Customer Reviews

Teach Yourself Volcanoes

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A good many folks have a passing interest in volcanoes, especially when a mountain like Kilauea or St. Helens erupts. Yet, most books on the subject are either very dry and technical, or, equally bad, overly concern themselves with the human details of a particular event, leaving the science of the thing as an abandoned stepchild. This excellent book suffers neither fault.

Simply put, if you want to learn the whys and wherefores of this most spectacular natural process, this is your book. The reading style is effortless, and not beyond the comprehension of anyone with a high school background in the sciences. The illustrations and diagrams are carefully chosen to clarify or expand upon points in the text. While reciting the individual and societal effects of volcanic activity, the book does not get bogged down in a welter of minutiae, and holds the reader's interest to the end.

The author has made every attempt to bring the text up to the state of the art in terms of scientific advances, and the reader benefits. Such concepts as plate tectonics, hot spots, and the like are well explained. Finally, for readers who live in the Western U.S., or anticipate travelling there, the book explains and illustrates a number of landforms that might elude one's attention, but for reading this fine work.

Upon concluding the book, the reader will have an understanding of volcanism, its landforms, and its effects on people superior to anyone, save a full-time geologist. I enthusiastically recommend it to all readers.