Solo Faces: A Novel

by James Salter

Solo Faces exposes the obsession that draws climbers away from civilization to test themselves against the most intimidating and inaccessible mountains in the world.



James Salter's novel captures the adventure of Gary, a roofer of churches, who feels restrained by conventions and flat ground. Unable to find happiness in his life, he travels to southern France to climb to the summits of the Alps. He finds peace and happiness within himself soon after. But when fellow climbers are trapped on the mountain, he makes a daring one-man rescue during a storm that brings him the notice he has always shunned. But the glory quickly dissipates and he returns to the anonymity he prefers, having thoroughly satisfied himself.

Genres: Fiction, Adventure, Sports, Novels, Mountaineering, Climbing, Literary Fiction

223 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1979

About the author

James Salter (1925 - 2015) was a novelist, short story writer, and screenwriter. Salter grew up in New York City and was a career officer and Air Force pilot until his mid-thirties, when the success of his first novel (The Hunters, 1957) led to a fulltime writing career. Salter’s potent, lyrical prose earned him acclaim from critics, readers, and fellow novelists. His novel A Sport and a Pastime (1967) was hailed by the New York Times as “nearly perfect as any American fiction.”

Reviews

[Will Byrnes · Rating 3 out of 5]

James Salter - from NPR

Rand and Cabot live for the thrill of climbing. Cabot is a natural leader, driven beyond reason. Rand is a tier down, but has enough core belief in himself to take on the most dangerous challenges. This is a very interesting book about these characters, what drives them, how it affects the rest of their lives, what society thinks of such people and, ultimately, what it all means. Rand changes over the course of the book, comes to some realizations while causing damage, and learns that he has to face up to what is truly valuable and what he wants from life. I did not like these characters, but I liked the book. I was also impressed with the almost lyrical language and imagery that emerged here and there. It reminded me a little of Thomas Hardy, but on a more minute, less landscaped scale. Good stuff. Recommended.

Solo Faces was a novelization of a script commissioned and rejected by Robert Redford.

James Salter, one of the brighter lights on America’s 20th century literary scene, passed away in 2015. He was 90 years old.

Other Salter books I have read (far too few)
-----Light Years
-----The Hunters

[Helga Martiros · Rating 4 out of 5]

You could not tell from looking at him that he had been lonely, that he had stood at society’s edge envying its light and warmth, wanting to be part of it, determined not to be; none of this was in his face.

The story centers around the ambitious Vernon Rand, an American climber who is constantly on the move in search of solitude, trying to escape the mundane; struggling to break away from life itself.

“You love the mountains …,” they said.
“Not the mountains,” he replied. “No, not the mountains. I love life.”

This is not an adventure tale nor is it a novel about climbing. This is an existential story; a philosophical meditation on life, death, desire and obsession and a hunt for the meaning of existence.
As in his ‘A Sport and a Pastime’, Salter’s prose is economical, spare, detached and melancholic.
At times you are confused. You hate it while you’re reading it. But in the end, you’re glad you read it.
Michael (Lund), thanks for your recommendation!

An excerpt:

It was morning, the light still new. Unknown sentinels stood distant, pale. He could have them, he had only to go forth. He was like the sun, touching remote peaks, they awoke to his presence. The thought of it made him reckless. He felt an immense strength. He saw an immortal image of himself high among the ridges—he was willing to die to achieve it.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

The second novel I've read this year about a mountaineer - odd because the subject has little interest to me! Like his counterpart in the other novel I read the central character of Solo Faces is rubbish with women. He's a serial philanderer. At the beginning he abandons his wife and child to go to France, seduced by the prospect of climbing various rock faces in the Mont Blanc region. He settles down in Chamonix which he does a fabulous job of evoking (I've been there a few times.)

The thing about James Salter is I adore his writing style but am far from keen about his chosen subject matter. He's a very manly writer, sort of Hemingway's heir apparent. Like Hemingway he's brilliant at saying so much with so few words. I have to admit it's fascinating reading about the kind of men who view women as playthings but ultimately as burdens that hamper their quest for some elusive notion of freedom. Often this seems to involve going to a different country. Salter's hero in Light Years goes to Rome; here he tries Paris.

I never liked the protagonist of this novel. But I loved the way Salter wrote about him. And I've just bought another two of his books.

