Rating: 
Summary: Boring
Review: My wife and I both found the book could be condensed into 5 pages the rest being repetitive background documentary material. No comparison to Into Thin Air should have been made. Don't buy it!
Rating: 
Summary: Definitely not up there with Krakauer!
Review: One of the blurbs I read on the book jacket compared this book to Into Thin Air and The Perfect Storm. No way!. Those two books were edge-of-your-seat reading experiences. This account of a kayaking expedition is just plain boring. The action doesn't start until about halfway or more into the book and even then, the cliched writing and deification of Balf's subjects make this book very hard to get through. Unless you are a serious kayaking fan, I would not recommend this book.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: Poorly written and an undistinguished entry in the survivor adventure genre. Hard to believe a book like this, where a National Geographic film crew accompanied the kayakers, does not have a single photo or illustration. And no map!!
Rating: 
Summary: Characters
Review: The essence of this book is its characters. If you want the typical second-by-second action, the literary equivalent of "slow-motion" - tense faces, surging muscles, tall waves bearing down, and all that - then this isn't your book. I mean, the river scenes are there, but they aren't the essence. If you want a cheap thrill, read something else. For Balf, this expedition wasn't like that. It wasn't about cheap, take-home, made-for-tv summiting. Sure, they called it "The Everest of Whitewater," but these were no twenty-something testosterone freaks selling an image. These were middle age guys, Harvard and Yale grads, writers, chemists, intellectuals. They all had wives and kids. Yet, at the same time, they were unmatched paddlers - pioneers and legends. Roger Zbel is famous for running the big Eastern rivers in flood when all the young dudes were scared off, and he has dominated extreme kayak racing for 15 years, ever since he and his buddies pretty much invented it, along with the whole new discipline and culture of squirt boating. Tom McEwan was the first big waterfall runner, and he has first descents in many countries. He's considered untouchable in a boat, and he runs his own kayak school nowadays. Jamie McEwan was an two-time Olympian paddler, and a Bronze medalist, the only American male to win a medal in whitewater solo craft. And on the river Doug Gordon was the best of them all . . . Balf knows that. He knows that Tom McEwan could drop off a thirty-foot falls without much thought, that Roger Zbel could run class V in his sleep, that all these guys had been near death on the river. But what Balf gets at in this book is the characters themselves -- what made these intelligent, middle age fathers and husbands leave their daily lives to paddle a river that left many of the world's great kayakers shaking in their spray skirts? He looks at them from many different angles, and it's great stuff. For example, there is a great part about Tom McEwan's paddling camps - Balf calls it an "Outward Bound-meets Bad News Bears" approach to travel, or a "Charlie Chaplin approach" to camping by the river -- a kid would be told to dig a ditch, but he wouldn't have a shovel. So he'd be directed toward a shed. But it would be locked. Next, he'd be sent to the neighbor's for wire-cutters . . . And then, after he gets back from the Tsangpo, McEwan is right back out there again, leading paddling trips in his way -- guiding clients expertly, infectiously down harrowing rivers by day, camping out with his four clients on someone's porch by night. "Why does it seem, the older I get, the more stuff I accumulate, but the older Tom gets, the less stuff he accumulates?" asks one of his clients. While most clubs are having a nice lunch, Tom's wealthy DC-area clients are being led through the noise and trubulence of a waterfall curtain, up into a secret room behind the falls, and not even thinking about lunch. And again, he's not just some insane guy. He dropped out of Yale with one semester to go, and then he lived out of his kayak for a year in a Florida swamp, training for the Olympics. I found this kind of thing fascinating, and it's much deeper and more interesting that my little summary, of course. What I took from this book was the characters -- interesting, complex guys -- brillant, highly talented men who found something in paddling that wouldn't let them go -- some challenge -- that led them to a river that everyone called insane. Certainly, what happened was tragic, but that's the nature of paddling whitewater, and right up to his last breath Doug Gordon was excercising the personal judgement that he valued so greatly. Any claims that Balf is a poor writer are unfounded. And anyone who claims that Balf doesn't get to the point is clearly looking for something different than I am. I found some of the most interesting characters I have ever come across, written about clearly, and with vigor. It's a book about brothers, friends, family, and a trip that was years in the making. Balf called it a "Celebration of Life." Dispute their judgement all you want, but this book shows you the men themselves -- and they are some of the most fascinating men I've ever read about.
