Navigating life from the peak of Everest to the valley of trauma

In the Shadow of the Mountain - A Memoir of Courage

Silvia Vasquez-Lavado

The 25 years since Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air have seen whole shelves of books from the high altitude 'death zone' where there is little oxygen and a lot of peril. Sadly, there is a deep sameness to many Mount Everest stories: Wealthy white men take centre stage, Tibetan and Nepali Sherpas labour in the background to keep everyone alive, and women are often reduced to crackling voices on the base camp radio.

In the Shadow of the Mountain turns all that on its ear.

When we first meet Silvia Vasquez-Lavado, she is 90 per cent of the way up Everest, aka Chomolungma (literally "goddess mother of the world"). Frozen and terrified, she tries to concentrate on ropes and ladders, with thoughts of her recently deceased mum vying for her attention. A monster storm slams into her climbing party. 

"Maybe Everest really is my glorified death wish. Maybe what I've been chasing is a way to go out on top. Literally. Why did I expect Chomolungma to save me? After all, she was not the first mother to let me down."

Vasquez-Lavado flashes back to her Peruvian childhood, and oddly, considering the high drama in the Himalaya, that's when the story becomes difficult to stop reading.

Born and raised in Lima in the 1980s, she grew up in terror that Shining Path guerillas would attack. In terror that her horrible dad would throw yet another violent tantrum. In terror that their family's trusted servant would sexually abuse the young Vasquez-Lavado, as he did repeatedly for five years. In terror that she was doomed in the afterlife because she was a sinful participant in this abuse.

Vasquez-Lavado details the child's perspective and the roots of her trauma with