[Daren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mountaineering fiction by the well known author James Salter - the first of his books I have read. I wasn't exactly taken by this story, so I am not yet convinced he writes in a style suited to me - although he is often compared to Hemingway. It may be the subject matter of this one - I have mentioned before I find mountaineering fiction less appealing than the screeds of mountaineering non-fiction available.

This short book tells the story of Vernon Rand, a Californian who moves to the French Alps (Chamonix) for the climbing. It is set in the 1970's, when life was seemingly far simpler than the modern day. Americans can bum around in France working low paid jobs and still get by with enough money to buy the climbing equipment they need!

Solo Faces refers to the mountaineering lifestyle where all other facets take second place - family, relationships, careers - at times even safety and making good decisions. Rand leaves behind a wife in California, gets an English girl he is seeing in Chamonix pregnant and withdraws himself from their relationship such that she moves back to Paris to a former lover. He competes and teams up with other climbers, equally seeking and shunning fame, unsure what he wants from life other than climbing.

Rand makes some dangerous climbs, including a climb to rescue some trapped climbers, gains some temporary notoriety, but fades back into relative obscurity.

3 stars

[Chrissie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Few authors are classified as writers of modern classics in their own lifetime. It is in these terms James Salter (1925 – 2015) was spoken of. I am a fan, on the basis of his prose. Its strength lies in its brevity, power and clarity. His prose style, the protagonists’ attitude toward women and the exhilaration common to his books makes Salter’s writing similar to Hemingway’s. One can compare Hemingway’s love of bullfighting to Salter’s love of mountaineering and his experiences as a fighter pilot.

In this book, and in Salter’s other novels, the focus is upon men rather than women. We observe how men related to each other and how they look upon women. We observe from the masculine point of view. Here Salter tells of men who are mountain climbers. Keep in mind he was a climber himself. This shows.

The central protagonist, Vernon Rand, is twenty-six, with a failed past in the army. The setting is in the 70s and we begin in Los Angeles, but soon Rand is off to the French Alps--Chamonix, Mont Blanc and the Aiguille du Dru, one particular mountain in the Mont Blanc massif. Later he attempts an ascent of Mount Walker. Initially he climbs with a partner, and it is with him a relationship evolves. Rand saves his life and he comes to save others. With this follows fame and acclaim from other mountaineers. He is drawn in two directions. He is a loner, a man ruled by forces from within, but at the same time he acknowledges that "he had stood at society's edge envying its light and warmth, wanting to be part of it, (and yet) determined not to be." This ambivalence makes him feel very real. It is not possible to view him as a cut-out, a two-dimensional figure.

Few today draw men who so blatantly disregard the wishes of their lovers. Does this make the book dated? Or is it that these women, his lovers, loved the man despite that he treats them with nonchalance. Their attraction cannot be denied. It is interesting to observe the choices the women make. Whom do they choose, him or another? And why? What are the consequences for them and for Rand? In any case, we rub shoulders with people as they really are. Warts are in full view.

Salter magnificently captures what draws these men to mountaineering—its inherent exhilaration as well as its hazards. The sense of freedom and excitement. The competition. All of this is vividly mirrored in the tale. Simultaneously, he captures nature in its ruggedness and in its most elemental. Its beauty and its dangers. One does not need to be a mountaineer to enjoy the book, but an appreciation of hiking and wild life is a plus.

The interaction between any two individuals can be viewed on a scale with instinct and inner will on one side and social restraints on the other. To what extent are we pulled in one direction or the other? In this book the central protagonist, the climber, feels most comfortable when he is out on a mountain alone, up in the air with the wind in his face; it is then he is “in his element”. All the interactions in this book, both those between men and between one man and one woman teeter on just such a scale. How you come to view the book most probably will be determined by your own position on such a scale. Are you drawn toward individualism? To what extent do you rely on yourself and only yourself when a problem needs to be solved?

Will and inner strength, which can at times lead to disregard for others, are the central elements of this book. They are also two means by which we battle the forces of nature, thus making the book about this too.

The GR book description is incorrect when it states that the book follows the adventure of Gary, a roofer of churches! The book is not about him.

If you are looking for a book on mountaineering, don’t choose Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster by Jon Krakauer; choose this instead.

