Last climb

A MAN, A MOUNTAIN, AND A MYSTERY George Leigh Mallory is not the only man to have died tragically on the forbidding heights of Mount Everest, but he is surely the most famous. When he and Andrew Irvine disappeared into the mists not far from the summit in June 1924, they climbed into a mountaineering legend. For more than 70 years, the fraternity of high-altitude adventurers could only speculate on their fate - until 1999 when Mallory's body was found at last, 2,000 feet below the summit. In LAST CLIMB, world-class mountaineer David Breashears and mountaineering historian Audrey Salkeld sift new evidence looking for an answer to the enduring question: Did Mallory and Irvine reach the summit? LAST CLIMB is more than a chronicle of a single attempt on Everest. It is a compelling account of the early Mallory expeditions into the unknown lands of the high Himalaya and an evocative portrait of an era when gentleman adventurers wore tweeds at 25,000 feet.