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oofie's review
informative
reflective
tense
medium-paced
4.0
This book talks about the first five women who summited K2, the second highest mountain in the world and one of the deadliest.
I love reading books about mountaineering/extreme climbing. The grit and perseverance these people have is absolutely insane. They have terrible things happen to them on these peaks, basically every time they try to summit literally any of these monster mountains. Despite this, they go back again and again.
Probably the coolest part of this book is that it's not just about mountaineers, but female mountaineers. These are women who are passionate about their craft and the mountains they climb, and show the world that women can not only do hard things, but *really* hard things.
It's both awe-inspiring and sad to see the way all of their stories ended, but cool to see how their stories went in the first place.
I would recommend this book if you like reading about mountaineering, extreme climbing, women in extreme sports, and just the stories of women in general.
I love reading books about mountaineering/extreme climbing. The grit and perseverance these people have is absolutely insane. They have terrible things happen to them on these peaks, basically every time they try to summit literally any of these monster mountains. Despite this, they go back again and again.
Probably the coolest part of this book is that it's not just about mountaineers, but female mountaineers. These are women who are passionate about their craft and the mountains they climb, and show the world that women can not only do hard things, but *really* hard things.
It's both awe-inspiring and sad to see the way all of their stories ended, but cool to see how their stories went in the first place.
I would recommend this book if you like reading about mountaineering, extreme climbing, women in extreme sports, and just the stories of women in general.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
cmilam06's review
adventurous
informative
sad
tense
medium-paced
4.25
Compelling stories of the 5 women who first summited K2 and their deaths. There’s some bias from the author but the stories are very compelling and well told
nadiajohnsonbooks's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
tense
medium-paced
4.0
This book gives important insight into the lives of five women whose motivations I will never completely understand. While no biography is truly impartial, Jordan presents portraits of each mountaineer that neither condemns her for her choices nor makes her out to be better than she was. They emerge flawed and more relatable for it. Like Jordan herself, I can't really wrap my head around the specific way in which the void calls to high-altitude mountaineers, but I at least feel like I have a better notion of why these five women in particular followed their friends, their obsession, or their love into the Death Zone. Wanda Rutkiewicz came across as particularly sympathetic to me, and I appreciated this glimpse into her storied and troubled life.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent and Death
Moderate: Blood, Pregnancy, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Alcohol, Animal death, Sexism, and Sexual harassment
Minor: Vomit, Cursing, Bullying, Islamophobia, Suicidal thoughts, and Blood
anitaofplaybooktag's review
4.0
I'm a little obsessed with reading about alpine mountain climbing in the sense that I have yet to read a book about it that I haven't found fascinating. This one was no exception, but I will say I was on the fence a bit about the writing itself.
The book tells the detailed life stories of five women who reached the summit of K2, something only achieved by 18 women as late as 2014. All five perished while pursuing their dreams of climbing. Their backgrounds are fascinating . . .as you might imagine, these women were not traditionalists and to some extent, they put their families second to their passion for the sport.
The author creates essentially mini biographies of each woman from young childhood to death, and I found each of them fascinating to read. However, unlike my favorite [b:Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster|1898|Into Thin Air A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster|Jon Krakauer|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1463384482l/1898._SX50_.jpg|1816662], I didn't have the suspenseful feelings as if I were on the mountain with these women. The way she writes about mountain climbing itself seemed much more arms length. There's nothing wrong with that per se, but it made for a flatter read without as much emotional impact.
Also, this book really focused on the gender issues with climbing, and even though there were many men who helped these women achieve their goals, somehow the book left you with the feeling that sexism was a tremendous barrier, and every man was in constant sexual pursuit. And maybe that's how it was, but for some reason it seemed as though aspects of the stories might have been exaggerated to make the themes of the book seem more important somehow.
At any rate, I still would recommend it to those who enjoy books about risk takers, but not necessarily to those looking for say, a gripping survival tale.
The book tells the detailed life stories of five women who reached the summit of K2, something only achieved by 18 women as late as 2014. All five perished while pursuing their dreams of climbing. Their backgrounds are fascinating . . .as you might imagine, these women were not traditionalists and to some extent, they put their families second to their passion for the sport.
The author creates essentially mini biographies of each woman from young childhood to death, and I found each of them fascinating to read. However, unlike my favorite [b:Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster|1898|Into Thin Air A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster|Jon Krakauer|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1463384482l/1898._SX50_.jpg|1816662], I didn't have the suspenseful feelings as if I were on the mountain with these women. The way she writes about mountain climbing itself seemed much more arms length. There's nothing wrong with that per se, but it made for a flatter read without as much emotional impact.
Also, this book really focused on the gender issues with climbing, and even though there were many men who helped these women achieve their goals, somehow the book left you with the feeling that sexism was a tremendous barrier, and every man was in constant sexual pursuit. And maybe that's how it was, but for some reason it seemed as though aspects of the stories might have been exaggerated to make the themes of the book seem more important somehow.
At any rate, I still would recommend it to those who enjoy books about risk takers, but not necessarily to those looking for say, a gripping survival tale.
dqbookish's review
adventurous
challenging
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
4.0
amadswami's review
adventurous
challenging
emotional
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
4.5
Better than Into Thin Air; ladies representing!
vanessakm's review
3.0
I went thru a period of mountain-climbing literature after reading [b:Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster|1898|Into Thin Air A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster|Jon Krakauer|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1158966247s/1898.jpg|1816662] which probably inspired a slew of other non-climbing readers. K2 is actually a more technically challenging mountain than Everest and far fewer people have climbed it. Those who do face a 1 in 7 chance that they will die on the descent. I enjoyed reading about these five women and what drove them to love climbing and eventually die for that love. There was some interesting perspective on the troubles they experienced as women travelling in Pakistan as well as the sexism they face within the climbing community, something no other book I've read on the topic has addressed. My favorite story of the bunch was of the legendary Polish climber Wanda Rutkiewicz, the first woman to successfully climb and descent K2.
I did do a mental eye roll at the author's seeming suggestion that K2 is cursed for female climbers as all of the women died on this climb or future ones. It's a giant rock. It doesn't get angry or sleepy or hungry. It does kill a lot of climbers, male and female.
I did do a mental eye roll at the author's seeming suggestion that K2 is cursed for female climbers as all of the women died on this climb or future ones. It's a giant rock. It doesn't get angry or sleepy or hungry. It does kill a lot of climbers, male and female.