The audiobook I listened to was narrated by Stephen Hoye. The narration I have given two stars. He pulls out each sentence too long, in an effort to give it ponderous strength. This is not necessary. The author’s words speak for themselves; they have their own inner strength. I dislike the exaggeration. The effect was dreary. I did understand all that was said, so I am willing to say the performance was OK.

****************

The Hunters 4 stars
A Sport and a Pastime 4 stars
Light Years 4 stars
Solo Faces 4 stars
All That Is 3 stars
Burning the Days: Recollection 3 stars
Cassada to-be-read

[Algernon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Through crowded terminals, cities, rain, he had carried certain hopes and expectations, vague but thrilling. He was dozing on them like baggage, numbed by the journey, and then, at a certain moment, the clouds had parted to reveal in brilliant light the symbol of it all. His heart was beating in a strange, insistent way, as if he were fleeing, as if he had committed a crime.



[view of Mont Blanc across Lake Geneva, from Vaud]

Mont Blanc, Chamonix Valley, les Alpes - imposing vertical aiguilles of granite exposed to wind, ice, avalanches. To certain men this vista, this challenge, calls insistently, like a siren song luring sailors into dangerous straits. Vernon Rand is one such person, an American itinerant worker with a passion for climbing that excludes everything else from his life: a steady job, a meaningful relationship with a woman, friendship, a future. Everything in life comes second to his thirst to prove himself against gravity.
Rand packs his scant belongings, cashes his meagre savings and flies to Europe without any clear plans for the future, other than to seek the most difficult mountains and climb them in ways no one has ever tried before. In Chamonix he finds kindred spirits, and convinces one of them to make an attempt on Aiguille du Dru, one of the most imposing peaks in this climbers paradise.

It cleared at last. They walked to the station. Their packs were huge, they weighed at least fifty pounds. Ropes slung over their shoulders, when they moved there was a muted clanking like the sound of armor.
His chest felt empty, his hands weightless. He felt a lack of density, the strength to cling to existence, to remain on earth, as if he were already a kind of husk that could blow away.

>>><<<>>><<<

I never climbed a vertical wall of stone, but I prefer holidays trekking up in the mountains to lazy days at the beach, even if I need to carry everything on my back. But my fascination with the mountains made me read almost every book written by a climber that fell into my hands, watch every documentary about famous ascents. That would make me already biased to rate this novel highly [that and the fact that I visited myself these places as a tourist in Annecy, Argentiere, Aiguille du Midi, Zermatt, Interlaken, etc.] Even so, I was bowled over by the way James Salter transforms this story into an existential quest to give meaning to one of the most dangerous acts a man may engage in out of his or her own free will. His artistic sensibility and his evocative, sensual phrasing I was already familiar with, from a previous novel, I just didn’t think it could be applied so well to an extreme sport subject.

The granite was dark and icy cold. Rand put his hand on it. It seemed he was touching not a face but something on the order of a planet, too vast to be imagined and at the same time, somehow, aware of his presence.

Most of those climbing memoirs and documentaries I’ve watched are decently written and gripping in their dry, self-effacing descriptions of extreme danger and of amazing feats of endurance required by the most difficult routes. Salter does a good job describing the actual technical details of the climbs done by Vernon Rand, most of them alone or as the lead climber. What makes this book special is the shift of focus towards the psychology, the motivation and the mental damage inflicted on the man who chooses this way of life, and on the people who try to get close to these solitary souls.

The rock is like the surface of the sea, constant yet never the same. Two climbers going over the identical route will each manage in a different way. Their reach is not the same, their confidence, their desire. Sometimes the way narrows, the holds are few, there are no choices – the mountain is inflexible in its demands – but usually one is free to climb as one will. There are principles, of course. The first concerns the rope – it is for safety but one should always climb as if the rope were not there.

Rand settles down in Chamonix, most of the time penniless or sponging on impressionable women, attracted by his athletic outlook or by his brooding demeanour. His early success on the Dru made Rand known to the other climbers converging on the valley, but in 1962 there was little exposure outside their own circle, no sponsorships and no interviews with famous newscasts. When not climbing, he absorbs the culture of this adopted country and, like other characters of James Salter, he falls in love with the place, in particular with the French women.

