In May 1996 a number of expeditions attempted to climb Mount Everest on the Southeast Ridge route. Each group contained world class climbers and relative novices, some of whom had paid tens of thousands of pounds for the climb. As they neared the summit twenty-three men and women, including the expedition leaders, were caught in a ferocious blizzard. Disorientated, out of oxygen and depleted of supplied, the climbers struggled to find their way to safety.

Experienced climber and guide Anatoli Boukreev led his exhausted and terrified group of six back to safety before going back out into the blizzard to help others stranded on the mountain. Rescuing a number of climbers from certain death he emerged a hero.

The Climb is an honest and gripping account of true endurance and contains interviews with most of the surviving climbers, medical personnel, Sherpa guides, and families of the dead who experienced the tragedy.

This edition also includes the transcript of the Mountain Madness debriefing, recorded five days after the tragedy, as well as G. Weston de Walt's response to Jon Krakauer.