Secrets from the Rocks [Hardcover]

Albert Marrin (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 9 and up | Grade Level: 5 and up

"I was born to be an explorer. I couldn't do anything else and be happy." Starting in 1922, Roy Chapman Andrews, working for the American Museum of Natural History, conceived a whole new "team" way of searching for fossils and led five car-and-camel expeditions to the Gobi Desert in Mongolia. His team's discoveries-of dinosaur eggs, new dinosaur species, and the earliest mammals-changed the way we think about the great Age of Dinosaurs. In deft, vivid strokes, master storyteller and historian Albert Marrin captures the excitement and the science of the expedition's encounters not only with fossils but with suffocating sandstorms, snakes, bandits, a strange culture, political turmoil, and more.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 4-8-This excellent biography tells what little is known of Andrews's childhood and youth, then focuses on the adventure and science of his explorations and dinosaur discoveries in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia. The fossils unearthed on his trips had an impact on our understanding of prehistoric life and cemented the stature of the Museum of Natural History in New York City. Marrin does an admirable job of recognizing the esteem due to such a robust and successful explorer without ignoring our contemporary views on excluding women, shooting rare animals, and plundering the national treasures of other countries. He includes compelling details of danger and triumph and offers scientific and political background. Many full-page, black-and-white photographs illustrate this oversized volume. Many of the archival photographs are identical to those in Ann Bausum's Dragon Bones and Dinosaur Eggs (National Geographic, 2000), which also includes some of the same details from the expeditions but does not offer the depth of explanation of important topics such as how fossils are formed or the role of women in scientific exploration at that time. Brian Floca's Dinosaurs at the Ends of the Earth (DK Ink, 2000) is a fictionalized picture-book version of the Gobi explorations illustrated with watercolors. Secrets will inspire and enlighten students who love dinosaurs or biographies or both.
Ellen Heath, Orchard School, Ridgewood, NJ
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Gr. 4-8. Andrews is best known for his famous 1920s Mongolian expeditions, during which he and his team unearthed rare dinosaur fossils, including the first dinosaur eggs known to Western science. In this photo-biography cum adventure story, Marrin gives brief mention of Andrews' early years, but focuses mostly on the Mongolian work, providing plenty of stories about the rigors of organizing such an ambitious expedition and of the scientific work itself, and folding in definitions of basic terms (for example, Mesozoic and warm-blooded). Marrin often sensationalizes his anecdotes, particularly when describing Mongolian life (there's a graphic story about Andrews being offered sheep eyeballs at a local feast). But the treatment of Andrews himself is more evenhanded, discussing both accomplishments and flaws (chauvinistic treatment of women; shirking of family responsibilities). The result is a colorful portrait that offers thought-provoking insight into the constantly shifting nature of scientific discovery. A spotty resource section concludes. Gillian Engberg
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 9 and up
  
• Hardcover: 80 pages
• Publisher: Dutton Juvenile (May 13, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0525467432
• ISBN-13: 978-0525467434
• Product Dimensions: 11.3 x 9.3 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,987,882 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Albert Marrin is an award winning author of over 40 books for young adults and young readers and four books of scholarship. These writings were motivated by the fact that as a teacher, first in a junior high school in New York City for nine years and then as professor of history and chairman of the history department at Yeshiva University until he retired to become a full time writer, his paramount interest has always been to make history come alive and accessible for young people.

Winner of the 2008 National Endowment for Humanities Medal for his work, which was presented at the White House, was given "for opening young minds to the glorious pageant of history. His books have made the lessons of the past come alive with rich detail and energy for a new generation."

Dr. Marrin's numerous other awards include the Washington Post Childrens'Book Guild Lifetime Achievement Award, the James Madison Award for Lifetime Achievement, several Horn Book awards by the Boston Globe, consistently appearing on the best book of the year lists of the American Library Association, frequent recognition by Book Lists, and the Western Heritage Award for best juvenile nonfiction book presented at the National Cowboy Hall of Fame among others.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Nice photos - some attempt to humanize myth, January 19, 2008

By 

Ovi Raptor (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Secrets from the Rocks (Hardcover)

This is another book on Andrews and the Central Asiatic Expeditions based on Andrews' own publications. Reference is made to the possible existence of other material from other members, but apparently the author made no attempt to access it. So, independent research lacks. That's an inherent problem with the more recent Andrews-CAE books: they rely heavily on the previously published material of one person, Andrews himself.

There is, nevertheless, an attempt to show kids that 'heroes' have flaws. But it's the hero presumption as applied to Andrews that really needs to be questioned. This book does not and instead suggests that, because he was so anointed, we have to live with it.

The CAE's science, as clearly shown, obviously belonged in the hands of others. This makes one wonder why mis-impressions of that premise nevertheless continue to exist.

The odd reference to 'Walt' Granger seems unique to this book. That is how Andrews inscribed a photo to him, but it is not how Granger was commonly known. Speaking of photos, that's Peter Kaisen (not George Olsen) in the photo at p. 29. The identification of Granger in the foreground of the photo at p. 49 (same as cover photo) is also in error. That's George Olsen (or Albert Thomson, depending on the year of the photo), not Granger, in the foreground. Andrews is to his left, a Chinese worker (perhaps Mr. Wang) is to Andrews' left, then Walter Granger, then Kan Chuen Pao (aka 'Buckshot').

Also, the Central Asiatic Expeditions did not begin as such. They originally were named the "Third Asiatic Expeditions" because they followed Andrews' First and Second Zoological Expeditions. Those were the ones Yvette attended. Henry Fairfield Osborn renamed this third to "Central Asiatic Expeditions" midway through the decade. Walter Granger didn't like the renaming, by the way, probably because they weren't truly in the central part of Asia.

There is some wierd logic here that I will never understand. At p. 46, Marrin writes: "Without realizing it, in 1923 Walter Granger made an exciting discovery. He found the skull of 'an unidentified reptile' in the same sandstone formation as Protoceratops. Although a brilliant paleontologist, Granger was still a human being. Like all humans, he made mistakes. This time he made a whopper. Museum preparators back in New York City got to the `reptile' skull two years later and were shocked at what they found. When they freed it from the surrounding rock, they saw that it only was an inch and a half in length. They could tell from its pointy snout, used to sniff out food, that it was no reptile skull. Given its size, they thought it must have belonged to a mammal no larger than a rat, probably one with a long tail and furry body. It was a mammal from the Age of Reptiles! Only one other mammal skull from the Age of Reptiles had ever been found, in South Africa." Now, if the NYC preparators didn't know it until two years later when they finally dug the skull out ('freed it from surrounding rock'), how on earth was Walter Granger supposed to identify it in the field while it was still encased in rock, and only once before had a fossil mammal been found in the Age of Reptiles and that was at a place many continents away? This wasn't a whopper mistake on Granger's part. Granger clearly wrote "unidentified" and didn't presume anything beyond "reptile" because that was the age he was working in. To try to portray this otherwise simply is ridiculous, modern-day oneupsmanship.

I gave this 3 stars because a 2.5-star rating isn't available.