He began to see France, not just a mountain village filled with tourists, but the deep, invincible center which, if entered at all, becomes part of the blood.

Rand may be sincere in his devotion to physical love and in his need for comfort, but he keeps his heart closely guarded nevertheless, knowing that no woman can compete with his ambition, with his need to prove himself constantly against greater and greater challenges. Not even after he becomes internationally famous, following a dramatic rescue on the same Aiguille du Dru [ a real event from 1966, just like the first direct ascent from 1962.]



[looking towards Matterhorn from Aiguille du Midi]

Friends try to warn Rand , his girlfriend needs him to acknowledge the child he had given her, yet Rand is impervious in his single-minded focus on climbing.

“I saw him not long ago, I hadn’t seen him for almost a year. He had left his wife, he wasn’t working, and still he felt if he climbed one more mountain, the most difficult, everything would somehow fall into place. It was like a drug. He constantly had to have more, and the doses had to be bigger.”
[...] He was an idealist. He had great inner strength, more than anyone I’ve ever known. But something changed in him. I could see it in his face.He had done everything and he was still unhappy. Two weeks ago ... on an easy climb, he fell to his death.”

This cautionary tale about another climber falls on deaf ears, Rand looks only towards the next unclimbed route on one of the major North faces in the Alps. His alienation, his addiction to fame, his despair at being unable to fit into an ordinary existence after sitting on top of the world is emblematic of the mind-frame of the modern incarnations of Icarus. ( They don’t expect me to do anything ordinary any more, that’s the trouble. )

A human face is always changing but there is a moment when it seems perfect, complete. It has earned its appearance. It is unalterable. So it was with him, that day, as he gazed up. He was thirty – thirty-one if the truth be known – his courage was unbroken. Above him lay the Walker. *



[Grand Jorasses, Pointe Walker is the left peak of the central massif in the picture, taken from Aiguille du Midi]

* one of the peaks atop the north face of the Grand Jorasses

Vernon Rand is fictional, a composite of personal experiences and the study of different climbers from the period chosen by the author . A certain Gary Hemmings shares numerous career similarities with the climbs attributed to Vernon Rand in the book, but this is a work of fiction, an author trying to explore the mentality of men addicted to extreme sports. This is inter-twinned with a study of love and with a passion for cultural France, described in a lyrical prose very similar to the other novel by Salter that I’ve read (‘A Sport and a Pastime’). A surprise Mayakowsky reference from the almost illiterate Rand helps to put his personal despair in perspective:

The small boat of love is shattered against the flow of life.

Another quote, from a famous French climbing reporter that remains unnamed in the novel, will serve as an epitaph for Rand / Hemmings or as a one-line resume of the book:

Ils livrayent leurs vies a la montagne, les etalant a son pied.

>>><<<>>><<<

[Dane Huckelbridge · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is another one of those books that gets overlooked because of the author's other works. Everybody knows about "A Sport and a Pastime," (wink wink) and some will mention "The Hunters" as an afterthought. Both of which are great pieces of literature. But "Solo Faces" is really an exceptional book as well—and about mountain climbing, no less, which doesn't receive a whole lot of attention in the literary canon. In the way it describes the mountains themselves, it somehow also captures the seemingly ineffable: the true motivations of those who live for reaching their summits in perfect solitude. This is a spiritual book, and a heart-breaking book, and it expresses in its crystalline prose a truth about the fragility of masculinity—indeed, humanity—that few other books have managed to apprehend.

And it's set in the French Alps, which is also pretty dang cool.

[path · Rating 4 out of 5]

“The tips of his crampons were driven in a fraction, barely half an inch — that half-inch would not fail. A kind of bliss came over him as he realized this, a feeling of invulnerability unlike anything he had known. It was as if the mountain had ordained him; he did not refuse it” (130-131).

There is something both awe-inspiring and galling about feats of climbing. When the 2018 film Free Solo came out, I became interested in Alex Honnold and what seemed to be the mixture of daring, courage, and foolhardiness that was driving him to climb El Capitan without ropes or safety equipment. The same impulse appears to have driven him to climb the Taipei 101 skyscraper in January of 2026, also without ropes or safety equipment. That there was a risk of death or serious injury in both cases went without saying. Even with equipment there was the risk of both. And to choose to undertake such a feat, with your family waiting on the ground, hoping for the best, was just an alien impulse.

