Book Reviews
- Walker’s Pocket Book 2007
- Hostile Habitats
- Rope Dancer
- A year in the life of Glencoe
- Mount Everest the Reconnaissance
Walkers Pocket Book 2007
By David Atchison-Jones
Published by Jingo Wobbly
Hard Back. 288 pages. Price: £9.99. Full colour. ISBN: 978-1-873665-01-5
Jingo Wobbly shook up the climbing guidebook world a few years back with its emphasis on quality photography, inclusion of other interesting things besides the climbing and the use (some would say over the top use) of icons for quick reference. Now they have introduced the same for walking. This is a lavishly illustrated diary book for 2007 with a log for recording your walking achievements across the UK (over ½ the book and includes dates of the major walking/film festivals as well as 50+ book reviews).
But the novelty of this book is that Atchison has introduced his own selection of hills called ‘The Atchison 500’ to include only interesting bumps that give a taste of the beauty of the UK. He offers a ‘Nifty Fifty’ selection of the best of the 500 and locates a whole host of ‘places to visit’ around the hills. To take on the challenge would entail 891,318ft of ascent and considering Atchison has done the lot, he certainly seems to know the UK well.
My one gripe is the confusing numbering of hills and venues and the fact that the latter amount to no more than very vague ideas of what’s available. This aside, time will tell if the Atchison 500 becomes as sought after as the other lists!
Kevin Howett
Hostile Habitats
Scotland’s mountain environments
Edited by Nick Kempe & Mark Wrightham
Published by the SMT (2006). Hard Back. Full Colour. 256 pages. Price £15. ISBN: 0-907521-932
Never mind the daft title, this is the book I have been waiting yonks for - a single guide to nearly everything we see as we go about the mountain; or might see if our eyes were opened. Every hill-goer who wants to know what that is and why it’s there will thumb this constantly - when they get home.
It’s great for club quizzes and bothy nights too. Why does my Sigg spray me up there, not down here? How many midge larvae per m2 (surely an underestimate)? What are schists anyway? Which northern summit once supported a village? Why have dotterel suddenly become common? The Highlands were originally as high as..? Answers – see the MCofS website (for my full review), or buy it.
But ‘Hostile Habitats’? In a gallery of brilliant pictures there’s not a dickybird of life-threatening conditions (not even a vulture), just invitingly sunny mountains, lush green or temptingly white, burgeoning with wildlife, inhabited for generations. They may offer frissons of hostility, but they’re pussycats up against extreme habitats like Ellesmere Island or the Tibesti. They’re not very high, they’re well-dissected so you can get through them easily, and the maritime climate is benign for this far north – it’s not even exceptionally wet let alone snowy. Even in the eastern plateaux country, there are summer-grazing shielings up to 800 metres. Life’s a breeze (unless you’re a deer – the wee yins will love the gore).
The giveaway is the odd-picture-out: two lesser-spotted twits up in the clag. Of course we can get up there and savour the hostility – having kitted ourselves out like the wildlife with fleeces, shells, and GPS. But the rest of nature has more sense, and adapts to the bad spells by chilling out in its burrows, nests, and pubs.
David Jarman
(Mountain Landform Research)
The Rope Dancer By Rob Leach
Published by Skink Press. Paperback. 219 pages. ISBN 0-9758057-0-3
Our hero becomes involved in an expedition forcing him to revisit his past. After an absence from climbing due to a near fatal mountain trip, he rediscovers the joys of life in its entirety and climbing in particular. There are drugs, sex, love and even hate in this book but it all adds to the story and in no way detracts anything.
An easy to read book with very descriptive passages that all hillgoers will recognise and respond to: scenery, attitudes. We may all find something of ourselves within these pages.
I was saddened by the ending but that’s probably the romantic in me. The other side of me sees that any other conclusion may have been messy. Worth reading.
Pet Thomas
A Year in the Life of Glencoe
By Bill Birkett
Published by Frances Lincoln Hard Back (2006). 112 pages. 115 full colour plates. Price £14.99. ISBN 0-7112-2551-6
This large scale coffee-table book is a follow-up to Birkett’s similar tome to his Lakeland back-yard valley of Langdale. He attempts to capture the identity of Glen Coe through the seasons, but stumbles at the first hurdle for me simply by getting the name wrong on the cover. Birkett’s writing is good tho’ and his connection to the glen is obvious in his narrative. But the essence of the book is as a ‘photographic essay’ and although there are some great images, many fall short of the quality we see nowadays, particularly the climbing ones. A pity, as it is competing with others (e.g. Colin Baxter / Jim Crumley’ Monarch of Glens) and fails.
Kevin Howett
Mount Everest
The Reconnaissance 1935 The Forgotten Adventure
By Tony Astill
Published by Tony Astill. Hard Back. 359 pages. B/W photos. Price £30. ISBN 0-9549201-0-4
This is the story of the expedition to Everest lead by Eric Shipton which did a lot to explore the area for future expeditions and leading to the successful ascent in ’53 - a story more or less untold until now; the discovery of diaries of expedition members allowing Astill to recount the tales of the trip. These include the first opportunity for Tenzing to have a bash at the hill. There was also the discovery of the body of Maurice Wilson who had visited the area the previous year, sneaking (in disguise) through Sikkim with some porters. He had vanished and the porters returned to civilisation after a month waiting for him. There was also an obligatory avalanche epic and exploratory ascents of over two dozen peaks over 20,000ft.
There are substantial extracts from the diaries which often go into minute detail. Astill has painstakingly researched every last event. If you are a real expedition buff you will find these enthralling, the introspective thoughts of the team members and their letters home to loved ones, but halfway through the book I had tired of this. I was more taken by the photos, some from the Royal Geographical Society’s archives, and the sketches of the region by Wigram and Kempson.
There is a superb photo showing Shipton deep water soloing with other team members in the Calanques of France – there’s nothing new under the sun!
Kevin Howett
The book is not readily available in the shops but can be ordered direct from the author at Les Alpes Livres (his mountaineering book business): Tel. 01238 029 3767
alpes@supanet.com.
