Alive by Piers Paul Read
Have you ever experienced a plane crash? No? Then dude, you have to read this book! No I’m serious; you really have to read it.
It is about a plane crash in the Andes and the survivors are faced with some tough choices. It’s a survival story of great courage and perseverance. The characters show great heroism while trying to find a way out of the treacherous Andes. They delight themselves on small pleasures, such as a cigarette. The characters have many disagreements but their amazing will to survive bands them together. When a lack of food becomes a reality, they have to eat the flesh of their dead companions. YUCK!!!! Many Leaders emerge throughout the story and you do have favourites. When a lifesaving treasure is found (the tail of the plane) it gives them new hope to get out of their ice prison. Leaders are chosen, and they are given more flesh to eat to give them energy. One thing that alarms me in the book is that one of them eats the genitals DOUBLE YUCK!!!!! All their hopes rest on the survival of their hikers. This is an amazing story that will have you captivated, so look forward to some quiet time and get reading!!
Review by Alexander
August 1st, 2008 at 10:42 am
There’s a documentary about the events described in ‘Alive’ on TV this Sunday night – SBS 9.30. ‘35 years on, the surviving members of the Uruguayan rugby team return to the Andes and the site of the plane crash that claimed the lives of 29 of their fellow passengers’.
Green Guide, The Age, 3/8/08.