Into Thin Air, An Honest Review
Title of the Book: Into Thin Air Author: Jon Krakauer Number of Pages: 279 Rating: ☆☆☆ Review:
Have you ever wanted to climb Everest? In Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, he takes us on a wild journey to the top of the mountain. An American journalist who takes the opportunity of a lifetime to live out his childhood dream is met with a horrible tragedy. He must overcome obstacles, catastrophe, and the harsh conditions atop Mount Everest.
This novel was a surprisingly informative read. What makes it unique is Jon’s ability to blend fact and personal narrative into a complete story. Overall after reading I have much more knowledge about the history of Mount Everest itself as well as the personal tribulation the author went through. In the beginning of the novel Jon really schools you on Mount Everest, telling you it’s long history as well as the complete commercialization of the mountain. He also tells us all about the persons accompanying him on this adventure. As you get toward the middle and ending of this novel, it’s definitely more of a personal account of what happened. For these reasons, Into Thin Air is a very unique read.
In this novel the writing style, language, and tone are definitely geared toward those who are familiar with climbing terms. I found myself struggling to understand a lot of the vocabulary terms. But once I familiarized myself with a certain term it was much easier to understand the next time it came up. The tone is pretty melancholy throughout the story obviously, because it’s based off one of the biggest tragedies on Mount Everest. I’d have to say some of the most memorable moments in this book for me would definitely include the amount of bodies seen on the mountain, as well as the trash. When I imagine Mount Everest, dead bodies and empty oxygen cans didn’t cross my mind until reading this novel. I was also extremely surprised about the high cost of being able to attempt the climb.
I would recommend Into Thin Air to those who are interested in climbing. Because of the difficult climbing jargon to pick through, it’s hard to understand a lot of the novel without knowing these terms. Another thing I was frustrated with was the amount of characters and names to remember. I had a very difficult time recalling who was who and what teams they were on. All the different climbers became pretty “muddied up” in my mind. For these reasons, I believe this book is best suited for those who are familiar with mountain climbing. For those who are not, this novel can become a little frustrating.
Have you ever wanted to climb Everest? In Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, he takes us on a wild journey to the top of the mountain. An American journalist who takes the opportunity of a lifetime to live out his childhood dream is met with a horrible tragedy. He must overcome obstacles, catastrophe, and the harsh conditions atop Mount Everest.
This novel was a surprisingly informative read. What makes it unique is Jon’s ability to blend fact and personal narrative into a complete story. Overall after reading I have much more knowledge about the history of Mount Everest itself as well as the personal tribulation the author went through. In the beginning of the novel Jon really schools you on Mount Everest, telling you it’s long history as well as the complete commercialization of the mountain. He also tells us all about the persons accompanying him on this adventure. As you get toward the middle and ending of this novel, it’s definitely more of a personal account of what happened. For these reasons, Into Thin Air is a very unique read.
In this novel the writing style, language, and tone are definitely geared toward those who are familiar with climbing terms. I found myself struggling to understand a lot of the vocabulary terms. But once I familiarized myself with a certain term it was much easier to understand the next time it came up. The tone is pretty melancholy throughout the story obviously, because it’s based off one of the biggest tragedies on Mount Everest. I’d have to say some of the most memorable moments in this book for me would definitely include the amount of bodies seen on the mountain, as well as the trash. When I imagine Mount Everest, dead bodies and empty oxygen cans didn’t cross my mind until reading this novel. I was also extremely surprised about the high cost of being able to attempt the climb.
I would recommend Into Thin Air to those who are interested in climbing. Because of the difficult climbing jargon to pick through, it’s hard to understand a lot of the novel without knowing these terms. Another thing I was frustrated with was the amount of characters and names to remember. I had a very difficult time recalling who was who and what teams they were on. All the different climbers became pretty “muddied up” in my mind. For these reasons, I believe this book is best suited for those who are familiar with mountain climbing. For those who are not, this novel can become a little frustrating.
I appreciate the honesty in your review! Into Thin Air is a memoir I've been thinking about reading for a long time. Maybe I'll get acquainted with some common climbing terms before reading it, though. I was also really surprised at the fact that there would be a significant amount of dead bodies and trash on Mt. Everest. When I picture the mountain, I always think of it as being covered in pristine white snow. It's too bad that image isn't very accurate.
ReplyDeleteI like how to described your book and made it clear to the reader that it includes climbing language and tone and is good to read if you are familiar with those. It sounds like a really interesting book, especially how the narrator can combine the two styles and do that successfully. I feel like Mt. Everest and major adventures like these are always interesting and compelling and it sounds really interesting that the narrator did well of combing the story and style together.
ReplyDeleteWe both read books by Jon Krakauer so I understand how it gets confusing with jargon words. He also talks about his climbs in Into The Wild. I like how you made the book sound unique to him as well because I also never read a book that had his tone and word choice style before. I thought this was a good review and informative review.
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