FACING UP
By Bear Grylls
Hardback Macmillan (2000)
Paperback Pan Books (2001)
287 pages. £6.99
ISBN 0 330 48437 0
Facing Up by Bear Grylls is the story of a remarkable journey to the summit of Everest. The writer was a member of the British 1998 Everest Expedition and when he reached the top at the age of 23, he was the youngest Briton to have achieved that goal.
Nowhere in the book are we told what Bear's Christian or first name is - 'Bear' was, he tells us, a nickname given to him in childhood by his sister, Lara. Neither do we read much about his father, except at the beginning, when he, a former Royal Marine, appears as the source of Bear's love of climbing.
