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Showing posts from June, 2018

Shackleton: The (Almost) Impossible Story of Surviving in Antarctica

Publisher: Carroll & Graf Publishers I like love survival stories. Being neither mentally tough nor physically strong, I’ve always admired those who overcame overwhelming adversity despite excruciating pain and nearly impossible odds. One of the best books I’ve read is Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air. It is about the 1996 Mount Everest  disaster, during which many experienced mountaineers died from a blizzard. I didn’t think another adventure story would fascinate me more. I was wrong. Ernest Shackleton’s 1914 ocean expedition to Antarctica may be the most gripping survival story ever. In his 1959 book, Endurance , Alfred Lansing recounts the experience in a real page-turner. There is something about true stories that makes them extra riveting to read. None of the fiction thrillers fiction I’ve read rival this nonfiction by Lansing—remarkable, considering that I knew the ending before I cracked open the book. It wasn’t about how the story concluded; it was about the