Solo Faces attempts, and I think succeeds, to capture something of the mentality that compels climbers to take the risks that they do. Salter elaborates a tension between the impulse to achieve and exceed one’s perceived limits with the sensible impulses of self-preservation and risk-aversion. There are times, during thrilling and beautiful descriptions of mountain face climbing, where Salter’s protagonist, Rand, is seized by fear, arrested by the sudden, clear sense that he could fall. This sense might be precipitated by chopping uncertain handholds from the ice-covered rock face, or by the near misses of debris falling from the rock face as it whistles by like a projectile, or merely remembering climbers who had been maimed or who had died from falls or exposure.

But then, there is a moment where the fears melt away. Rand is certain that he can do it. He wills himself through the fear and reaches the summit. He is indomitable until there comes a time when the fears overwhelms his will. When that happens, he is left with the impulse to climb but the feeling that he has lost his edge, a kind of psychological vertigo that he struggles to manage.

An enjoyable read with very good, descriptive writing.

[Ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautifully written. Although I have no experience--or interest--in mountain climbing and find Salter's portrayal of women somewhat flat, his men are interesting and their stories gripping.

I love all of Salter's work. I particularly loved A Sport and A Pastime as well as Light Years but Solo Faces is an exciting, exceptional work.

[Joy D · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nicely written novel about American mountaineer Vernon Rand and his travels to the Alps to climb rock faces. He occasionally meets a fellow climber, and they go up the mountain face together. Some have accidents. Rescues are necessary. Rand’s love life is rocky, and he has trouble staying with anyone for any length of time. Rand believes his expeditions to the Alps will improve his skills and reputation. I particularly enjoyed the realistic and vivid descriptions of the terrain and the climbs. I had a little more trouble remaining interested in Rand. I suppose he is well characterized in his machismo, but that character type has little appeal for me. I picked this book up because I enjoy non-fiction about mountaineering, and why people embark on such perilous endeavors. This is along the same lines, except in the form of fiction. I think Salter is attempting to portray the psychology of a person who enjoys these types of dangerous adventures. I was with him up until the ending, which I found rather bizarre.

[jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

There is a tempting urge to begin: "This is a book about mountain-climbing, but it's not about mountain-climbing." That would help reassure some non-hobbyists (like me), but in fact, this is a book that's not "about" mountain-climbing that happens to be very about mountain-climbing.

I'll try to explain. Salter takes us into the world of someone we might call an anti-hero, if he ever let us get close enough to him to judge him with finality. We're thrown deeply inside his mind, body, and spirit, the higher he climbs. There's a linear relationship between his closeness to death and his distance from earth vs. our connection to his psychology. It's as if he only wants to light up when he's godlike. On descent, our graph line connection to him shoots abruptly downward. Back on earth, he's this hollow shell that's accented beautifully by Salter's Hemingway/Cormac McCarthy-esque sparse prose. He sleeps with women. He drinks. He moves around. He waits…

In my mind, Salter steps nimbly around all the mistakes he could be making in this narrative strategy. For one thing, the mountaineering passages are absolutely necessary. Terminology surfaces, sans the Moby Dick-esque discourses on the subject or the Philip Roth chest-thumping on author research (I'm still bitter about reading and living through that whole 'gloving industry' thing). Sure, mountain-climbing is a perfect metaphorical apparatus but he fleshes it out as the real thing inside the plot that it is.

Even if you enter this book with zero interest in the topic, you'll be edified by commonalities that all time-consuming, manic hobbies have. Whatever you use for escapism, Salter's guy is just maxing out in the same categories of escapism, selfishness, oneupmanship, etc.

Salter also has this completely unique way of suddenly delving into characters you might assume would just be hollow husks: specifically, the women that get slept with and left. It's this almost apologetic turning of the POV from the anti-hero to the woman scorned, and it reads so naturally, for a reason I can't quite put my finger on. Is it because our antihero is such an unsubstantial husk on flat ground that he can't bear to have us stay with him for more than a brief chapter or two?

I would five-star recommend to anyone who appreciates literary form as much as they do plot and "likable characters." If the latter are your meat and potatoes and nice form is just a side-dish, you will tend to agree with the 3-star reviewers.

