Soundings: A Richly Detailed Prose Map of Marie Tharp’s Life and Legacy

History dislikes remembering science’s founding mothers. So you may have never heard of the mother of the mid-ocean ridge. She was one of the parents of plate tectonics. Her 100th birthday is today. And Hali Felt’s Soundings: The Story of the Remarkable Woman Who Mapped the Ocean Floor is the book you need to read about her.

Hali isn’t an earth scientist, but after immersing herself in Marie’s life and work, you’d never know it. She draws the birth of plate tectonics with as much skill and assurance as Marie drew her remarkable maps. But she doesn’t just tell a science story.

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