Breaking Trail: A Climbing Life

by Arlene Blum

Book Overview

A legendary trailblazer, Arlene Blum defied the climbing establishment of the 1970s by leading the first all-female teams on successful ascents of Mount McKinley and Annapurna and by being the first American woman to attempt Mount Everest. At the same time, her groundbreaking scientific work challenged gender stereotypes in the academic community and led to important legislation banning carcinogens in children's sleepwear. With candor and humor, Breaking...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0156031167
• ISBN13: 9780156031165
• Release Date: March 2007
• Publisher: Mariner Books
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.3" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Inspirational adventures, part detective story.

I'm not a huge memoir fan, it takes an outstsanding story to get to me, but I can place Arlene's book Breaking Trail firmly in that catagory. Part narrative and part detective mystery, Arlene's story recaps the inspirational climbs up the world's high peaks and across the world's largest mountain ranges. Woven in between these amazing adventures is the mystery of her family life and it literally unfolds as you read the book. A must read for anyone interested in the natural world, the challenge of high mountain climbing, a women's desire to suceed, all wrapped around a family mystery.

Woman to Woman

Arlene Blum's new book, Breaking Trail, is a book for everyone interested in the experience of high peak mountaineering--plenty of thrills and chills for those who stayed up all night reading Into Thin Air or Touching the Void like I did. However, there is one huge difference with this book--its written with a tenderness of narratorial voice I have not seen in other, more macho mountaineering books. Here, the high peaks become a metaphor for what all women face when they aspire to dreams outside the suburban marriage with freezer, soccer kids, and SUV. Her voice is intimate, modest, and honest. By the time I finished this book, I felt like we had been hiking together for days. This is not just a running account of a life spent in the highest peaks on earth--it is also the story of an accomplished scientist and social activist who is an inspiring role model for women of any age. She has lived a creative, adventurous, and uniquely imagined life, rich in adventure, beauty, love, and tragedy. She is the embodiment of: "If you can dream it, you can do it." After I finished the book, I was able to go to her website, where there are twelve slide shows of the climbs she writes about in the book; seeing the color photos of many places and incidents mentioned in the book took my breath away and only deepened my appreciation of this remarkable woman. She was not afraid to follow the deepest currents of her own soul into the mountains at a time when there were virtually no women participating in serious mountaineering (except to cook and make the coffee or truck loads of gear from one base camp to another while the guys made the glamouress sprints up to the summit.) Even having lived through it (being a contemporary of Ms. Blum's) I was indignant at the way she met with sexual bias at every turn. Its a great reminder of how different things were just forty years ago--and how they could be again. This is a book to read and pass to a woman friend or to a daughter. Its a great read and contains, through the recounting of incidents from the writer's childhood, a lot of insight into how someone ends up in high peak climbing. Arlene Blum is a role model for women everywhere and her story is told woman to woman. This is THE summer read this year. I loved it!

WHAT A LIFE...WHAT A WOMAN...WHAT A MEMOIR...

Having read and loved the author's other book, "A Woman's Place", I looked forward to reading this one, knowing that, at the very least, I could expect a well-written book. Well, it is that and much more. It is a memoir that kept me turning its pages, as it provides a peek as to how this highly intelligent and articulate, nice, Jewish girl became a mountaineer with which to contend. In a macho arena, where women were considered to be mere appendages to the male of the species, when considered at all, the author is surely a trailblazer. With her world famous, women only, expedition to summit Annapurna, she put women on the mountaineering map, letting the world know that a woman's place is on top. Independent and singular in her desire to make her mark, the author has written a memoir that provides insight into her desire to climb mountains, as well as her development as both a person and a woman. Set across the backdrop of women's changing roles in the social fabric, this memoir is an intimate and compelling look at a life well-lived and filled with achievement in a man's world, as the author is not only a mountaineer but a well-respected scientist known for some ground-breaking research that has had impact on the general public. Neither of these fields was initially receptive to the inclusion of woman, and the author's memoir details her travails in gaining acceptance as an equal, both as a mountaineer and a scientist. Written with humor and insight, the author creates an intimate memoir that chronicles her development into the person that she became. This is a memoir that will keep the reader engaged and turning the pages of this wonderful book. Highly enjoyable, those who are interested in why one would climb mountains, as well as those who enjoy well-written, interesting memoirs, will love this book. Bravo!

Wonderfully inspiring!

After reading and enjoying Arlene's first book detailing her experiences climbing Annapurna, it has been a great joy to have an account of her life to read. "Breaking Trail" is not only for those interested in mountaineering and trekking. I recommend the book to all women, especially those of us who find it challenging to forge our way through a world which still does not give credit to a woman's abilities and strengths. Many thanks to Arlene Blum for being a trail-blazer and a mentor.

Life Altering Experience

As a adventure Arlene Blum's Breaking trail: A Climbing Life is captivating; as a memoir a life altering experience. Reading about a women who had the fortitude to push past conformity, offers the reader renewed enthusiasm for today. Blum writes beautifully and in wonderful detail that keeps her human. Insights into her childhood, turn this adventure into a thought provoking tale of life, death and the meaning of it all. Nicely done in one book.