Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage
by Alfred Lansing

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Book Reviews of Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage

Book Review: "She was being crushed. Not all at once, but slowly . . ."
Summary: 5 Stars

One of the strengths of the book is the elegant, slowly building power of Alfred Lansing's prose. He hits the perfect pitch, not sensational and yet not a dry retelling of facts. His writing is very clean, cuts right to the quick, and is full of perfect details. The book is also full of journal entries from several of the men, and most of these are masterpieces of understatement and courage. I won't even begin to describe the elements and details of the hardships these men faced. I simply don't know how they kept going, kept trying, in the face of such awesome, soul-crushing circumstances.

This book, to say the least, is a testament to the survival instinct in men - the surprising deep need the human animal has to simply stay alive, no matter what. And, of course, the book is a testament to the men of the Endurance. The author puts it best in the book's dedication: "In appreciation for whatever it is that makes men accomplish the impossible."

Summary of Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage

Through the diaries of team members and interviews with survivors, Lansing reconstructs the months of terror and hardship the Endurance crew suffered. In October of 1915, there "were no helicopters, no Weasels, no Sno-Cats, no suitable planes. Thus their plight was naked and terrifying in its simplicity. If they were to get out--they had to get themselves out." How Shackleton did indeed get them out without the loss of a single life is at the heart of Lansing's magnificent true-life adventure tale.

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