Pakistan's magnificent K2 is known also as "The savage mountain." At 28,250 feet it is second only to Everest in height but first in difficulty to climb, endowed with the worst weather in the Himalaya. Five times, American mountaineers had tried to climb this mountain, and failed. Five men had died in these attempts.

This is the story of the year that the Americans took care of their unfinished business. In 1978, under the leadership of Everest-veteran Jim Whittaker (himself trying K2 for the second time), fourteen men and women set out with a common goal: to work together to get somebody--anybody--to the top of K2.

It is said about K2 that if you do not take the mountain in 45 days, you will not take it at all. The Americans spent 67 days on K2 in 1978, nearly all above 18,000 feet, where the stresses of high-altitude living, of monotonous food, of confinement in tiny tents for day after day of frustrating storms ultimately give the mountain the last word.

This is the story of how people, each day left more naked before themselves and before the mountain, overcame their individual fears, desires and disappointments to achieve a victory in which all could share. After four decades of failure, four Americans--Jim Wickwire, Lou Reichardt, Rick Ridgeway and John Roskelley--finally stood atop K2. Wickwire so savored the victory that he lingered too long and was forced to bivouac just below the summit, without food, oxygen or shelter in -40 degree temperatures and winds over 50 mph. His will to survive kept the mountain from claiming yet another life, but when the four came down, their emaciated physical condition told, more graphically than words, the cost of climbing "the savage mountain."

Pakistan's magnificent K2 is known also as "The savage mountain." At 28,250 feet it is second only to Everest in height but first in difficulty to climb, endowed with the worst weather in the Himalaya. Five times, American mountaineers had tried to climb this mountain, and failed. Five men had died in these attempts.

This is the story of the year that the Americans took care of their unfinished business. In 1978, under the leadership of Everest-veteran Jim Whittaker (himself trying K2 for the second time), fourteen men and women set out with a common goal: to work together to get somebody--anybody--to the top of K2.

It is said about K2 that if you do not take the mountain in 45 days, you will not take it at all. The Americans spent 67 days on K2 in 1978, nearly all above 18,000 feet, where the stresses of high-altitude living, of monotonous food, of confinement in tiny tents for day after day of frustrating storms ultimately give the mountain the last word.

This is the story of how people, each day left more naked before themselves and before the mountain, overcame their individual fears, desires and disappointments to achieve a victory in which all could share. After four decades of failure, four Americans--Jim Wickwire, Lou Reichardt, Rick Ridgeway and John Roskelley--finally stood atop K2. Wickwire so savored the victory that he lingered too long and was forced to bivouac just below the summit, without food, oxygen or shelter in -40 degree temperatures and winds over 50 mph. His will to survive kept the mountain from claiming yet another life, but when the four came down, their emaciated physical condition told, more graphically than words, the cost of climbing "the savage mountain."

I've spent the past couple of weeks reading a lot of mountaineering books, including the incredible "High" and "Epic" collections. This book was more interesting from a sociological perspective than an historical one. It should have been titled, "The Me Generation Climbs a Mountain and Lives (Somehow) to Tell About It."

There is some detail about the actual climb and route(s) chosen, but most of the book is about interpersonal relationships and navel gazing on the part of the author/narrator as well as those who contributed to the book. If this team had been climbing during the 50's, the rest of the mountaineers would have thrown them off a cliff after a week. If they'd been climbing with Messner, he'd have thrown each of them off a cliff. Without oxygen. After the first day. The whining! The arguments! The touchy-feely "we cleared the air and now everything'll be great!" attitude.

No, really, the previous generation was wiser: keep your feelings to yourself and stifle, stifle, stifle, all the way to the top, because when you have to live with people under very stressful conditions for a long time, even small things get magnified into major issues; and this group started out with HUGE things.

Some of the attitudes displayed were also condescending. The author thinks little of the Japanese conquest of K2, and makes a snide remark early on about how he has no doubt they will find lots of Japanese trash on the mountain left over from the huge Japanese expedition. As the book wends on, oddly enough, he finds loads of Polish trash and rope left, even excavating what he terms a "garbage dump." But the only Japanese trash he finds on the mountain is a soup wrapper! I don't think, in all his navel-gazing, he realised how disrespectful and denigrating he came across, because I'm sure he'd have beaten his breast over that too.

The epilogue was very satisfying: after the temper tantrum thrown by one of the climbers, it was interesting to read about karmic retribution, if you will. But I'd pick up Ed Hillary's book to reread (again) before I'd read this book again. Edmund Hillary actually seems to enjoy climbing mountains, and is able to convey the wonder and excitement he felt climbing even "small" peaks in the Himalayas.

PS: My husband points out that the book has a magnificent collection of photographs. This is very true.

