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Summary: Dickinson makes you feel like you're on the mountain!
Review: Matt Dickinson's book took me by surprise--he reallly makes you feel like you're on Mount Everest. The piercing cold, the loss of oxygen, rusty equipment and frayed ropes: it's amazing climbing. He doesn't try to figure out why the deaths happened or place blame on anyone for the tragedy of the 1996 storm. He just tells a really great story about how his team survived it and how he, though he was not that experienced, made it all the way to the top. And the North Side is even more challenging than the South! That's where Mallory & Irvine may have first reached the summit and now they found Mallory's body. Dicksinson's takes you there -- you can't imagine how Mallory could have done it. This book is one that adventure lovers shouldn't miss.
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Summary: A Cameraman's View of Everest
Review: Matt Dickinson, the clumsy, inexperienced, determined cameraman, left behind debts and a family to shoot Brian Blessed, a famous British actor, climb Everest via the less traveled North Face. Little did the group of climbers know that they would be stuck on Everest with the worst storm in modern history hovering above their heads. Matt shows that the illusion of a "nice climb" on Everest does not ehxist. Waiting for good weather at base camp is nerve wracking, while getting news that many people including Rob Hall and Scott Fischer have died. When good weather finally arrives, Matt, Brian Blessed, Al Hinkes - and experienced climber, Kees - Matt's friend, and Barney - the leader for group A, leave to summit Everest. Altitdue bites at their minds and they move too slowly to continue together with Brian, the weak link. together, Al and Matt attempt a summit, while the others head back to base camp. This book shows the true effects of altitude and a great mountain, against inexpeience and determination. A very good book. Though I was not glued to the book, something made me want to go on and read more. I was waiting to finish it for it showed the other side of Everest, the north face, and the other side through the climber's mind. Very solid, intense, yet through Matt's point of view - a likeable character who the reader can relate to - an average person/climber who got stuck with more than he thought he could handle. Two thumbs up!
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Summary: Everest '96 again but with a refreshing new slant
Review: Much has been written about Mount Everest 1996 and indeed the debate that was initiated not just by the events on the mountain but by the accounts of it primarily in Krakauer's Into Thin Air and Boukreev's The Climb continues. The Other Side of Everest (The Death Zone in England and Australia - don't but the same book twice!) adds to our knowledge of May '96 while at the same time does not attempt to mimic other accounts or indeed to enter the understandably emotive arena of claim and counter claim that personifies the 1996 Everest season. Matt Dickinson, a film maker, writer and novice climber attempted Everest by its North Face. Essentially a cameraman there to film the English actor Brian Blessed's third attempt on the mountain, Dickinson writes with a refreshing honesty regarding his motivations, his fears and his almost lack of climbing skill. The result is an excellent account of the climb that enables the reader - particularly those of us whose highest peak is a flight of stairs - to get an understanding of the reality not just of climbing in general but of climbing Everest in May of 1996. Most people will read this book after Boukreev and Krakauer have stimulated their interest in Everest. If this is the case you might also want to take a look at Everest: Mountain Without Mercy, a stunning IMAX pictorial account of the '96 climb. Furthermore, if like me you're now hooked on the whole subject of mountaineering then do a search for the books of Joe Simpson and Andrew Greig, you won't be disappointed.
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Summary: Where Do You Go From the Top Of the World?
Review: Since my wife won't let me mortgage my house, and deprive my kids of their college education, I have to live vicareously through these high mountain adventures. My quest for the top of Mt. Rainier 25 years ago seemed like a walk in the park, compared to the peak of Everest. The rendition by Matt Dickinson was very well put to word. I see that his quest for the top came at a sacrifice to his marriage (as did Krakhauer in "Into Thin Air"). Of the three Everest books I've read in the past month (Krakhauer, Breshears, and this), Matt's book seemed more "down to earth". Sharing his passion for photography, I could relate to him more than the other two. Althoug I like Breshears technical dissertations of his IMAX filming. The only fault about his book was that is was too short. I would imagine after having reached Everest, everything else would be anti-climactic.
