For untold ages, the awesome power of the world's greatest mountains has lifted our spirits, inspired our imaginations, and fed our sense of adventure. Indeed, such legendary peaks as Mont Blanc, Kilimanjaro, and Annapurna represent the ultimate challenge to the human spirit. Now, in its continuing quest to bring the world's wonders to lovers of knowledge and exploration, Discovery Books presents Distant Mountains, a celebration of magnificent summits and the adventurers who overcame adversity and danger to conquer them. Distant Mountains showcases over 150 full-color photographs by mountaineering's most respected photographer. An experienced climber, John Cleare has spent his life scaling famous ranges, including the Western Alps, the Canadian Rockies, the Scottish Highlands, the Indian and Nepalese Himalayas, and Chilean Patagonia, to bring back extraordinary, diverse images of vast mountainscapes, treacherous glaciers, crystalline icefalls, and snow-clad summits. Accompanying these arresting images are dramatic essays from ten world-renowned mountaineers who have braved their own mountain odysseys. These evocative accounts--marked by awe and exhilaration, achievement and disappointment, fear and relief--will transport the reader to exotic and far-reaching locales, including the sublime, low-altitude peaks of Scotland's Western Isles, the intriguing monoliths of Arizona, the ice-fluted walls of the Peruvian Andes, and the savage spires of the Karakorum of Pakistan. In addition, Cleare provides his own narrative on Chilean Patagonia. With its visual grandeur, enthralling storytelling, and informative "fact-file" sections that follow each chapter, Distant Mountains is an important addition to the genre of mountain literature and a must-have book for both the active and armchair enthusiast.

<b>John Cleare</b> is a professional photographer who has been climbing for over forty years. His expeditions and assignments have taken him to sites on six continents, including the mountains of Nepal, India, Pakistan, and China. He was a member of the 1971 International Everest Expedition and in 1982 led the successful American ski ascent of Muztagh Ata in China. Cleare's television and film credits include The Climbers, which won the 1971 Trento Prize, and Clint Eastwood's The Eiger Sanction. The author of fifteen previously published books, Cleare lives in Wiltshire, England.<br><br><b>Discovery Books</b> is part of Discovery Communications, Inc., which brings understanding to new levels through the highest-quality nonfiction television programming, publishing, and film production. Discovery Networks, a division of Discovery Communications, Inc., operates and manages Discovery Channel, TLC (The Learning Channel), Animal Planet, and Travel Channel. <br><br><br><b>About the Essayists</b><br><br><b>Mike Banks, MBE</b> (b. 1922), has been on many climbs on every continent and in the Arctic. His books include Commando Climber (1955), High Arctic (1957), and Greenland (1975). He lives in Bath, England.<br><br><b>Sir Martin Conway</b> (1856-1937) was the first to complete a traverse of the Alps, in 1894. An art <br>critic, writer, and explorer, he made pioneering climbs in the Himalayas, in the Andes, and in Tierra del Fuego. In 1881 he produced the first modern-style climbing guide, the Zermatt Pocket Book.<br><br><b>Nicholas Crane</b> (b. 1954), the author of several travel books, won the Royal Scottish Geographical Society's Mungo Park medal in 1993. He lives in London, England.<br><br><b>Kurt Diemberge</b>r (b. 1932) is one of the most experienced climbers of the post-1945 period, best known for his Himalayan and Karakorum exploits (including Everest and K2).  His autobiography, Summits and Secrets (1971), has been hailed as a modern classic. He lives in Bologna, Italy.<br><br><b>David Harris</b> (b. 1948), a climber for twenty-five years, is currently a coeditor of Ascent. He divides his time between Vancouver and Seattle.<br><br><b>W. H. Murray, OBE</b> (1913-1996), inspired a whole generation of climbers with his evocative descriptions in his classic Mountaineering in Scotland (1947).<br><br><b>Jim Perrin</b> (b. 1947), a noted broadcaster, was the first winner of the Boardman Taskter prize for mountain writing in 1985. He lives in Bangor, Wales.<br><br><b>Kev Reynolds</b> (b. 1943) has been on nine Himalayan trekking expeditions and twenty-four treks in the Pyrenees. He has written more than<br>thirty books. He lives in Kent, England.<br><br><b>Steve Roper</b> (b. 1941) is well known as a frequent climber in Yosemite and explorer of lesser-known regions of the American Southwest. He became one of the editors of the journal of Ascent in 1967, and his book Camp 4: Recollections of a Yosemite Climber won first prize for nonfiction at the 1994 Banff Festival of Books. He lives in Oakland, California.<br><br><b>H. W. Tilman</b> (1898-1977) was famous as an explorer, mountaineer, sailor, and writer. He led the 1938 Everest attempt and in 1956 was the first to traverse the Patagonian southern ice cap. He has been hailed as the greatest explorer of the twentieth century.