Rating:
Summary: Characters
Review: The essence of this book is its characters. If you want the typical second-by-second action, the literary equivalent of "slow-motion" - tense faces, surging muscles, tall waves bearing down, and all that - then this isn't your book. I mean, the river scenes are there, but they aren't the essence. If you want a cheap thrill, read something else. For Balf, this expedition wasn't like that. It wasn't about cheap, take-home, made-for-tv summiting. Sure, they called it "The Everest of Whitewater," but these were no twenty-something testosterone freaks selling an image. These were middle age guys, Harvard and Yale grads, writers, chemists, intellectuals. They all had wives and kids. Yet, at the same time, they were unmatched paddlers - pioneers and legends. Roger Zbel is famous for running the big Eastern rivers in flood when all the young dudes were scared off, and he has dominated extreme kayak racing for 15 years, ever since he and his buddies pretty much invented it, along with the whole new discipline and culture of squirt boating. Tom McEwan was the first big waterfall runner, and he has first descents in many countries. He's considered untouchable in a boat, and he runs his own kayak school nowadays. Jamie McEwan was an two-time Olympian paddler, and a Bronze medalist, the only American male to win a medal in whitewater solo craft. And on the river Doug Gordon was the best of them all . . . Balf knows that. He knows that Tom McEwan could drop off a thirty-foot falls without much thought, that Roger Zbel could run class V in his sleep, that all these guys had been near death on the river. But what Balf gets at in this book is the characters themselves -- what made these intelligent, middle age fathers and husbands leave their daily lives to paddle a river that left many of the world's great kayakers shaking in their spray skirts? He looks at them from many different angles, and it's great stuff. For example, there is a great part about Tom McEwan's paddling camps - Balf calls it an "Outward Bound-meets Bad News Bears" approach to travel, or a "Charlie Chaplin approach" to camping by the river -- a kid would be told to dig a ditch, but he wouldn't have a shovel. So he'd be directed toward a shed. But it would be locked. Next, he'd be sent to the neighbor's for wire-cutters . . . And then, after he gets back from the Tsangpo, McEwan is right back out there again, leading paddling trips in his way -- guiding clients expertly, infectiously down harrowing rivers by day, camping out with his four clients on someone's porch by night. "Why does it seem, the older I get, the more stuff I accumulate, but the older Tom gets, the less stuff he accumulates?" asks one of his clients. While most clubs are having a nice lunch, Tom's wealthy DC-area clients are being led through the noise and trubulence of a waterfall curtain, up into a secret room behind the falls, and not even thinking about lunch. And again, he's not just some insane guy. He dropped out of Yale with one semester to go, and then he lived out of his kayak for a year in a Florida swamp, training for the Olympics. I found this kind of thing fascinating, and it's much deeper and more interesting that my little summary, of course. What I took from this book was the characters -- interesting, complex guys -- brillant, highly talented men who found something in paddling that wouldn't let them go -- some challenge -- that led them to a river that everyone called insane. Certainly, what happened was tragic, but that's the nature of paddling whitewater, and right up to his last breath Doug Gordon was excercising the personal judgement that he valued so greatly. Any claims that Balf is a poor writer are unfounded. And anyone who claims that Balf doesn't get to the point is clearly looking for something different than I am. I found some of the most interesting characters I have ever come across, written about clearly, and with vigor. It's a book about brothers, friends, family, and a trip that was years in the making. Balf called it a "Celebration of Life." Dispute their judgement all you want, but this book shows you the men themselves -- and they are some of the most fascinating men I've ever read about.
Rating:
Summary: Mysterious Tibet
Review: The largely unexplored Tsangpo region of Tibet is the backdrop for a story that weaves adventure and sport (river kayaking) into a very compelling story. Todd Balf's The Last River is the story of 4 men's attempt to take on one of the world's last great challenges, the Yarlung Tsangpo River. Balf does a good job of explaining the complexities of kayaking without eliminating the thrills. He also balances the telling of the story with a throughtful analysis of the four participants rationale for taking on such a potentially deadly challenge. As an armchair adventurer, I found this book to be engrossing - I recommend highly!
Rating:
Summary: Boring
Review: The marketing of this book was the only reason I picked it up. It claimed to be as good as Into Thin Air, all the book did for me was to make me appreciate Into Thin Air even more. I have to admit that I have never even wanted to trek to the middle of the Asian continent to go white water kayaking down a very dangerous river with no civilization near you. That is basically what these people did and of course, fell into a horrible life and death situation due to high water levels. Given this lack of drive in my own life I was hoping to live vicariously through this adventure, unfortunately the book did not live up to the excitement or drama the actually participants of this adventure experienced. The book provides all the details, many of which are very interesting, and runs down the action as it took place, but it just does not grab me the way other books in this category have. Overall it is an interesting book, and if you are involved in this sport or are interested in this part of the world then you will come away with far more then the general interest reader.
Rating: 
Summary: Average
Review: The marketing of this book was the only reason I picked it up. It claimed to be as good as Into Thin Air, all the book did for me was to make me appreciate Into Thin Air even more. I have to admit that I have never even wanted to trek to the middle of the Asian continent to go white water kayaking down a very dangerous river with no civilization near you. That is basically what these people did and of course, fell into a horrible life and death situation due to high water levels. Given this lack of drive in my own life I was hoping to live vicariously through this adventure, unfortunately the book did not live up to the excitement or drama the actually participants of this adventure experienced. The book provides all the details, many of which are very interesting, and runs down the action as it took place, but it just does not grab me the way other books in this category have. Overall it is an interesting book, and if you are involved in this sport or are interested in this part of the world then you will come away with far more then the general interest reader.
Rating:
Summary: A waste of time and money (and paper and ink)
Review: There are troubling questions in The Last River that are never fully dealt with: Did our intrepid kayakers blunder into a dangerous situation because they were racing others to be the first to explore and conquer a new territory? Were they pressured by big money sponsors to move forward with an ill-timed expedition? Well, there's been another race, too, a rush among big-money publishers to be the first to capitalize on the Tsangpo saga. This race is to blame for Todd Balf's faltering missteps. In a book obstensibly about kayaking the last great untamed river, there's almost no kayaking. Some guys plan a trip, things go wrong, they go home, and people argue about it in Internet newsgroups. There's no bone-pounding thrill of whitewater; the river is just cubic feet per second. The landscape isn't spiritual or ugly or haunted or massive; it's just a curvy line on a globe. And the kayakers aren't driven or psychotic or lonely or deluded; they're just pins on a map. And the pins are all the same color. Balf wasn't there, and the people who were haven't shared much with him, and it shows. Don't buy this book; don't read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Problems
Review: This book could stand a translation into English; or, at least, a language editor. I found myself, repeatedly, struggling to understand what a given sentence might have been intended to mean; and, occasionally, failing.
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