[Liina · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Solo Faces" is classic Salter. Manly and like a glistening slippery stone. Hard, beautiful, predictable. Something you will pick up from the beach in Southern France. Then it is spring again and you put your hand in your pocket, caress it and memories unfold. Something to revisit.

With Salter, it does not really matter what is the plot. In this instance, it is Rand - a mountain climber and a hero, or an anti-hero, if you wish. Primitive, selfish and living only for the mountains. Of course, there are women. Many and always neglected in the end. Because the pull to freedom doesn't like anything in its way.

Salter is often said to have her women one dimensional and flat, mere puppets. Outdates views. I agree but at the same time, I think that he captures something that very few male writers do. There is always the unsaid knowledge that women are the lighthouses, the supreme beings that are the occasional glimpses of hope to men like Rand. The twilight hours when sleep has gone too early, gulping mineral water, in an anonymous motel. A moment of softness before the screen closes and guards are being put up again. In this book, there was a passage that moved me more than anything. Something that assures that Salter can really "see" women. A girl, after a night spent together encountering Rand again trying to hide her excitement but failing:

When he went by the shop he said a few whispered words to her. Her expression softened, she did not reply. The thing that betrayed her was an unexpected, childish gesture. After he had gone, elated by his visit, she took hold of the end of the counter, leaned back and pulled herself dreamily forward, leaned back and did it again.

Salter has the rare gift of turning a cliche into something timeless. And I have never read more alluring descriptions about Paris. He remains a writer I will cherish and dare not to reread, afraid the brilliance will wear off.

[Sheska · Rating 4 out of 5]

The thing about heroic adventure lit is that it’s always so… well… heroic. The people involved in these feats of superhuman endurance and strength are mythologised and their accomplishments are, often justly, enshrined in history and immortalised in old faded photographs in random Inns across the globe. Even books about tragic failures are editorialised, again often quite rightly, as ones where a much more lasting spirit of success can be gleaned. As Lord Hunt, the leader of the 1953 Everest expedition, put it, “The true result of endeavour, whether on a mountain or in any other context, may be found rather in its lasting effects than in the few moments during which a summit is trampled by mountain boots. The real measure is the success or failure of the climber to triumph not over a lifeless mountain but over himself: the true value of the enterprise lies in the example to others of human motive and human conduct.”

But what if the motive is misguided and human conduct reeks of self-destructive tendencies? How likely is one to triumph over themselves by reaching that summit, when at the foot of the mountain their life is a quagmire of abandonment, broken hearts, and pathological rootlessness. This is a book about one such hero. I saw him as someone misplaced in space and time, an ascetic and morose echo of the Lost Generation, one whose biggest climb is not some Alpine peak but that out of the emptiness into which he throws himself with determination the moment the climb is over, this is why you don’t get any accounts of descent in this book.

I have to say this is something I didn’t realise I was missing—an authentic lie in an ocean of true heroic accounts.

Defeat, my Defeat, my shining sword and shield,
In your eyes I have read
That to be enthroned is to be enslaved,
And to be understood is to be leveled down,
And to be grasped is but to reach one's fullness
And like a ripe fruit to fall and be consumed.

Defeat, my Defeat, my bold companion,
You shall hear my songs and my cries and my silences,
And none but you shall speak to me of the beating of wings,
And urging of seas,
And of mountains that burn in the night,
And you alone shall climb my steep and rocky soul.

— Kahlil Gibran, Defeat

[nathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

In some ways it's Salter leaving the tenderness of the body to see that the world is more expansive beyond the trivialities of romantic desire. Here, there is a desire to be on edge. To taste the cut of the air. To lick the salt of the earth and feel the weight of it all.

Because when you realize you are deep into something you don’t care about that churns into a kind of caring, you realize you’re much like everyone else, with everything else. You are a triviality in a game of many, churning and churning into an unimportance that keeps the churning going.

We must obsess. We must escape. We must reach for the impossible. Because that’s what keeps the world spinning on its brittle axis.

In one of his lesser known works, he manages to combine all that we know him for in an uncommon passion that breathes new light and concept in a thing like climbing.

