In May 1996 a number of expeditions attempted to climb Mount Everest on the Southeast Ridge route. Each group contained world class climbers and relative novices, some of whom had paid tens of thousands of pounds for the climb. As they neared the summit twenty-three men and women, including the expedition leaders, were caught in a ferocious blizzard. Disorientated, out of oxygen and depleted of supplied, the climbers struggled to find their way to safety.

Experienced high-altitude guide Anatoli Boukreev led an exhausted and terrified group of climbers back to safety before going back out into the blizzard to help others stranded on the mountain. Rescuing a number of people from certain death, he emerged a hero.

The Climb by Anatoli Boukreev is an honest and gripping account of true endurance and contains interviews with most of the surviving climbers, medical personnel, Sherpa guides, and families of the dead who experienced the tragedy.