I love that book. There's a handful of other memoirs of that same disastrous event that I read, which is pretty interesting in a Rashomon way (by Anatoli Boukreev, Lene Gamelgaard, one of the Brashears expedition members, and Beck) but Krakauer's is by far the best-written and gives you the best sense of what it was like.

I think I understand what drives people to climb Everest, but I wouldn't want to do it myself because it sounds so profoundly unfun. You're nauseated and can't sleep and once you get to the top, you don't even enjoy it.