[Amira Khali · Rating 1 out of 5]

"her shoes, her stockings, her breasts, they were silently being collected." james, girl, wtf is this.

so incredibly misogynistic, finished only because i had to. the nature descriptions and the nice last 40 pages were not enough to redeem it

[Sara · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was beautifully written - I liked the style of writing. Easy to read, the prose flowed smoothly. This book is about Vernon Rand, the mountain climber and his drive to climb higher and climb solo. He has a friend/rival - Cabot - also driven to attain summits.

I was interested enough in these foreign peaks - for example, Mont Blanc - to do a little research on the internet so I learned some things I didn't know before. (Mainly I'm thinking - why California? Why France? Why not climb in Colorado??)

The main character is definitely not without flaws. He's not a likable fellow. Neither is Cabot. Rand has trouble with keeping or even wanting a steady relationship with a woman. It's all about the mountain, but even that relationship is difficult to maintain for the long term. A very melancholy book.

[Charles White · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reread June 2023.

[Peter · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you haven any interest in rock climbing, as I do a little, you will probably like this book. The story follows Rand an isolated young man in his late twenties who seems to have an unhealthy desire to take risks in mountain climbing adventures. The descriptions of the mountain climbing scenes are breathtaking, very tense. Salter puts you right in the moment on the side of the mountain. The character study of Rand is very good. He remains a mystery even to himself, characteristic of Salter. What drives this man? Where will this obsession lead him? These questions move the novel along. I like Salter as a stylist and even more as a storyteller. This one will have you on the edge of the seat and scratching your head.

[Matthew Willis · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a wonderful book. There are as many moments of high adventure as quiet introspection as Vernon Rand attempts to conquer the vertical, vertiginous faces of the Alpine Aiguilles. Salter's spare but poetic narrative makes numerous attempts at scaling Rand's character, through fleeting triumphs, tragedies large and small, from different angles, before eventually retreating.

[Chrissie · Rating 5 out of 5]

bleak. pointillistic. good.

[Heckasac · Rating 1 out of 5]

I can handle some sexism in this book but this goes too far. Plus, his protagonist reminds me of an Ayn Rand character.

[Miguel Garzón · Rating 5 out of 5]

Magnífica novela que narra la vida a través de la vida de una persona, un alpinista, un solitario que no logra encontrar su lugar y busca en la altura su propio enigma. La narración es bellísima, propia de su autor, lírica, brutal, desolada. La morfología de los solitarios puede encontrar adeptos entre los lectores, supongo, pero casi nadie sabe destilarlas en novelas breves vitalistas y borrachas de tristeza. Muy recomendable.

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

UPDATE: I reread, more slowly this time and have a deeper appreciation for all the detail Salter uses. This novel is about Rand finding himself and being a hero climbing mountains in the French Alps. When he comes home he saves his friend - a true hero story. However, Salter uses so much detail in the beginning:

"Seen picking their way down the slope from the highway to the beach, half naked, towels in their hands, they seemed to be a family. As they drew closer it was even more interesting. She already had a stiffness and hesitation about that part of middle age. Her attention was entirely on her feet. Only the humorous, graceful movement of her hands and the kerchief around her head made her seem youthful. The man following her, tall and resigned. He hadn’t learned that something always comes to save you.

She was a woman who would one day turn to drink or probably cocaine. She was high-strung, uncertain. She often talked about how she looked or what she would wear. Brushing the sand from her face, she wondered, What would you think of – white? Pure white, the way they dress at Theodores? "

She will turn to cocaine - Salter's thought through this Louise Rate character so much even though she's thoroughly minor. He paints the picture of the family, Rand will leave behind. Crossing the threshold is never easy, Rand needs a family eventhough he's footloose and free.

Salter's fine prose paints a perfect portrait of a true hero. Salter knows writing and mountain climbing and the hero. Rand is not without flaws but he lives a hunter's life. Some men are hunters others are farmers. What does hunter do when he's long in the tooth? Retire to Florida where there are no mountains, no snow, no glaciers or get lost in oblivion of mountainside.

