Learning To Breathe

Joint Winner of the Boardman Tasker Prize 2005 and Winner of the Adventure Travel Award - Banff Festival 2005 
The extraordinary autobiography of a brilliant young climber who began life as one of the last generation of British miners.

A tale of split lives fused into one extraordinary story of adventure, laughter, tears and joy

A brilliant book, well-written, gripping, honest and very moving

Andy Cave's compelling autobiography is, like Joe Simpson's Touching the Void, a gripping book on mountaineering that will appeal even to those who didn't know they were interested in climbing ... Fascinating

Enthralling ... Cave's elegant writing draws on the congruence between mining and climbing, the black humour, the danger, the camaraderie ... Excellent

The story of Andy Cave's transition from Yorkshire coal miner into one of Britain's best climbers echoes the heroic tones of Don Whillans or Joe Brown ... Thoughtful and often gripping ... Cave explains what it actually feels like to climb the kind of exceptionally dangerous routes that the rest of us, climbers or not, find unimaginable. There are few other climbers with the writing skills to be able to pull this off. There are fewer still who have led such an interesting and varied life as Cave

Andy Cave was born into a mining family and is now a cutting-edge alpinist with several formidable first ascents to his credit. He has a PhD in socio-linguistics and is an IFMGA international mountain and ski guide.

At the age of sixteen, Andy Cave followed in his father's and grandfather's footsteps and became a miner - one of the last recruits into a dying world. Every day he would descend 3,000 feet into Grimethorpe pit. 
But at weekends Andy escaped from the pithead to a very different world - testing his nerve on the cliffs and mountains around Britain, and forging endearing friendships with his new companions. 
Enduring the 1984-5 miners' strike - the guilt, the broken friendships, the poverty - Andy continued to indulge his passion. In 1986, after much soul searching, he quit his job as a miner in order to devote himself to mountaineering. At the same time he decided to educate himself, acquiring almost from a standing start academic qualifications including a PhD in socio-linguistics. This extraordinary twin odyssey is graphically recalled in this remarkable book. 
In the Himalaya in 1997 Andy achieved a courageous first ascent on one of the steepest and most difficult summits in the world - the North Face of Changabang. Seventeen days later, he and only two of his team-mates crawled into base camp, frostbitten, emaciated and traumatised. His account of this terrifying experience provides a dramatic climax to this compelling story.

Andy Cave

An intriguing mix of travelogue, mountaineering history, geography and an affectionate portrait of the climbing fraternity

A skilful blend of dialogue and descriptive prose threading a narrative that captures the highs and lows of a mountaineer's existence and the environments he travels through... Plenty of action... Gripping

In Thin White Line, Andy Cave picks up the story after his epic on the north face of Changabang in which his partner was lost in an avalanche. He could have been forgiven for giving up climbing after the harrowing experience but he returns with a vengeance, climbing hard routes from Alaska to Patagonia

Andy Cave's compelling autobiography is, like Joe Simpson's Touching the Void, a gripping book on mountaineering that will appeal even to those who didn't know they were interested in climbing

In 1997, Andy Cave returned from the Himalayas, having climbed the stupendous north face of Changabang but losing his friend and climbing partner in the process. Traumatized by the savage ordeal, he must examine his relationship with the mountains that have defined his life so far. Will he have the courage to undertake such a challenge again? Does he want to? Thin White Line charts his struggle towards finding an answer. It is as much a journey into the mind of an extreme mountaineer as it is into the wild landscapes through which he travels. 
 
In a nail biting narrative set in Patagonia, Norway and Alaska, Cave tackles the severest challenges modern Alpinism can pose. Juxtaposed with the stark beauty of the environment are the colourful characters populating his stories, from the adventurers around him, past and present, to the pioneer aviators who get him and his kind to those impossibly remote places. He vividly recreates the joy and despair of climbing, building the book to a desperate finale that lays bare the fragility of our carefully constructed convictions.

Andy Cave

Praise for Thin White Line

An intriguing mix of travelogue, mountaineering history, geography and an affectionate portrait of the climbing fraternity

A skilful blend of dialogue and descriptive prose threading a narrative that captures the highs and lows of a mountaineer's existence and the environments he travels through... Plenty of action... Gripping

In Thin White Line, Andy Cave picks up the story after his epic on the north face of Changabang in which his partner was lost in an avalanche. He could have been forgiven for giving up climbing after the harr ...

An intriguing mix of travelogue, mountaineering history, geography and an affectionate portrait of the climbing fraternity

A skilful blend of dialogue and descriptive prose threading a narrative that captures the highs and lows of a mountaineer's existence and the environments he travels through... Plenty of action... Gripping

In Thin White Line, Andy Cave picks up the story after his epic on the north face of Changabang in which his partner was lost in an avalanche. He could have been forgiven for giving up climbing after the harr ...

An intriguing mix of travelogue, mountaineering history, geography and an affectionate portrait of the climbing fraternity

A skilful blend of dialogue and descriptive prose threading a narrative that captures the highs and lows of a mountaineer's existence and the environments he travels through... Plenty of action... Gripping

In Thin White Line, Andy Cave picks up the story after his epic on the north face of Changabang in which his partner was lost in an avalanche. He could have been forgiven for giving up climbing after the harr ...

Books by Andy Cave

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