Everest, but her own personal crisis.For every three climbers who attempt to reach the elusive summit of Mt. Everest, one dies trying. But in 1988 Stacy Allison became the first American woman ever to climb the world's highest peak, having triumphed over not just the mountain—a treacherous and overwhelmingly male domain—but over a devastating home life filled with domestic abuse. With each step, she got closer not just to the summit, but to throwing off the ropes that held her in a marriage dangerous to both her physical and mental well-being.Allison's thrilling account of how she called upon the same strength and courage that took her to the top of the world to finally leave her abusive husband is a dramatic testimony to her never-say-die spirit. The power of her vision, and her quest to achieve her dreams and free herself from a life of despair, are an inspiration of the highest kind."Men climb mountains because they're there.' Allison...did it to see if she could measure up. And as she scales peak after peak...her self esteem soars. Braving the Himalayan death zone, the most violent blizzard in forty years, avalanches, white-outs, and being lost at 26,000 feet, Allison...conquers her own life as she conquers Everest."—Jan Goodwin, author of Caught in the Crossfire

    In 1999, climber Conrad Anker discovered Mallory's body on Everest and helped solve one of the greatest mysteries in the history of adventure and exploration. In "The Lost Explorer," Anker and historian David Roberts craft a dramatic account of the expeditions of 1924 and 1999, and ultimately capture the passion and spirit of two men driven to test themselves against nature at its most brutal.

    Of the twenty-six British climbers who, on three expedtions (1921-24), walked 400 miles off the map to find and assault the highest mountain on Earth, twenty had seen the worst of the fighting. Six had been severely wounded, two others nearly died of disease at the Front, one was hospitalized twice with shell shock. Three as army surgeons dealt for the duration with the agonies of the dying. Two lost brothers, killed in action. All had endured the slaughter, the coughing of the guns, the bones and barbed wire, the white faces of the dead.In a monumental work of history and adventure, ten years in the writing, Wade Davis asks not whether George Mallory was the first to reach the summit of Everest, but rather why he kept on climbing on that fateful day. His answer lies in a single phrase uttered by one of the survivors as they retreated from the mountain: "The price of life is death." Mallory walked on because for him, as for all of his generation, death was but "a frail barrier that men crossed, smiling and gallant, every day." As climbers they accepted a degree of risk unimaginable before the war. They were not cavalier, but death was no stranger. They had seen so much of it that it had no hold on them. What mattered was how one lived, the moments of being alive.For all of them Everest had become an exalted radiance, a sentinel in the sky, a symbol of hope in a world gone mad.

    Everest, saw nothing that "suggested that a murderous storm was bearing down." He was wrong. The storm, which claimed five lives and left countless more--including Krakauer's--in guilt-ridden disarray, would also provide the impetus for Into Thin Air, Krakauer's epic account of the May 1996 disaster.

    Eerie aspects of the incident—unexplained violent injuries, signs that they cut open and fled the tent without proper clothing or shoes, a strange final photograph taken by one of the hikers, and elevated levels of radiation found on some of their clothes—have led to decades of speculation over what really happened. This gripping work of literary nonfiction delves into the mystery through unprecedented access to the hikers' own journals and photographs, rarely seen government records, dozens of interviews, and the author's retracing of the hikers' fateful journey in the Russian winter. A fascinating portrait of the young hikers in the Soviet era, and a skillful interweaving of the hikers narrative, the investigators' efforts, and the author's investigations, here for the first time is the real story of what happened that night on Dead Mountain

    When Alex Honnold topped out at 9:28 am on June 3, 2017, having spent fewer than four hours on his historic ascent, the world gave a collective gasp. His friend Tommy Caldwell, who free climbed (with a rope) the nearby Dawn Wall in 2015, called Alex's ascent "the moon landing of free soloing." The New York Times described it as "one of the great athletic feats of any kind, ever." It was "almost unbearable to watch," writes Synnott.This majestic work of personal history delves into a raggedy culture that emerged decades earlier during Yosemite's Golden Age, when pioneering climbers like Royal Robbins and Warren Harding invented the sport that Honnold would turn on its ear. Synnott paints an authentic, wry portrait of climbing history, profiling Yosemite heroes John Bachar, Peter Croft, Dean Potter, and the harlequin tribe of climbers known as the Stonemasters. A veteran of the North Face climbing team and contributor to National Geographic, Synnott weaves in his own amateur and professional experiences with poignant insight and wit. Tensions burst on the mile-high northwest face of Pakistan's Great Trango Tower; photographer/climber Jimmy Chin miraculously persuades an intransigent official in the Borneo jungle to allow Honnold's first foreign expedition, led by Synnott, to continue; armed bandits accost the same trio at the foot of a tower in the Chad desert . . .The Impossible Climb is an emotional drama driven by people exploring the limits of human potential and seeking a perfect, dialed-in dance with nature. They dare beyond the ordinary, but this story of the sublime is really about all of us. Who doesn't need to face down fear and make the most of the time we have?

    but second to no peak in terms of danger. From tragic deaths to unbelievable stories of heroism and survival, No Way Down is an amazing feat of storytelling and adventure writing, and, in the words of explorer and author Sir Ranulph Fiennes, “the closest you can come to being on the summit of K2 on that fateful day.”

