I'm not sure what to rate this one ... Hubs picked this as his next read, and I like to find commonalities and discussion possibilities, so I picked it up too. It didn't really grab me to start ... it was fine, just a little rambling. I stopped and shifted to some fiction, then came back to this (beat Hubs through it). 

I went with the audio ... it was included in AudiblePlus, but I grabbed a library copy so that Hubs and I could listen at the same time and not mess anything up. The library had the Kindle copy as well, which I like to have on hand for reference. 

This was the basic 1st person, as with most memoirs. It had a strange setup, as each chapter would start out in the present tense, like a "live" moment (in italics also in print) and then shift to storyteller and past tense, usually leading up to that moment. The book starts right at the heights of excitement, the two men on the wall (present tense) ... not labeled as a prologue, but preceding chapter one. There were four "parts"  with 21 chronological chapters through. No headers. Dates and locations were given in the text to tell the reader "where/when" we were. 

Random notes: refers to learning to sew, making teddy bears and stuffing "the carcass" ... I have made stuffed bears and never referred to the body as a carcass! In chapter2, he talks about his father/father's friend leading expeditions, and their two different styles (reaching the top, enjoying the journey) ... which was interesting and up for discussion. "Playing Indians"  mentioned in childhood memories, but in today's PC world, I always wonder if groups will come after an author for mentioning such  things. Gravity - the physics formula was mentioned a couple times ... I zeroed in on that after "taking" physics with my son a few years ago. "Dais" ... one of the words I track, and it was pronounced with a long I (whereas most pronunciations use a long A). And ROUTE ... said 200+ time. How do you pronounce it? "root" or "rout" ... here, it's always the former. 

I'm not into climbing at all (Hubs has done some) ... I think it's crazy. I've been reading more nonfiction and memoirs though. It's always interesting the set-up, and how a personal memoir can differ so much from a non-fiction, analytical account, where the author needs to address what is absolute fact, what quotes are taken directly from written or recorded accounts, what has been fact-checked and "proved" per se, with clarifications given for memory, etc. In memoirs, it seems individuals can just write whatever they want, include dialog (was everything included here recorded somewhere, or just what someone thinks they remember someone saying something like that) and call it non-fiction ... in other words, REAL. But memory and personal perspective is SUCH a fragile thing. 

The author here gives a shout out to Krakauer- whose Into Thin Air became a controversial book after The Climb came out from another perspective, attacking some things presented. Here the author mentions a bit of a similar situation ... I wanted to re-read that portion but couldn't find where it was. 

And one wonders how much of this is actually Caldwell as "the author" ... in the acknowledgements he does credit several others for their help, and not credited on the cover, but "c0-writer" Kelly Cordes. Ghost writer or just "helper?"  Not that it really matters that much I suppose. 

The Kindle copy had quite a few pictures which were very interesting.
I'm betting Hubs and I will end up watching the documentary.

Content: There were a couple instances of proFanity. Some talk of sex but nothing at all explicit.