but I agree with previous reviewers that this was no page-turner (or let's put it this way, I wasn't sitting in my garage, after coming home from my commute, to stay listening to the tape). If you are a kayaker, maybe this is for you - having trekked in Nepal, I found some of the countryside info of interest, but can't really recommend this book.
Rating: 
Summary: The River Wild
Review: Anyone who enjoys stories about the Himalayas, Tibet, or people pushing themselves to peak performance, needs to read this. It's not quite the five-star material of Krakauer's "Into Thin Air", but it's very close. Mr. Balf uses the accounts passed to him by the members of the doomed October 1998 Tsangpo expedition so well that you forget he wasn't there. The History is well used and interesting. The descriptions of the mammoth arena in which the story takes place are highly vibrant. And, the relationships of the men on the team are portrayed with realism, as well as a careful depth that could rival the Gorge itself. These are not people out for glory alone. These are people with a passion. Read this book, and see how they fare against one of the last untamed patches of earth we have left.
Rating:
Summary: The River Wild
Review: Anyone who enjoys stories about the Himalayas, Tibet, or people pushing themselves to peak performance, needs to read this. It's not quite the five-star material of Krakauer's "Into Thin Air", but it's very close. Mr. Balf uses the accounts passed to him by the members of the doomed October 1998 Tsangpo expedition so well that you forget he wasn't there. The History is well used and interesting. The descriptions of the mammoth arena in which the story takes place are highly vibrant. And, the relationships of the men on the team are portrayed with realism, as well as a careful depth that could rival the Gorge itself. These are not people out for glory alone. These are people with a passion. Read this book, and see how they fare against one of the last untamed patches of earth we have left.
Rating:
Summary: A Good Read; Entertaining
Review: As someone who knew zero about paddling before this book, I found it interesting as an introduction to the sport. As for the story, I could have used more information on the locals and the wildlife as a backdrop to the main event. I get a little tired of the thread that if it isn't American, it isn't important. I also have a new perspective on National Geographic, both magazine and televison. I will in future read and/or watch with a high level of skepticism.
Rating:
Summary: Don't waste your time with this one!
Review: Awful story telling. Spins its wheels for the first two thirds of the book. Jumps around in time with agonizing drivel.
Rating:
Summary: a few notches below Into Thin Air and The Perfect Storm
Review: By now, the world is familiar with the Outside Magazine writer-turned novelist after Into Thin Air and The Perfect Storm. I did enjoy this narrative, but it strives too hard to imitate Krakeneur's style without succeeding very well. Sure, we have the present tense action sequences, the character shots (also not as nuanced as Junger and Krak.), the action, the unconquerable foe, but it's missing the emotional ummmff that the others had. I couldn't get over the feeling that I was reading a formula (now some background of the area, then a look at the characters, the scouting, the set up, the river, etc...) On its own merits, the author does a nice job providing background to previous Himalyas exploration and expeditions and captures quiet nicely the river its incredible force. It's simply not as sharp as the others in its genre -- one too many "oh and did I mention that rescue was impossible" that an editor should have caught. Still, it's a pageturner that should entertain anyone interested in experiencing the thrill of white water kayaking and understanding a bit of the mystique behind the sport. Despite my small complaints, I did enjoy the book.
Rating: 
Summary: Good snappy journalistic read
Review: First, I want to say that Langdon Cook's comment, in the above amazon.com review, about the "actual tragedies (cultural fallout)", is one of the strangest I've ever read. Remember that Tibet is under the direct subjugation of a hostile foreign power; that it teems with Chinese soldiers, and it's capital city is now more than 50% Chinese; that enormous efforts are being made to stamp out the Tibetan culture; that it is illegal even to own a photograph of the Dalai Lama, their spiritual leader; that Tibeten children, even many of those from remote villages, are indoctrinated in Chinese-run schools. And Langdon Cook feels that the sight of some lost American wandering around in Gore-tex constitutes a "tragedy"? What planet is he from? But oh yes, the book. Balf has more of a feel for Tibet than Mr. Cook, and a pretty good feel for whitewater adventure, as well. It's a little too journalistically smooth, perhaps, but consistently interesting and engaging, and a couple of pages devoted to 'why they do it' is among the best I've read. I gave it three stars, but I'm a tough grader. Recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Waste of Money, too
Review: I couldn't agree more with Michael Craig Johnson's review. Structurally, this book is a mess, as well as being a completely uninspiring story of guys with bad judgement. I have never seen a real-life adventure story without any, repeat any, maps of the area or pictures of the participants. Balf could surely have found one picture, or showed us one of the maps mentioned on page 13, and never referenced again. It takes the group 105 pages of disjointed biographical info to get to Lhasa. There we meet more people we have no reason to care about. The group gets on the river on page 143. After some history and more bios, the group is off the river by page 227. After less than two weeks, the action is over. Even the river scenes fail to give any sense of place to help the reader along. Mr. Balf obviously said what had to be said about the expedition in his magazine article. It was no service to the buyers to produce a whale of a book from the original minnow. As Mr. Johnson says, don't buy this book. I wouldn't even borrow it, or lend it to a friend. Instead, check out Alfred Lansing's classic, "Endurance". With maps nd pictures.
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