    Blehm narrates this true account of the disappearance and search for Randy Morgenson, a National Park Service ranger who, one morning after 28 seasons on the job, failed to answer his radio call.The introverted Morgenson was more comfortable with the natural world than with people. A gifted photographer and a lyrical writer, he dropped out of college to begin a career that would send him into the remote parts of California's Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks. Passionate about the mountains, he excelled at his responsibilities, which ranged from clearing away garbage left by careless campers to rescuing injured hikers. Dedicated to keeping the wilderness undisturbed, he was proud of his ability to leave no trace of himself wherever he camped.That skill would prove costly when, at age 54, he went missing. Blehm seamlessly combines a detective story with a celebration of nature that calls to mind the works of classic American writers like Thoreau and Emerson. His gripping narrative will cause readers' hearts to ache at the disappearance of this undervalued soul. But their spirits will soar at the grandeur and mysticism of nature expertly captured in its most primal state.

    To Messner, and to thousands of others, Mallory’s attempt—whether or not it succeeded—remains the greatest exploit in the annals of mountain climbing. Though Mallory’s body was finally found, we have lost, Messner believes, the spirit that guided him; summiting Everest has become merely a corporate challenge and a matter of technology, not a rendezvous with destiny.Using the British climber’s journals and letters, Messner thrillingly re-creates Mallory’s three assaults on Everest, including his final ascent. Here is both an investigation into the death of George Mallory and a deeply felt homage—to a mountain, to the spirit of an age, and to the man who inspired those who followed in his footsteps.

    He was the first North American to summit Mount Everest. As the first manager and employee, and ultimately the CEO, of fledgling Recreational Equipment, Inc. (REI), he guided the company through years of record-setting growth. He guided Bobby Kennedy up the newly named Mount Kennedy, helping him to become the first person to summit the Canadian peak. He lead the first and only International Peace Climb, which put climbers from the U.S., Russia, and China on the summit of Everest in the name of world peace.Contrary to what many people might think, Jim Whittaker's career neither began nor culminated with that famous first ascent of Everest. His achievement on Everest and his many successes before and after are, rather, the natural outcome of a life driven by a passion for outdoor adventure combined with strong leadership qualities and a commitment to making a difference. In A Life on the Edge, readers will discover a true hero -- someone who inspires others to seek challenges in their own lives.

    

    It means learning the hard lessons the mountains teach.Reinhold Messner calls Steve House the best high=altitude climber in the world today, an honor he declines. "Being called the 'best,'" says Steve, "makes me very uncomfortable. My intention is to be as good as I can be. Mountaineering is too complex to be squeezed into a competition. It is simply not something that lends itself to comparison. Climbing is about process, not achievement. The moment your mind wanders away from the task of the climbing-at-hand will be the moment you fail."Steve House built his reputation on ascents throughout the Alps, Canada, Alaska, the Karakoram and the Himalaya that have expanded possibilities of style, speed, and difficulty. In 2005 Steve and alpinist Vince Anderson pioneered a direct new route on the Rupal Face of 26,600-foot Nanga Parbat, which had never before been climbed in alpine style. It was the third ascent of the face and the achievement earned Steve and Vince the first Piolet d"or (Golden Ice Axe) awarded to North Americans.Steve is an accomplished and spellbinding storyteller in the tradition of Maurice Herzog and Lionel Terray. Beyond the Mountain is a gripping read destined to be a mountain classic. And it addresses many issues common to nonclimbing life -- mentorship, trust, failure success, goal setting, heroes, partnership -- as well as the mountaineer's heightened experience of risk and the deaths of friends. Beyond the Mountain is a window into the process of a man working to be the best he can be.

    Alone in a snowy wilderness without any way of calling for help he knew his chances of survival were slim.Darkness Descending is the harrowing and psychologically compelling account of the next four freezing days and nights as he dragged himself to safety, battling constantly with extreme pain, biting cold, and his own, often hallucinatory swings between hope and despair.

    It started out as a simple hike in the Utah canyonlands on a warm Saturday afternoon. For Aron Ralston, a twenty-seven-year-old mountaineer and outdoorsman, a walk into the remote Blue John Canyon was a chance to get a break from a winter of solo climbing Colorado's highest and toughest peaks. He'd earned this weekend vacation, and though he met two charming women along the way, by early afternoon he finally found himself in his element: alone, with just the beauty of the natural world all around him. It was 2:41 P.M. Eight miles from his truck, in a deep and narrow slot canyon, Aron was climbing down off a wedged boulder when the rock suddenly, and terrifyingly, came loose. Before he could get out of the way, the falling stone pinned his right hand and wrist against the canyon wall. And so began six days of hell for Aron Ralston. With scant water and little food, no jacket for the painfully cold nights, and the terrible knowledge that he'd told no one where he was headed, he found himself facing a lingering death -- trapped by an 800-pound boulder 100 feet down in the bottom of a canyon. As he eliminated his escape options one by one through the days, Aron faced the full horror of his predicament: By the time any possible search and rescue effort would begin, he'd most probably have died of dehydration, if a flash flood didn't drown him before that. What does one do in the face of almost certain death? Using the video camera from his pack, Aron began recording his grateful good-byes to his family and friends all over the country, thinking back over a life filled with adventure, and documenting a last will and testament with the hope that someone would find it. (For their part, his family and friends had instigated a major search for Aron, the amazing details of which are also documented here for the first time.) The knowledge of their love kept Aron Ralston alive, until a divine inspiration on Thursday morning solved the riddle of the boulder. Aron then committed the most extreme act imaginable to save himself. Between a Rock and a Hard Place -- a brilliantly written, funny, honest, inspiring, and downright astonishing report from the line where death meets life -- will surely take its place in the annals of classic adventure stories.

    A first-person account of the American K2000 expedition by Heidi Howkins who if successful, would be the first American woman to successfully summit the world's most notorious and challenging mountain.