Tag: Reviews
The Perfect Book for Coal Lovers (and Also Haters)
It’s Coalmas! Around this time of the year, some people threaten to leave coal in our stockings like it’s a bad thing. Pfft. Geologists know coal is actually a very amazing rock and very cool to have a lump of.
If you’re not convinced that holding a several hundred year-old shiny black flammable vestige of a really unique geological era is a fabulous thing, or if you just want to marvel at its remarkable past, let me suggest Coal: A Human History by Barbara Freese. This is one of the best books I read in 2022. And I’m not just saying that because I’m a coal miner’s daughter with a soft spot for rocks that burn. I would have loved it even if I hated the vile, polluting stuff.
Iceland from the West to the South: A Meh Guide With Some Eye-Popping Mistakes
(This post first appeared on Patreon. To get early access, plus nifty extras, all while supporting Rosetta Stones, please click here.)
So of course with all of the Iceland Volcano excitement, I had to run out and buy a bunch of books on Icelandic geology. It’s actually not super easy to find affordable ones in English. So I was very pleased to find one published by Springer for a good price: Iceland from the West to the South by Wolfgang Fraedrich. Springer is all about science written by scientists. I was stoked.
I have now read it, and…I’m considerably less stoked.
Resurrecting Pompeii: The Testimony of Skeletons
It’s amazing what bones will tell you if you know what questions to ask. Dr. Estelle Lazer spent years making inquiries of the skeletons of Pompeii, and her Resurrecting Pompeii is filled with their stories.
This is an academic work, written in academic language, so please don’t go into it expecting an easy, breezy read. There isn’t a ton of geology involved, either. You’re going to be encountering more anatomy and pathology than you might have been strictly prepared for. But if you want to see a lot of myths busted, and learn who the people trapped in Pompeii by the eruption were, this book will more than repay all the time you spend googling unfamiliar terms.
Dana’s Pandemic Holiday Shopping Guide
Ah, yes, it’s that time of year again, where the holidays bunch up like they’ve put off celebrating til the last minute and suddenly it’s time to give All The Gifts. Of course, this being 2020, and many of us being in America where the ostensible leader can’t see reality past his artificially inflated ego, this is a complicated holiday season. Many of us will be socially distancing still. Viruses don’t take holidays, even when we wish they would.
Thanks to eCommerce, though, we can still give our loved ones some nice little gifts if we don’t want to skip that part, many of which will help while away a long pandemic winter. Let’s explore!
Our Fabulous Floods of Fire and Ice Book List
Floods of lava, followed by floods of glacial lake water, formed some of the most intriguing landscapes in the American West. The books herein explore the remarkable geologic events involved. Whether you’re looking for cool summer reading (Southern Hemisphere) or some hawt winter stories (Northern Hemisphere), I’ve got you covered. Here’s your all-ages pass to the stories behind some of the most spectacular landscapes on Earth!