No Shortcuts To The Top

This gripping and triumphant memoir follows a living legend of extreme mountaineering as he makes his assault on history, one 8,000-meter summit at a time. For eighteen years ed viesturs pursued climbing's holy grail: to stand atop the world's fourteen 8,000-meter peaks, without the aid of bottled oxygen. But no shortcuts to the top is as much about the man who would become the first american to achieve that goal as it is about his stunning quest. As viesturs recounts the stories of his most harrowing climbs, he reveals a man torn between the flat, safe world he and his loved ones share and the majestic and deadly places where only he can go. A preternaturally cautious climber who once turned back 300 feet from the top of everest but who would not shrink from a peak (annapurna) known to claim the life of one climber for every two who reached its summit, viesturs lives by an unyielding motto, reaching the summit is optional. Getting down is mandatory.