Read The Impossible Climb Alex Honnold El Capitan and the Climbing Life Mark Synnott 9781101986646 Books
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INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER
NEW YORK TIMES MONTHLY BESTSELLER
One of the 10 Best Books of March--Paste Magazine
A deeply reported, insider perspective of Alex Honnold’s historic achievement and the culture and history of climbing.
“One of the most compelling accounts of a climb and the climbing ethos that I've ever read.”—Sebastian Junger
In Mark Synnott’s unique window on the ethos of climbing, his friend Alex Honnold’s astonishing “free solo” ascent of El Capitan’s 3,000 feet of sheer granite, is the central act. When Honnold topped out at 928 A.M. on June 3, 2017, having spent fewer than four hours on his historic ascent, the world gave a collective gasp. The New York Times described it as “one of the great athletic feats of any kind, ever.” Synnott’s personal history of his own obsession with climbing since he was a teenager—through professional climbing triumphs and defeats, and the dilemmas they render—makes this a deeply reported, enchanting revelation about living life to the fullest. What are we doing if not an impossible climb?
Synnott delves into a raggedy culture that emerged decades earlier during Yosemite’s Golden Age, when pioneering climbers like Royal Robbins and Warren Harding invented the sport that Honnold would turn on its ear. Painting an authentic, wry portrait of climbing history and profiling Yosemite heroes and the harlequin tribes of climbers known as the Stonemasters and the Stone Monkeys, Synnott weaves in his own experiences with poignant insight and wit tensions burst on the mile-high northwest face of Pakistan’s Great Trango Tower; fellow climber Jimmy Chin miraculously persuades an official in the Borneo jungle to allow Honnold’s first foreign expedition, led by Synnott, to continue; armed bandits accost the same trio at the foot of a tower in the Chad desert...
The Impossible Climb is an emotional drama driven by people exploring the limits of human potential and seeking a perfect, choreographed dance with nature. Honnold dared far beyond the ordinary, beyond any climber in history. But this story of sublime heights is really about all of us. Who doesn’t need to face down fear and make the most of the time we have?
Read The Impossible Climb Alex Honnold El Capitan and the Climbing Life Mark Synnott 9781101986646 Books
"I have never, and I shall never climb a cliff of any height, but devouring Mark Synnott's brilliant and riveting book The Impossible Climb gave me enormous joy. If, as a reader, you crave context, and there is context galore, this book is for you. If you wonder how these elite climbers, both male and female, balance the hunger for risk with the recognition that staying alive is essential to providing the very opportunities for that risk taking, this book will move you and challenge your assumptions about the sport. If you harbor a fascination for the history of great climbers and their historic expeditions, this book provides a rare, even profound education. Yes, the book culminates with Alex Honnold's epic free solo of El Capitan, but this book is about so much more. There are so many impossible climbs described in this book, not just the final one. It is about the ethos of climbing, the passion that possesses every climber. Synnott invites you into this universe, on every level, and what every reader will be able to see and understand and feel is the absolute honesty, the fierce authenticity that such a life requires. This book is, of course, about the human condition. It is no accident that Synnott and Honnold bonded over the sharing of literature and ideas during the early expeditions together. Brothers Karamazov, The Things They Carried, Walden, religion, philosophy all provided that connection in this remarkable friendship, a friendship that grows and evolves and ultimately becomes an essential part of the final drama. I learned so much from this book, and I found that the meticulous detail about the climbing techniques became important to me. Even the jargon charmed, and the excesses of how one survives for days on the side of a mountain or deep in a slot canyon left me breathless. The writing is powerful, the perspective universal, yet intimate. Free soloing will never be on my dance card, but I rejoice that Mark Synnott made climbing accessible to me and enriched my understanding of the human spirit."
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The Impossible Climb Alex Honnold El Capitan and the Climbing Life Mark Synnott 9781101986646 Books Reviews :
The Impossible Climb Alex Honnold El Capitan and the Climbing Life Mark Synnott 9781101986646 Books Reviews
- After watching the documentary 'Free Solo' and seeing the title of this book, I thought it would be a more detailed insight into Alex Honnold's climb up El Cap. But this book is foremost about the author and his climbing, followed by the history of climbing in general and the previous generations of climbers before Alex, and merely sprinkled with some details about Alex. In fact, the amount of pages dedicated to Alex's actual free solo account up El Cap are only a few pages at the very end of the book. Maybe if you're a climber (I am not) this book would be more interesting. Or maybe if you know the author and want to know more about him, it would be more interesting. But if you want to know more about Alex Honnold and his free solo of El Cap, just stick with the documentary or read his own book 'Alone on the Wall'. I also didn't think the author painted a very flattering image of Alex Honnold, not that I know Alex, but the documentary projects a more flattering image of Alex than this book. (It also references at least a dozen times about Alex and his bowel movements which is just TMI in my opinion.) After finishing the book, it just felt like the author was capitalizing (riding the coat tails perhaps?) on Alex's famed climb up El Cap seeing as the book came out not long after the documentary was released.
- I wanted to like this book, after seeing Free Solo, and reading Alex Honnold's account, as well as Tommy Caldwell's book on the Dawn Wall climb. But this book is a strange mishmash of stuff, including some history of Yosemite climbing, and a lot about the author's preoccupation with his own mortality , as well as his relationship with an earlier superstar, Alex Lowe. It also has an oddly chosen group of unrelated photos, very few of which are of Alex Honnold or even of El Capitan or Yosemite. The author is a good writer and may have interesting stories to tell, but this book seems like a misguided attempt to ride the bandwagon of Free Solo. I very rarely write critical reviews, but feel almost as though this book is marketed under false pretenses.
- I have never, and I shall never climb a cliff of any height, but devouring Mark Synnott's brilliant and riveting book The Impossible Climb gave me enormous joy. If, as a reader, you crave context, and there is context galore, this book is for you. If you wonder how these elite climbers, both male and female, balance the hunger for risk with the recognition that staying alive is essential to providing the very opportunities for that risk taking, this book will move you and challenge your assumptions about the sport. If you harbor a fascination for the history of great climbers and their historic expeditions, this book provides a rare, even profound education. Yes, the book culminates with Alex Honnold's epic free solo of El Capitan, but this book is about so much more. There are so many impossible climbs described in this book, not just the final one. It is about the ethos of climbing, the passion that possesses every climber. Synnott invites you into this universe, on every level, and what every reader will be able to see and understand and feel is the absolute honesty, the fierce authenticity that such a life requires. This book is, of course, about the human condition. It is no accident that Synnott and Honnold bonded over the sharing of literature and ideas during the early expeditions together. Brothers Karamazov, The Things They Carried, Walden, religion, philosophy all provided that connection in this remarkable friendship, a friendship that grows and evolves and ultimately becomes an essential part of the final drama. I learned so much from this book, and I found that the meticulous detail about the climbing techniques became important to me. Even the jargon charmed, and the excesses of how one survives for days on the side of a mountain or deep in a slot canyon left me breathless. The writing is powerful, the perspective universal, yet intimate. Free soloing will never be on my dance card, but I rejoice that Mark Synnott made climbing accessible to me and enriched my understanding of the human spirit.
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