Photography book review: Everest - Summit of Achievement, By Stephen Venables

Expedition members cross a crevasse using a light metal sectional ladder (Alfred Gregory, courtesy of the Royal Geographical Society)

On 29 May 1953, the New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary and the Nepalese Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers to reach the summit of the planet's highest mountain, described by Hillary as "a symmetrical beautiful snow cone".

This volume, by the mountaineer Stephen Venables, celebrates the 60th anniversary of the men's achievement and chronicles the history of Everest exploration from the start of the 20th century to the present day.

It is the only book on the subject to benefit from complete access to the Royal Geographical Society's collection of photographs, documents, and artefacts.

Painstakingly selected from more than 20,000 subjects, the 400 images featured record the surveying, planning, reconnaissance expeditions and actual attempts by the Society and the Alpine Club to conquer Everest from 1921 onward.