[stefan · Rating 2 out of 5]

OK, so I gave it two stars, but I still read it to the end. It's a story about a climber who at times directs but mostly follows his way through adventures in the mountains and with women. It moves along well in part because the climbs are suspenseful -- how could getting injured 1,000 feet up a rock face not be? -- and because the hero, Rand, is unpredictable. He lives a completely selfish life, not allowing even the woman he loves any hint of commitment. He seduces, conquers, leaves or is left, with no emotion, or at least none the author cares to give us. He blows his best chance at love, blows off the idea of a normal job, and suffers only enough from it that he loses the courage to climb and not enough to actually try to change himself. He is not a likable or particularly interesting character.
A review on the back claims Salter's writing "exemplifies the purity it describes." The style does stand out, but pure isn't the first word that comes to my mind, unless somehow the short sentences reflect Rand's simple mind. The book is peppered with anecdotes (the stories of a man who picks him up hitchhiking, for example) that lead nowhere and seem to have no role in carrying plot or providing meaning, unless the point is the simple randomness of life. For all that happens in the short years covered in the book, there seems little in the way of narrative. At least there's nothing in the way of personal growth for Rand.
I'm open to the argument that writing meaningfully about climbing and mountaineering is hard -- the unique experiences of climbing could be more corporal than cerebral -- and this book does little to counter that.

[DoctorM · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm a city kid. Climbing for me is something you do in walk-up flats. My vision of nature is probably about coastlines and open water. So 'Solo Faces' isn't a call for me to learn to climb late in life and go to the Alps or the Himalayas. But it is--- as you'd expect from James Salter ---hauntingly beautiful and powerful. 'Solo Faces' is nowhere near as lush as "Light Years", but it is beautifully crafted and allusive and spare.

Salter is writing about obsessions that his characters can't or won't describe. Rand, his central figure, is a drifter, hopeless at relationships, just as hopeless in his late thirties at constructing any life that isn't about climbing. What matters is the climbing. He isn't looking for fame, and when he's finally brushed by a bit of media attention he hates it. He has no one to impress, and while Salter creates a foil and climbing competitor in Cabot, the idea of rivalry isn't really explored. His characters climb because...they have a singular skill, maybe the only real skill they have in their lives, and all they can do is devote themselves to that skill, even if it makes them hopeless at everything else.

'Solo Faces' is one of those books that'll take a second reading. And it's a book that should've been filmed (something low-key, something without lots of CGI or special effects) long ago. And perhaps only because there is something stereotypically male in me, it's a book that makes me envy both physical skill and the idea of an obsessive dedication to something inexplicable, consuming, and dangerous.

[Tom · Rating 2 out of 5]

A book better skimmed than read.
When reading it closely, I found it a bit of a slog, but skimming gave me enough of Rand & Cabot's climbing adventures to satisfy me. Maybe it's partly because every climb (and there are SO MANY) reads almost the same? Maybe (probably) it's because Rand, as a character, just isn't all that interesting until the final ~35 pages?

Speaking of those final 35 pages-- the level of the prose elevates dramatically , particularly in the final Rand/Cabot scene, and it leaves you thinking a) this is really good and b) why the hell didn't Salter do this the rest of the book? But he didn't. And so it's just not all that good, really. I've been told by Salter fans that this is a terrible way for me to have introduced myself to him. If not for their testimony, there's pretty much no chance I would give another of his books a shot.

This is the kind of book I probably would have liked a lot when I was 20.

[Chris Via]

“The smallest act took on immense dimensions” (142). This sums up Mr. Salter’s unique, compressed prose style. Too often lumped in with, say, Hemingway—no doubt on account of short, declarative sentences—Salter is in a class of his own. This is probably on par with A Sport and a Pastime, but neither reach the crown jewel of his repertoire, Light Years.

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great book. Salter's writing reminded me of a more-accessible version of Cormac McCarthy, with short sentences and limited descriptions of the plot, allowing the protagonists action to speak for themselves. I thought the ending was abrupt and out of character for the protagonist, which keeps me from giving it five stars.

[Yvonne · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you can ignore the rampant misogyny, this is a fair read. There are some seriously clunky sentences but some great ones too. The climbing passages are by far the highlights. It's when he tries to write about Rand's wen that Salter runs into trouble. Worth reading from a craft perspective.

[Keith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really starting to enjoy Salter's style. While sparse with his words, he manages to be very descriptive. Here he explores not necessarily the pull of the climbing life but the desire to find oneself in outside goals and achievements.