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    1. InternationalEbb9146 on

      Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer

      Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson – this one isn’t strictly a survival story but it is tense in the same way and deals with an incredibly unlikely and dangerous underwater exploration of a German U-boat discovered off the coast of New Jersey. I really loved it.

    2. The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard. He was a member of Scott’s South Pole Expedition. He chronicles his journey and an insane side trip to gather emperor penguin eggs in the dead of Antarctic winter.

    3. freerangelibrarian on

      The Third Man Factor: Surviving the Impossible by John Geiger.

      When I Fell from the Sky by Julianne Koepcke.

    4. Blecher_onthe_Hudson on

      Lost at sea stories are a genre unto themselves. Off the top of my head:

      – The Raft
      – Survive the Savage Sea
      – Adrift
      – A Marriage at Sea

    5. The Indifferent Stars Above by Daniel James Brown. It’s about the Donner Party. I cannot recommend this book enough!

    6. LoneWolfette on

      Endurance by Alfred Lansing

      Into the Heart of the Sea by Nathaniel Philbrick

      Touching the Void by Joe Simpson

      Between Rock and a Hard Place by Aron Ralston

    7. CalicoSparrow on

      I second Touching the Void if you do in fact want the survival part.

      Into Thin Air which others are recommending is good but there’s a lot of death in it.

    8. MikeyMortadella on

      We Die Alone: a WWII Epic of Escape & Endurance by David Howarth.

      The story is about a Norwegian resistance fighter named Jan Baalsrud, who is sent in with a group after training in the UK to Nazi occupied northern Norway where they get ambushed. Jan is the sole survivor, and he escapes into the arctic winter and treks across the mountains into Sweden, fighting through avalanches, frostbite, etc to survive.

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