- Paperback: 272 pages
- Publisher: Three Rivers Press
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0812933400
- ISBN-13: 978-0812933406
- Product Dimensions: 14 x 1.6 x 20.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 272 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #385,040 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Most helpful customer reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent companion to 'Into Thin Air',
By Ivy (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Other Side of Everest: Climbing the North Face Through the Killer Storm (Paperback)
I was a bit hesitant to read The Other Side of Everest; it was beginning to seem to me that there wasn't a person anywhere near the mountain during 1996 that *hadn't* written a book. I figured this one would be a rehashing of the story we all know so well, from Into Thin Air and other books. How wrong I was. The Other Side of Everest offers a different perspective of the 1996 tragedies, but it's well told - *and* the book offers a great deal more.Dickinson, in my opinion, did a better job than Krakauer at writing for the non-climbing audience, perhaps because he isn't really a climber at all. He doesn't use much jargon, and when he does - "the Death Zone," for example, which was the UK title of this book - he defines his terms. He also answers a lot of the questions non-mountaineers and armchair adventurers have about climbing; for once and for all, he explains why climbers dread calls of nature above 8,000 meters, as just one example. Dickinson writes very differently than most climbers, especially the ones who have written about Everest 1996. His narrative retains the tension and, in some places, tragedy that are common to the best expedition accounts, but he also uses humor in places where it's appropriate. I found myself laughing out loud in several places. The Other Side of Everest is also different in that it doesn't have the haunted, agonizing tone that Into Thin Air did, perhaps because Dickinson was farther from the tragedies, relatively speaking, or perhaps just because he waited longer than Krakauer did to write about it. Also, The Other Side is an account of a successful, "easy" Everest climb, not a disaster, which changes the perspective and the tone a lot from the other books about the 1996 season. In additional to the Everest-disaster-season story, The Other Side has another story to tell: how a non-climber got to the top of the world. Dickinson's case of summit fever drives him to the top of a mountain he didn't really expect to climb - after all, he's clumsy even at sea level - and so his book is a good look at the way normal people with little mountaineering experience (i.e., commercial expedition members) handle high-altitude climbs - and, to the extent that it can be explained at all, why. This book was written by a film director, so perhaps it isn't a surprise that the pictures are so good, but it's lovely anyway. I'm also pleased that the publishers sprung for two different insets of color photos, at least in the hardcover edition; some of them are truly breathtaking. In short, The Other Side of Everest is well worth reading for all lovers of adventure travel and climbing writing; even those who feel they've read Everest to death should enjoy this one. The book is a welcome addition to climbing literature, and would give pleasure on almost anyone's bookshelf.
4.0 out of 5 stars
An honest story of a climb, with a bit of tragedy,
By Louis-Eric Simard (Montreal, Quebec Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Other Side of Everest: Climbing the North Face Through the Killer Storm (Paperback)
The fact that this book is sold as a May 1996 Tragedy book does not do it justice: the main storyline relates first to Matt's climb of the North Face, second to how tragedy was averted by NOT climbing through the "Killer Storm", and finally to the relating of the comments heard during the storm and his validation of such after the appeasement of weather hostilities.If the book had been meant to only be about the Storm, it would fail to be as encompassing and visceral as Jon Krakauer's book. Where it succeeds, however, is as a brutally honest, genuine, humbling story about a reasonably ordinary climber attempting the mythically treacherous North Face of Everest in the wake of tragedies that have taken the lives of far more experienced climbers. In this sense, the story forms a fantastic complement to the collection of 1996 accounts by relating the story of one who was not in the brunt of the storm, but rather very close to it and its aftermath, and in closer proximity yet to others who were directly affected, some of which were in a place inaccessible to Jon Krakauer's first-person South Face narration. The book also revisits in an valuable, honest way, the difficulties one has in retaining the part of their humanity not directly involved in taking a further step. The pages on this alone make this book a worthy read, describing with exceptional candor and utility a subject that has already been discussed countless times but in a deeply relatable and authentic way that I have yet to find elsewhere. The narration process itself is poignant, haunting, and calls for pages to turn faster than one can read them.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent! Excellent!,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Other Side of Everest: Climbing the North Face Through the Killer Storm (Paperback)
I didn't think I would find a book to top "Into Thin Air" and one that would take a different view of the 1996 tragedy. I could NOT put this book down. I made it last a week and didn't want it to end. Dickinson really achieves putting the reader into the story. I live under the High Sierra and have summited Mt.Whitney in Calif. Driving by that mountain that seems to shoot straight up into the sky, I remembered Dickinson's description of the Himalaya valley floors that were at 18,000 feet. I imagined the towering 14,000 foot peaks of the Sierra buried under 4,000 feet of dirt and that would be only the valley FlOOR of the Himalays with 11,000 feet to go to the summit of Everest. THEN I could visualize the unbelievable height of this mountain. THEN I could realize the effort it takes (and what it takes OUT of someone) to get to the summit.Dickinson's writing is funny, tragic and extremely descriptive of the area, the people and the hard-to-imagine-summit he finally made. I know his wife would like him to stay home, but I hope he makes another trip to the Himalayas and writes another book!
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