The Calling: A Life Rocked by Mountains

In 1964, a nine-year-old Barry Blanchard sat on a Greyhound Bus on his way from his grandmother’s house in Medicine Hat, Alta., to Calgary. He sat alone until a young woman began to read to him from Heinrich Harrer’s classic, Blanchard eyed the Rockies on the horizon while he listened to the tales of the Eiger. “Something called to me,” writes Blanchard.

He has spent much of his life answer ing that call by climbing the “beautiful, beautiful mountains.” Four-hundred pages provide a gr ipping, humourous, scatological, ir reverent, histor ical, geographical account of Blanchard’s life. He dives deep into his partnerships over the years. He details failures and successes on the world’s biggest mountains. Blanchard does not shy away from the disturbing, the dangerous and the deeply personal. His clever render ing of dialogue during crux times paints str iking vignettes of personalities. Mountaineering classics were Blanchard’s first teachers: the teenager raided his high school shelves. In the book’s first chapter Blanchard writes that climbing the Rupal Face of Nanga Parbat is like “having sex with death.” Twenty-five years later he concludes his book with, “Climbing mountains is good for the soul.”

is about the culture of climbing during the punk rock days, the adrenaline and the egotism of youth. It is about the power of the mountains to move us physically, emotionally, intellectually and spir itually. With heart-pounding descr iptions of epics and histor ical ascents, world-renowned alpinist Barry Blanchard tells us about his transfor mation from being a poor kid on the wrong side of the tracks to being one of the most esteemed climbers in the world. An excellent read.–