Customer Reviews

The Last River: The Tragic Race for Shangri-la

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

Anyone who enjoys stories about the Himalayas, Tibet, or people pushing themselves to peak performance, needs to read this. It's not quite the five-star material of Krakauer's "Into Thin Air", but it's very close. Mr. Balf uses the accounts passed to him by the members of the doomed October 1998 Tsangpo expedition so well that you forget he wasn't there. The History is well used and interesting. The descriptions of the mammoth arena in which the story takes place are highly vibrant. And, the relationships of the men on the team are portrayed with realism, as well as a careful depth that could rival the Gorge itself. These are not people out for glory alone. These are people with a passion. Read this book, and see how they fare against one of the last untamed patches of earth we have left.

I couldn't agree more with Michael Craig Johnson's review. Structurally, this book is a mess, as well as being a completely uninspiring story of guys with bad judgement. I have never seen a real-life adventure story without any, repeat any, maps of the area or pictures of the participants. Balf could surely have found one picture, or showed us one of the maps mentioned on page 13, and never referenced again. It takes the group 105 pages of disjointed biographical info to get to Lhasa. There we meet more people we have no reason to care about. The group gets on the river on page 143. After some history and more bios, the group is off the river by page 227. After less than two weeks, the action is over. Even the river scenes fail to give any sense of place to help the reader along.

Mr. Balf obviously said what had to be said about the expedition in his magazine article. It was no service to the buyers to produce a whale of a book from the original minnow. As Mr. Johnson says, don't buy this book. I wouldn't even borrow it, or lend it to a friend. Instead, check out Alfred Lansing's classic, "Endurance". With maps nd pictures.

"Extreme", "lantern jawed", "boulders the size of buildings". Mix these three cliches, stir in an almost incomprehensible mix of first names and some [partial] biographies and you have the essence of Todd Balf's The Last River - The Tragic Race of Shangri-La. Ostensibly the tale of a river exploration by kayak gone awry it's focus is continuously blurred by disorganized snippets of arcana and personal information about the participants and (too many) peripheral players in this tale of a grand scheme gone bad. The real tragedy of this story seems to be the fact that Balf is the self- appointed chronicler of it. Balf continuously mires the reader in minutiae that is scattered seemingly hodge-podge throughout the story. The timeline of the book wavers between serpentine and non-existent and further clouds an already confusing tale. The story itself, the story of a group of experienced paddlers seeking the ultimate challenge on one of the mightiest rivers in the far east, has unlimited potential to be engaging. Instead, Balf scrawls such a circuitous, hackneyed missive, that the weakly developed principal characters rush down a river of unpredictable, choppy and confusing prose long before they reach the river that shares those qualities. In the Author's Note Balf writes of his struggle to give shape to an original article about the topic of his book. The reader is predisposed to think that Balf underwent the same struggle with the book..and lost. Balf seems overwhelmed by the topic at hand: too much information, too much forced drama and too many characters have resulted in an unruly pastiche of a story. In the end it is the story that suffers: the clarity of the participant's vision has been lost, the essence of the experience that beckoned them left unexplored. For [the money] CAN there are more entrancing journeys for the reader to take.

The essence of this book is its characters. If you want the typical second-by-second action, the literary equivalent of "slow-motion" - tense faces, surging muscles, tall waves bearing down, and all that - then this isn't your book. I mean, the river scenes are there, but they aren't the essence. If you want a cheap thrill, read something else.

For Balf, this expedition wasn't like that. It wasn't about cheap, take-home, made-for-tv summiting. Sure, they called it "The Everest of Whitewater," but these were no twenty-something testosterone freaks selling an image. These were middle age guys, Harvard and Yale grads, writers, chemists, intellectuals. They all had wives and kids. Yet, at the same time, they were unmatched paddlers - pioneers and legends. Roger Zbel is famous for running the big Eastern rivers in flood when all the young dudes were scared off, and he has dominated extreme kayak racing for 15 years, ever since he and his buddies pretty much invented it, along with the whole new discipline and culture of squirt boating. Tom McEwan was the first big waterfall runner, and he has first descents in many countries. He's considered untouchable in a boat, and he runs his own kayak school nowadays. Jamie McEwan was an two-time Olympian paddler, and a Bronze medalist, the only American male to win a medal in whitewater solo craft. And on the river Doug Gordon was the best of them all . . .

Balf knows that. He knows that Tom McEwan could drop off a thirty-foot falls without much thought, that Roger Zbel could run class V in his sleep, that all these guys had been near death on the river.

But what Balf gets at in this book is the characters themselves -- what made these intelligent, middle age fathers and husbands leave their daily lives to paddle a river that left many of the world's great kayakers shaking in their spray skirts?

He looks at them from many different angles, and it's great stuff. For example, there is a great part about Tom McEwan's paddling camps - Balf calls it an "Outward Bound-meets Bad News Bears" approach to travel, or a "Charlie Chaplin approach" to camping by the river -- a kid would be told to dig a ditch, but he wouldn't have a shovel. So he'd be directed toward a shed. But it would be locked. Next, he'd be sent to the neighbor's for wire-cutters . . . And then, after he gets back from the Tsangpo, McEwan is right back out there again, leading paddling trips in his way -- guiding clients expertly, infectiously down harrowing rivers by day, camping out with his four clients on someone's porch by night. "Why does it seem, the older I get, the more stuff I accumulate, but the older Tom gets, the less stuff he accumulates?" asks one of his clients. While most clubs are having a nice lunch, Tom's wealthy DC-area clients are being led through the noise and trubulence of a waterfall curtain, up into a secret room behind the falls, and not even thinking about lunch. And again, he's not just some insane guy. He dropped out of Yale with one semester to go, and then he lived out of his kayak for a year in a Florida swamp, training for the Olympics. I found this kind of thing fascinating, and it's much deeper and more interesting that my little summary, of course.

