Touching the Void

It feels like this is a book everyone has read (and seen the film), yet up until now I had done neither. I guess even if you haven't seen or read, you will at least know the outline of the story: Two men climbing a remote mountain, one falls, injures himself badly, other man must decide whether to risk his own life to help him or leave him to his outcome; then once he has decided to assist, it goes even more wrong and the rescuer must decide whether to cut the rope (sending the injured man to almost certain death) and prevent himself from being dragged down the mountain. Well Joe Simpson is that injured man, and spoiler alert - he survives, and writes this book!

The writing contains some technical bits, although there is a glossary at the end; and a lot of the description of the climbing and the terrain was lost on me, but this isn't really relevant. This book is more about the mental capacity of Simpson to overcome his physical condition and to literally just continue. I can't imagine that one in 100 or 1 in 1000 people would have the ability the author did to continually take the hard option over the easy option (stopping, giving up, sleeping, crying, etc), and continued to hop, crawl and drag himself down a mountain to the camp where he hoped (against the odds really) that his friends still remained.

The action occurs in 1985, when Joe and his companion Simon Yates tackle the Western face of Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes. At 6334m, its no easy pickings, and the complete the first successful summit. the return to base camp, however was less successful.

For maximised enjoyment, brush up on your moraines, seracs, verglas, belays and bergschrunds. Also an ideal book if you want to terrify yourself into not taking up mountaineering.

4 frostbitten stars.