127 Hours: Between a Rock and a Hard Place - Softcover

Ralston, Aron

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1451617704 ISBN 13: 9781451617702

Publisher: Pocket Books, 2010

Synopsis

THE "EXTRAORDINARY" (Booklist) #1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER--THE "HARROWING" (The Washington Post) SURVIVOR'S MEMOIR YOU WILL NEVER FORGET
Aron Ralston, an experienced twenty-seven-year-old outdoorsman, was on a day's solitary hike through a remote and narrow Utah canyon when he dislodged an eight-hundred- pound boulder that crushed his right hand and wrist against the canyon wall. Emerging from the searing pain, Aron found himself completely stuck. No one knew where he was; no one was coming to rescue him. With scant water and food, and a cheap pocketknife his only tool, he eliminated his options one by one. On the fifth night, wracked by delirium and uncontrollable shivers, Aron scratched his epitaph into the rock wall, certain he would not see daylight.
Yet with the new morning came an epiphany: if he could use the rock's vise-like hold to break his arm bones, his blunted pocketknife could serve as a surgeon's blade. . . .

About this title

Review

'Ralston manages to keep the tension flowing throughout . . . alternating each chapter of angst-ridden, present-tense narrative with a cosier chapter of climbing nostalgia. This lends the book a Hitchcockian rhythm, see-sawing neatly between calm and tension. . . . . He is somehow able to chronicle the ebb and flow of his thoughts and feelings during his ordeal with an exactness that gives his book the emotional pull of a psychological thriller.'

Craig Brown, book of the week in the MAIL ON SUNDAY

'Ralston is a passionate man who has lived his life resolutely pursuing this passion. His fortitude in his dire predicament was, as he would say, awesome, and from this it is possible to learn much about hope in the face of overwhelming odds.'

Toby Clements, DAILY TELEGRAPH

'Heroic, searing and compelling' Benedict Allen '[This book has] the emotional pull of a psychological thriller'

MAIL ON SUNDAY

'A gripping book . . . It not only details his entrapment and escape but tells vivid tales of extreme mountaineering prior to that defining misadventure'

Joanna Walters, DAILY EXPRESS

'Ralston is superb at evoking the epic beauty of the land, and his description of his ordeal is riveting: think Touching the Void directed by Tarantino'

Sarfraz Manzoor, NEW STATESMAN

'Here is one man's heroic struggle with the infinite, a searing and compelling read. Aron Ralston tells his agonizing, inspiring tale of survival with all the verve and honesty you'd expect of someone who somehow found inspiration even in the face of a lonely death.'

Benedict Allen

'Riveting . . . if you only read one adventure book this year, this is it'

THE GREAT OUTDOORS

About the Author

Aron Ralston, a native of the Midwest, retired from a career as a mechanical engineer at age twenty-six before moving to Aspen, Colorado. Since his accident, he has completed his unprecedented project to climb the fifty-nine Colorado peaks of more than 14,000 feet, alone, in winter. His first book, Between a Rock and a Hard Place, was a New York Times bestseller and was adapted into the major motion picture 127 Hours by Danny Boyle. Today, as a father of an infant daughter and four-year-old son, Aron lives in Boulder, Colorado. He continues to travel the world for both adventure and to share his story. Follow his journey at AronRalstonSpeaker.com.

Edition details

• Publisher: Pocket Books
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 1451617704
• ISBN 13: 9781451617702
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 413