As a high school student, Ed Viesturs read and was captivated by the French climber Maurice Herzog's famous and grisly account of the first ascent of Annapurna in 1950. When he began his own campaign to climb the world's 14 highest peaks in the late 1980s, Viesturs looked forward with trepidation to undertaking Annapurna himself. Two failures to summit in 2000 and 2002 made Annapurna his nemesis. His successful 2005 ascent was the triumphant capstone of his climbing quest.

In The Will to Climb Viesturs and co-author David Roberts bring the extraordinary challenges of Annapurna to vivid life through edge-of-your-seat accounts of the greatest climbs in the mountain’s history, and of his own failed attempts and eventual success.  In the process Viesturs ponders what Annapurna reveals about some of our most fundamental moral and spiritual questions--questions, he believes, that we need to answer to lead our lives well.

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Praise for The Will to Climb

 “The Will to Climb captures the essence and spirit of the great sport of mountaineering… For anyone who loves the outdoors and for those who admire the will of mankind, this book is a must-read.” –Tod Leiweke, CEO of Tampa Bay Lightning

“Viesturs and Roberts have written an exhaustively researched and wonderfully compelling history of the most fascinating and dangerous of the Himalayan giants.” –David Breashers, veteran mountaineer and documentary filmmaker, director of IMAX film Everest

"A detailed, nicely told account of a man’s endurance and perseverance in achieving a singular goal."-- Publishers Weekly

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         Foreword, by Roger Goodell, Commissioner of the National Football         League           
         Chapter One: The Brick Wall       
         Chapter Two: A New and Splendid Life      
         Chapter Three: South Face          
         Chapter Four: So Close to the Dead                
         Chapter Five: The Door to the Land of the Living        
         Chapter Six: Messner and Kukuczka              
         Chapter Seven: Comet on Annapurna             
         Chapter Eight: My Annapurna      
         Epilogue: Goddess of the Harvests         
         Acknowledgments                       
         Bibliography                                

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Ed Viesturs is the first and only American to ascend all fourteen of the world’s 8,000-meter peaks without supplemental oxygen. In addition to his collaborations with Ed Viesturs, David Roberts is the author of more than twenty books, including Finding Everett Ruess.

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