The Calling, Barry Blanchard
The Calling, Barry Blanchard
4 Rating(s)
List: $22.50 | Sale: $15.75
Club: $11.25

The Calling
A Life Rocked by Mountains

Author: Barry Blanchard

Series: Patagonia

Narrator: Barry Blanchard

Unabridged: 14 hr 5 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 03/07/2017


Synopsis

With heart-pounding descriptions of avalanches and treacherous ascents, Barry Blanchard chronicles his transformation from a poor Native American/white kid from the wrong side of the tracks to one of the most respected alpinists in the world. At thirteen, he learned to rappel when he joined the 1292 Lord Strathcone’s Horse Army Cadets. Soon kicked out for insubordination, he was already hooked on climbing and saw alpinism as a way to make his single mother proud and end his family’s cycle of poverty. He describes early climbs attempted with nothing to guide him but written trail descriptions and the cajones of youth. He slowly acquires the skills, equipment and partners necessary to tackle more and more difficult climbs, farther and farther afield: throughout the Canadian Rockies, into Alaska and the French Alps and on to Everest, Peru, and the challenging mountains in Pakistan. From each he learns lessons that only nature and extreme endeavor can teach. This is the story of the culture of climbing in the days of punk rock, spurred on by the rhythm of adrenaline and the arrogance of youth. It is also a portrait of the power of the mountains to lift us – physically, emotionally, intellectually,

Reviews

Goodreads review by Daniel on April 24, 2015

I really wanted to like this more than I did - I think that Blanchard's writing in other places (Apinist magazine especially) is great but stretched out to book length it just doesn't hit as hard. The books makes clear how fully he has devoted himself to climbing and especially to hard alpine climbs......more

Goodreads review by John on December 29, 2014

Quit about halfway through. Bit of a bore after awhile. The climbs blend together after a while.......more

Goodreads review by Tom on May 06, 2023

This is one of the most enjoyable climbing books I have read as Blanchard relates a life of climbing and of the life that was the vehicle to pursue that climbing. Personally, his time of pursuit paralleled my ten year foray into rock and ice climbing and I related to much of what he went through—min......more