"The Last Step: The American Ascent of K2" is Rick Ridgeway's extremely well written account of the first successful American ascent (and only third overall ascent at the time) of the world's second highest peak. "The Last Step" is the "expedition account" and includes fascinating commentary from several climbers, making for a more rounded view than most climbing books. "The Last Step" is blessed with a stunning collection of photographs which provide a sense of scale both of the beauty of the Karakoram Mountains and of the incredibly difficult terrain the expedition overcame.



Ridgeway's account candidly describes the tensions and acrimony that built up in the expedition as it was repeatedly stalled by poor weather in the fall of 1978. The expedition spent 67 days on the mountain, much of it exposed to the debilitating effects of high altitude. The normally driven and competitive natures of good climbers became points of friction as the expedition faced oncoming winter and the likelihood that few if any of the climbers were going to get a shot at the summit.



Ridgeway's narrative of the two successful summit attempts is absolutely hair-raising, as men too long in the "dead zone" above 26,000 feet climbed like near-zombies over dangerously exposed snow slopes. One climber, Jim Wickwire, was forced to bivouac overnight in sub-zero temperatures at 28,000 feet after zoning out and lingering too long at the summit.



The account makes clear that only the most fit, capable, and single-minded climbers had any chance of topping out on K2 under the conditions faced in 1978. Those climbers with lesser skills or with distractions such as homesickness or as in one case, an affair with another member of the team, were unable or unwilling to risk all for the summit.



This book is most highly recommended to fans of the climbing account genre. Although a long read at over 300 pages, others may find it of interest as an indepth look at what happens on world-class climbing expeditions.

"The Last Step: The American Ascent of K2" is Rick Ridgeway's extremely well written account of the first successful American ascent (and only third overall ascent at the time) of the world's second highest peak. "The Last Step" is the "expedition account" and includes fascinating commentary from several climbers, making for a more rounded view than most climbing books. "The Last Step" is blessed with a stunning collection of photographs which provide a sense of scale both of the beauty of the Karakoram Mountains and of the incredibly difficult terrain the expedition overcame.

Ridgeway's account candidly describes the tensions and acrimony that built up in the expedition as it was repeatedly stalled by poor weather in the fall of 1978. The expedition spent 67 days on the mountain, much of it exposed to the debilitating effects of high altitude. The normally driven and competitive natures of good climbers became points of friction as the expedition faced oncoming winter and the likelihood that few if any of the climbers were going to get a shot at the summit.

Ridgeway's narrative of the two successful summit attempts is absolutely hair-raising, as men too long in the "dead zone" above 26,000 feet climbed like near-zombies over dangerously exposed snow slopes. One climber, Jim Wickwire, was forced to bivouac overnight in sub-zero temperatures at 28,000 feet after zoning out and lingering too long at the summit.

The account makes clear that only the most fit, capable, and single-minded climbers had any chance of topping out on K2 under the conditions faced in 1978. Those climbers with lesser skills or with distractions such as homesickness or as in one case, an affair with another member of the team, were unable or unwilling to risk all for the summit.

This book is most highly recommended to fans of the climbing account genre. Although a long read at over 300 pages, others may find it of interest as an indepth look at what happens on world-class climbing expeditions.

"The Last Step: The American Ascent of K2" is Rick Ridgeway's extremely well written account of the first successful American ascent (and only third overall ascent at the time) of the world's second highest peak. "The Last Step" is the "expedition account" and includes fascinating commentary from several climbers, making for a more rounded view than most climbing books. "The Last Step" is blessed with a stunning collection of photographs which provide a sense of scale both of the beauty of the Karakoram Mountains and of the incredibly difficult terrain the expedition overcame.

Ridgeway's account candidly describes the tensions and acrimony that built up in the expedition as it was repeatedly stalled by poor weather in the fall of 1978. The expedition spent 67 days on the mountain, much of it exposed to the debilitating effects of high altitude. The normally driven and competitive natures of good climbers became points of friction as the expedition faced oncoming winter and the likelihood that few if any of the climbers were going to get a shot at the summit.

Ridgeway's narrative of the two successful summit attempts is absolutely hair-raising, as men too long in the "dead zone" above 26,000 feet climbed like near-zombies over dangerously exposed snow slopes. One climber, Jim Wickwire, was forced to bivouac overnight in sub-zero temperatures at 28,000 feet after zoning out and lingering too long at the summit.

The account makes clear that only the most fit, capable, and single-minded climbers had any chance of topping out on K2 under the conditions faced in 1978. Those climbers with lesser skills or with distractions such as homesickness or as in one case, an affair with another member of the team, were unable or unwilling to risk all for the summit.

This book is most highly recommended to fans of the climbing account genre. Although a long read at over 300 pages, others may find it of interest as an indepth look at what happens on world-class climbing expeditions.

Outstanding account of the expedition. May be a bit too detailed for some, but it definitely picks up as it goes. It's unusual to see this much detail on personal interactions. Photos were incredible, could have even used a few more.