Alive

Paul Piers Read is the author of numerous, critically acclaimed works of fiction and nonfiction, including A Patriot in Berlin (1996), Ablaze: The Story of the Heroes and Victims of Chernobyl (1993), On the Third Day (1989), and A Season in the West (1989). Mr. Read lives in London.

"A classic in the literature of survival." -Newsweek

On October 12, 1972, a Uruguayan Air Force plane carrying a team of rugby players crashed in the remote, snow-peaked Andes Mountains. Ten weeks later, only 16 of the 45 passengers were found alive. This is the story of those ten weeks spent in the shelter of the plane's fuselage without food and scarcely any hope of a rescue. They survived by protecting and helping one another, and coming to the difficult conclusion that to live meant doing the unimaginable. Confronting nature at its most furious, two brave young men risked their lives to hike through the mountains looking for help-and ultimately found it.