Earth History: Stories of Our Geological Past
© Cambridge University Press
It is all in the title: this is Earth’s history as told through stories, an approach that I think works extremely well. As the authors note, “rocks are books telling us about geological stories, written in a number of languages”, including stratigraphy, petrology and palaeontology. The first six chapters provide a foundation for those that follow, with an overview of the major events in Earth’s history, and the techniques used to address them. These include overarching concepts like the differing philosophies and scientific methods of geology, Earth’s origins, plate tectonics, natural selection and evolution, as well as case studies such as reading strikingly exposed rocks in the Grand Canyon. Subsequent chapters build on key concepts: the origin of life, dinosaurs, the Cambrian explosion, and environmental change during Snowball Earth, as well as humanity’s impact in the Holocene.
There is an impressive coherence and thread through the different topics, which surely reflect years of teaching courses on Earth’s history. The book is written for North American undergraduates, so inevitably there is emphasis on examples from North America, including tectonics in the west and closure of the Iapetus Ocean from an Appalachian perspective. These are excellent case studies, even if not immediately accessible to European students, as might also be said of the Himalayas and, to a lesser degree, the Messian salinity crisis.
The writing style is engaging and light of touch. Each chapter has key words to accompany concepts in the text, alongside further reading and review questions, which allows for welcome flexibility in how each chapter is taught. It succeeds in drawing on a variety of sub-disciplines to provide students who have little or no previous knowledge of geology with a broad understanding of our planet and its fascinating journey. There is an excellent glossary, and the online resources include figures, lecture PowerPoint slides and a test bank for instructors. Overall, the chapters are impressively comprehensive, yet they provide the opportunity to be read at different levels depending on the Earth history course they accompany. The authors are to be warmly congratulated on what may turn out to be a hallmark book in the teaching of geology.
Reviewed by Chris Hawkesworth
DETAILS
BY: Peter Copeland and Janok Bhattacharya (2025) Cambridge University Press 408pp. (pbk/hbk)
ISBN: 9781108724159
PRICE: £54.99 (pbk), £120 (hbk) cambridge.org