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Summary: He Can't Believe He Did That...
Review: The man who couldn't get up Mount Snowden, may in fact never even have been *on* Mount Snowden what with the rain and the dark and the half bottle of Southern Comfort, summits Everest! Talk about your missions improbable.
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Summary: some mistake, surely
Review: this book I have read before, only it was called "The Death Zone", right?
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Summary: What a fantastic book!
Review: This book starts a little slowly, but then it takes off and never looks back. Written by a man who never dreamed he would stand on top of mount Everest, he tels it like it was. He never lets up the pace, and does not speak with forked tongue. He is honest to the core, and writes it exactly how it happened, and how it affected him and those who were around him. This is a barnburner, once you start the book, the further you read, the more you can not put the book down. It is suspenseful, and even though you think you know the ending, he does a masterful job of holding you in suspense until the very last page. A fantastic entry into the climbing of great mountains series. Do not miss reading this book. It is wonderful, fantastic and harrowing in nature. I fully recommend it from cover to cover. My wife who dislikes non-fiction books said it was the greatest adventure that she has read this year. Buy this book.
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Summary: A Fun Read but "Over the top"
Review: This book was a good read, an exciting story and the author is a likeable protagonist. But the author spends so much effort detailing his physical challenges, impediments and frailties, (splitting headache, exhaustion, prolonged sleeplessness, frozen body parts, hunger, dehydration, confusion, weight loss and more) that the reader is left incredulous that the author can summon the strength to even walk, much less ascend the several thousand vertical feet from the lower camps to the summit, up some of the most inhospitable terrain on the planet at a life-killing altitude. Krakauer, in "Into Thin Air", does the same. Only the late Anatoli Boukreev avoids melodrama in his matter of fact account of the 1996 Everest Disaster. Reading Mr. Dickinson's book I often felt he was trying to impress more than inform. Ascending Everest is impressive enough. And the setting and challenges of Everest are dramatic enough. His tale is only burdened by his "every step defied death" tone. I found myself wishing for a more informative explanation of how, despite his physical state, he was able to get to the summit. No one, in the condition which he often described himself to have been in, could have even gotten out of a sleeping bag. The author started the book as a "regular guy" and emerges from the book as more than superhuman. In doing so he wounds his story.
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Summary: A spellbinding book by a man with great heart & courage.
Review: This book, more than any I have read about climbing Everest, conveys the sense of being there--it gives the reader a feeling of climbing along side. Since the author is not a renowned climber, (more like one of us) one feels as though his emotions are more moving, more real. The descriptions are vivid and terrible. I am looking forward to reading more books by Mr. Dickinson. My personal favorite would be a book about his sea voyage to Antarctica.
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Summary: KILLER STORM...KILLER STORY...
Review: This is a gripping account of the deadly storm which engulfed Mt. Everest in May 1996 and left a trail of dead bodies in its wake on the south face of the mountain. The author writes about the storm as experienced on the north face: hence, the title of the book. He writes about the tragedy which engulfed the north side of Everest, in which death also came calling. The author provides many details of his expedition's ascent which is sure to fascinate and delight all Everest junkies. The narrative is compelling and absorbing. The tragic deaths of three members of the Indian team who reached the summit, only to become engulfed by the storm during their descent down the precipitous north face of Everest, trapping them over night, is heartbreaking. The callousness of a Japanese expedition who, on their ascent to the summit the following day, passed the Indian climbers, still alive but near death, and refused to aid them in their extremis, is truly shocking. The author also rehashes the effect of the storm on the south face and the heavy toll of life it exacted there. Jon Krakauer, however, does it better in his gripping book "Into Thin Air". In the final analysis, the author, Matt Dickinson, a novice climber who first ascended Everest that May 1996, comes across as a self-absorbed, selfish sort of lout. Notwithstanding his own personal shortcomings, however, his book still makes for an absorbing read.
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