TOUCHING MY FATHER'S SOUL A Sherpa's Journey to the Top of Everest

When Jamling Tenzing Norgay was invited to accompany the Everest IMAX Expedition of 1996, it was mostly for the prestige of his name. As the son of the legendary Sherpa guide, Tenzing Norgay, who with Sir Edmund Hillary in 1953 was the first to reach the summit of Mt. Everest, his presence would be valuable. Though not an experienced Sherpa mountaineer, Jamling wanted to go, and from the first it became for him a kind of spiritual quest. Oddly, it is the voice of Grover Gardner that renders this spiritual dimension believable. Like the wind blowing across the prayer flags atop Everest, Gardner's voice has a persistent energy and rhythm. It is reasoned and thoughtful, but intimately engaged with Jamling at every step. As Jamling approaches the summit, his rediscovery of his father's presence in his life is both moving and exciting. Gardner's subtle emotional control of the text directs the reader, and Jamling's account becomes less a journey up Everest than a young Sherpa's spiritual return to his faith and his father's people. P.E.F. (c) AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC/JAN 02]