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Miracle In The Andes: 72 Days on the Mountain and My Long Trek Home | 
 enlarge | Author: Nando Parrado
Creator: Josh Davis
Publisher: Orion
Category: Book
List Price: £14.67
Buy New: £2.72
You Save: £11.95 (81%)
New (3) Used (1) from £2.72
Rating:  14 reviews
Sales Rank: 331124
Format: Audiobook, Cd
Media: Audio CD
Number Of Items: 5
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 5.4 x 5 x 0.9
ISBN: 0752875124
EAN: 9780752875125
ASIN: 0752875124
Publication Date: May 17, 2006
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews: Read 9 more reviews...
 RIVETING... November 29, 2008
Lawyeraau (Balmoral Castle)
Having read Piers Paul Read's book, "Alive", a riveting account of the 1972 plane crash in the Andes mountains in which sixteen of the forty-five aboard survived a harrowing ordeal on the mountain for nearly two and a half months, I was sufficiently intrigued to read a first person account by one of the pivotal survivors of that ordeal. I was not disappointed.
Nando Parrado, reflecting back over a span of thirty plus years, shares his experiences with the reader. At twenty-three, as a young Uruguayan high on life and flying to an exhibition rugby game in Chile, he was master of his universe, when the unthinkable happened. The plane carrying his family, friends, and teammates, suddenly crashed onto a glacier deep in the Andes Mountains. The crash killed many of those he had known and loved, including his beloved mother and sister. Life as he knew it was over, and from its ashes a new Nando Parrado was born.
Before the crash, Nando had lived a comfortable, privileged life and was more of a follower than a leader. Yet, as their situation on the mountain became more desperate and death seemed a certainty for all of them were extraordinary measures not taken, Nando rose to the challenge, emerging as a leader in the unlikeliest of circumstances. In a desperate bid to save his life and that of the other survivors, an emaciated and ill-clad Nando, together with his friend, Roberto Canessa, climbed an unknown peak in the Andes, and trekked over forty-five miles across frozen terrain to seek help for the remaining survivors. How he and Roberto did this is the stuff from which legends are made. It is simply an extraordinary and riveting story.
In his reflections and reminiscences, Nando explains the impact this singular event had on his life and how it shaped him into the man he became. It is a story well-told and one worth reading. Those who love memoirs and true life adventure stories will find themselves riveted to the pages of this book. It is little wonder that this book has become a New York Times bestseller.
 What would or could you do? June 17, 2008
Ms Alex (Leeds, UK)
It's every flier's worst nightmare. Surviving a plane crash but with little hope of survival.
This book is not easy reading because it doesn't draw simple conclusions. Written 30 odd years after the events some of the conversations Parrado describes are hard to believe as he glosses over conflict and doesn't want to besmirch anyone. It's understandable but Parrado feels an overwhelming need to present everyone in the same understanding accepting way which gives the book a distancing effect that can be at times frustrating. That minor niggle aside Parrado manages to tell the story honestly and with minimal shock tactics despite the massive press attention the story of the survivors' cannibalism has continued to generate throughout the years. He tells the story of everyone, especially those who didn't make it. It's a great legacy to the pragmatism of the group's decisions and the love they bore for those they walked out of the Andes to return to. The hardest thing to read about was the moment when they heard through a weak and intermittent radio signal that the search for them was being called off on Day 8 after the crash. It led to some very hard choices:
'I understood the magnitude of the taboo we had just broken, but if I felt any strong emotion at all, it was a sense of resentment that fate had forced us to choose between this horror and the horror of certain death. [...] There were no illusions now. We all knew our fight for survival would be uglier and more harrowing than we had imagined...'
Nando Parrado discussing the reality of resorting to cannabalism after 10 days of living in the wreck of half a plane at high altitude in light summer clothes surviving on a handful of chocolate squares.
Amazing story fantastically well told February 13, 2008
Chris (Ireland)
This book was an absolute page turner. Even though I had read the book Alive, and knew how the story went, I just couldn't put the book down. Nando Parrado tells the story from a totally different perspective. He also manages to captivate the reader's imagination in such a way, that puts you right in on the scene.
It is a tale of what humans are able to withstand and achieve given the right state of mind and beliefs, whether religious or other, and how important family and friends are in all sorts of situations in life. Parrado manages to tell the story with both sadness and humour, which makes it a very humbling, yet totally enjoyable experience.
Passionate, demonstrative, emotional January 31, 2008
happyreviewer (UK)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Nando Parrado reminds me very much of two other South American authors: Paulo Coelho and Eduardo Galeano. That's not necessarily a compliment either. In fact it isn't a compliment at all. At times I felt this to be too mawkish and sentimental. In fact throughout the book it is mawkish and sentimental. There's too much love. Everybody is so wonderful. The author is so deficient and unworthy (in his own words). I'm probably sounding like a barrel of laughs here but why should I lie? I think perhaps this is a cultural thing. I don't want to start stereotyping anybody but that's exactly where I'm going with this: perhaps people with a fiery Latin temperament will enjoy this more than those saddled with Anglo-Saxon reserve? Perhaps? Who knows. Apart from the beginning and end, where Parrado introduces and sees off his fellow victims respectively in tedious detail (like what kind of a rugby player they were and how many children they've got and what their names are) the middle bit, which deals with the ordeal itself, is excellent. Anyway I'm giving this four stars because Parrado is a brave guy and this is a fascinating story.
TOTALLY ENGROSSING November 30, 2007
Chelli (Yorkshire)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Amazing true story of the Uruguayan rugby team's long fight for survival following a plane crash in the high Andes.Even more detailed and captivating than the book ALIVE.
Nando writes with such detail and emotion that you feel like you're there with him enduring the bitter cold and starvation and debating what the best plan of action is to survive.
Totally engrossing and hard to put down.
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