What I took from this book was the characters -- interesting, complex guys -- brillant, highly talented men who found something in paddling that wouldn't let them go -- some challenge -- that led them to a river that everyone called insane. Certainly, what happened was tragic, but that's the nature of paddling whitewater, and right up to his last breath Doug Gordon was excercising the personal judgement that he valued so greatly.

Any claims that Balf is a poor writer are unfounded. And anyone who claims that Balf doesn't get to the point is clearly looking for something different than I am. I found some of the most interesting characters I have ever come across, written about clearly, and with vigor. It's a book about brothers, friends, family, and a trip that was years in the making. Balf called it a "Celebration of Life." Dispute their judgement all you want, but this book shows you the men themselves -- and they are some of the most fascinating men I've ever read about.

The marketing of this book was the only reason I picked it up. It claimed to be as good as Into Thin Air, all the book did for me was to make me appreciate Into Thin Air even more. I have to admit that I have never even wanted to trek to the middle of the Asian continent to go white water kayaking down a very dangerous river with no civilization near you. That is basically what these people did and of course, fell into a horrible life and death situation due to high water levels. Given this lack of drive in my own life I was hoping to live vicariously through this adventure, unfortunately the book did not live up to the excitement or drama the actually participants of this adventure experienced. The book provides all the details, many of which are very interesting, and runs down the action as it took place, but it just does not grab me the way other books in this category have. Overall it is an interesting book, and if you are involved in this sport or are interested in this part of the world then you will come away with far more then the general interest reader.

Todd Balf did not do himself a favor by allowing the editors to include phrases such as the above into the dust jacket reviews. While "Into Thin Air" was certainly has its merits, Balf struggles with a number of limitations that keep his book from attaining the popular standard that was set by the aforementioned.

First and foremost is that Balf's account is not first hand, and as a result, lacks the authority and clarity of Krakauer's book. Second, is that there are no photographs. Descriptions of the big water, the individuals, and the challenges they faced would have been a lot less abstract than the scenarios created by Balf (tho I recognize the National Geographic's contract with the team probably did not allow photos from the trip to be used).

Lastly, a different level of writing might have corrected the above ills - his prose was sometimes difficult to plow thru, and often times his descriptions of the rapids and environs, which were meant to envoke, only served to dull. To boot, on numerous occasions he would reference an event or conversation in the book as tho it was the first time, when in fact it had been referenced before.

And lastly, the photo of the kayak and the skull on the cover appears contrived and sensationalistic.

All of the above could be passed off as minor irritants to be sure. However, being a sucker for anything that intersects my interests in Tibet, travel and kayaking with extra-ordinary individuals, I expect a more adept handling of the subject.

Todd Balf's The Last River was a very compelling read about something I know little about - the sport, adventure and competition of white water kayaking. It was also a very interesting read about a part of the world that I always find intriguing - Tibet -- and the history of the Tsangpo region and the river itself. However, what made the book compelling was the story of the group of people involved in kayaking and this adventure, both those who went on the trip and those who didn't. I also enjoyed Into Thin Air and Perfect Storm, and would be surprised if this book wasn't another bestseller.

Like others, I wondered at the number of people who slammed this book, which I found to be gripping, enjoyable, and in places hard to read for all the right reasons. The answer is simple: this book is not written for the armchair adventurer, for someone who will watch the Discovery Channel but never actually go to any of those places they'll see on the screen. It tells some hard truths, and I can easily understand why those who bought the book hoping to be entertained by someone else's tragedy would be greatly disappointed. If, however, you've ever been closer to real adventure than picturing yourself in an SUV ad, I have a feeling this book will work for you.

It is not a fun book. No book with a tragedy at its center should be fun or light reading, really. But it is fascinating, compelling, a page-turner. It is highly educational, particularly for those who are inclined to view adventure athletes as brain-dead adrenaline junkies. By taking the reader through the expedition members' hard work and preparation, the hassles and hardships they endured, the book forces us to see them as being in many ways the antithesis of the stereotype: they are patient, painstaking, and thorough.

The bottom line is that this book isn't the literary equivalent of America's Most Death-Defying Videos. It's not written to titillate the folks back home. It seeks to tell the truth about a pursuit that many people find simply incomprehensible. If read with an open mind and without an expectation of being thrilled by death-defying feats, I think it will give the reader that understanding.

As someone who knew zero about paddling before this book, I found it interesting as an introduction to the sport.

As for the story, I could have used more information on the locals and the wildlife as a backdrop to the main event. I get a little tired of the thread that if it isn't American, it isn't important.

I also have a new perspective on National Geographic, both magazine and televison. I will in future read and/or watch with a high level of skepticism.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. OK,so I live in Isrel and the though of a huge river pulsating with white water waves is already a bit dreamlike, but then I am reading to be entertained which I certainly was. I felt that the book gave meaningful insights into the thought processes and personalities of a group of people who came together to do something that seems positively insane to me. I was enthralled by the descriptions of the river and the kayaking, attracted to the dilemmas of middle aged guys doing something that doesn't jive with middle of the road expectations and had my appetite whetted for understanding more about Tibet. Could any of us ask for more in a book?

This is a good adventure book that makes you think, imagine and grimace. The story flows, the chacters are real and while the river came alive I am happy to say that my living room stayed dry all the way through. Get out and enjoy the book.