Jon Krakauer is a man of many trades. He is an avid mountaineer, outdoorsman, and writer. His novel Into Thin Air is a personal account of the most fatal season in Everest’s history. Jon was a member of the Adventure Consultants team whom made an attempt at the summit in what is thought to be a “freak” storm. The novel is a non-fiction story through the eyes of Jon. The novel begins with a cloudy ball of names, places, and historical information of Everest. To be honest, the first quarter of the novel is tough to push through. Jon throws a clump of names of his fellow climbers along with foreign names of towns as he begins his trek towards the summit. I thought it was extremely surprising how little climbing knowledge you needed to understand the novel. Being a climber myself, I did not think that my knowledge particularly aided me in reading the book. Spoiler alert: there are some awful things that happen in the novel. I believe that Jon walked the line of literary artistry and bluntness perfectly to easily let the reader know how bad the situations were on the summit. Jon did a wonderful job of painting the astounding views he had on Everest in my own imagination. When he trekked through the Khumbu Icefall, I truly thought I might fall through one of the ladders with him. I really enjoyed how Jon led the reader through his acclimation treks up the mountain.
The story line clearly follows a path of him making his way to base camp and then slowly making his way towards the summit. There was really no jumping back in time present in the novel at all. Being a rock climber, this novel truly made me want to go climb a mountain. He speaks of his rock-lust and his urge to get to the top of the mountain and I have similar urges. I can somewhat understand his delirious rationale of continuing the pursuit to the top when the circumstances were as bad as they were. I think the insights the Jon offers us are this, we all may live our lives thinking “I know that if I was in that situation I would sacrifice myself to save that person”. Jon lived through that moment more then once on his Everest trip. I think he accurately portrayed that in reality there are almost none of us who would actually sacrifice ourselves. In conclusion, I loved this book. It has pushed me to want to read climbing inspired novels and has pushed me to want to climb more in my life. I think this novel gives the reader a beautifully graphic insight into the true Everest and I recommend it.