Home

Completed	17 January 2008
Title	Eiger Dreams
Author	Jon Krakauer
Published	1990
Quote	"The fat blue tongues of several glaciers thrust well into the Valdez city limits, and throughout the winter months frigid temperatures and the damp marine air conspire to glaze the downtown streets with a treacherous armor of black ice."
Review	Krakauer's writing style is like a little girl's birthday cake, with fancy candles and pink frosting and technicolor sprinkles. It's so sweet it makes me sick. I wish Krakauer would just go on a diet and cut out all the adjectives and adverbs. I wish he would stop being cutesy and just report. I get the impression that he spends way too much time thinking up ways to be rhetorically clever. I much prefer the lean, mean writing style of Hemingway. As I've mentioned before, there's something about Krakauer that rubs me the wrong way. That being said, Eiger Dreams is a collection of his articles published in such magazines as Outside and Smithsonian. Some of the articles are more readable than others. The short story, Valdez Ice, is about climbing frozen waterfalls, and so it was of interest to me as I have one brother who lived in Valdez and two other brothers who have been known to climb frozen waterfalls. The short story, On Being Tentbound, was of interest to me because I know what it's like to be "trapped" inside a tent, waiting out the rain or what have you. Now, though, since I've become a bonafide knitter, I don't think being tentbound would irk me so. If I were trapped inside a tent, I'd just take out my knitting needles and get on with it. I'd knit me some socks.

For next book review, please click here.