In “A Light Through the Cracks,” Beth Rodden recounts her amazing climbing accomplishments. She also shares an underlying story of food and weight obsession, sometimes crippling self-doubts, and the traumatic legacy of being kidnapped while climbing in Kyrgyzstan. This book celebrates elite sports while demonstrating their physical and psychological toll.
Rock climbers have probably seen endless documentaries and magazine covers chronicling Rodden’s victories. Some may have even had her poster up in their teenage bedrooms. For those unfamiliar with the sport, Rodden specialized in free climbing, which means she used her gear only for fall protection, not to help her move up the rock. She was best known for her climbs in Yosemite, including establishing a new El Capitan route called Meltdown in 2008. At the time, Meltdown was considered the hardest traditional climb in the world. Nobody repeated it until 2018.
Published by Amazon imprint Little A, “A Light Through the Cracks” opens in Amsterdam in August 2000. Rodden and her three fellow climbers have just escaped from their kidnappers. Her then-boyfriend/climbing partner Tommy Caldwell pushed their captor off a cliff, saving them all. And making Rodden feel extremely indebted. The story goes back and forth in time between several threads — her amazing rock climbing efforts and wins, her mental health struggles, and the kidnapping.
Depending on your interests, one thread will be more gripping than another. Lots of climbing details and lingo went over my head. For example, she frequently uses the verb “sending,” which means to get to the top of the rock in one go without falling. It’s not too hard to pick up the meaning, but non-climbers will feel like they’re peeking into an unfamiliar and very intense world.
Many people will relate to Rodden’s desperate need for control. This was related both to her sport — the heavier you are, the harder it is to pull your body up the rock (plus, many companies didn’t want to sponsor fat girl climbers) — and wanting to prove she had not been broken by the kidnapping. She and Caldwell got married, stayed climbing partners, and helped each other tamp down any mental health issues.
Rodden was only 20 years old and already a professional climber when she was kidnapped. It was a bitter pill to become more famous for surviving a kidnapping than for sending the hardest routes. Throughout the book, she circles back to Kyrgyzstan, revealing more details each time, touching the experience here and there as though it still burns.
Her group’s captors were guerilla soldiers of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. Rodden, Caldwell, John Dickey, and Jason Smith endured six days of being held hostage while dodging fire from Kyrgyz soldiers. Her writing expresses the terror that all four felt, but with her added fear of rape.
She describes hiding under a boulder with her captors and fellow climbers. “I was scared to sleep and desperate not to be awake. I needed to be both alert and inured. What if another firefight broke out? What if they killed the boys and I woke up alone? I didn’t even know where I was. I could never get home.”
That’s the kind of experience you don’t get over by sucking it up and continuing to exercise, as Rodden tried for years. Many readers will relate to trying to find ways to overcome trauma and take control in a world that is so beyond our control that our efforts are laughable. This book is a well-written page-turner, even if you’ve never climbed more than a flight of stairs.
Writer received a free copy of the book for review.
