Book Reviews by Mike Fredericks from the pages of the
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Dinosaurs, Paleontology, and Prehistoric Life. Book Reviews by Mike Fredericks from the pages of the <<<Back to search4dinosaurs.com |
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From Issue #81 Spring 2007 Dawn of the Dinosaurs: Life in the Triassic (Life of the Past) by Nicholas Fraser (Author), James O. Farlow (Editor), Douglas Henderson (Illustrator) $49.95 Hardcover: 307 pages Publisher: Indiana University Press (November 2006) ISBN-10: 0253346525 ISBN-13: 978-0253346520 At the beginning of the Age of Dinosaurs there was an age in Earth's history known as the Triassic. It was a world of truly fantastic creatures, a genetic stew of the ancient and the modern. During this time the Earth took its first steps toward the creation of modern terrestrial ecosystems. This incredibly exciting period is brought vividly to life in the words of paleontologist Nicholas Fraser and the consummate artistry of Douglas Henderson. Together they have created a book in which the riches of Triassic life are presented with clarity, scientific accuracy, and imaginative recreation. Every lover of the life of the past will treasure Dawn of the Dinosaurs. Horns And Beaks: Ceratopsian And Ornithopod Dinosaurs (Life of the Past) Hardcover 369 pages by Kenneth Carpenter (Editor) S49.95 Indiana University Press, ISBN-10: 025334817X ISBN-13: 978-0253348173 Horns and Beaks completes Ken Carpenter's series on the major dinosaur types. As with his volumes on armored, carnivorous, and sauropod dinosaurs, this book collects original and new information, reflecting the latest discoveries and research on these two groups of animals. The Ornithopods include Iguanodon, one of the first dinosaurs ever discovered and analyzed, and perhaps the most common and best-documented group, the hadrosaurs or "duckbilled dinosaurs." The Ceratopsians include Triceratops, known for its distinctive three-horned skull and protective collar. All of the new findings on Triceratops, Iguanodon and other related dinosaurs are discussed from contributors that include a who's who of paleontologists and dinosaur experts: Michael K. Brett-Surman, Kenneth Carpenter, Nate L. Murphy, Gregory S. Paul, Darren H. Tanke, and many more. Glorified Dinosaurs: The Origin and Early Evolution of Birds by Luis M. Chiappe $69.95, 192 pages, Wiley-Liss, ISBN-10: 0471247235 ISBN-13: 978-0471247234 The last few years have witnessed an unparalleled rate of discoveries of early birds and their dinosaurian predecessors and it has become quite evident that birds evolved from their dinosaur ancestors. Famous paleontologist Chiappe's "Glorified Dinosaurs" provides a comprehensive summary of these discoveries and addresses the fascinating topic of how modern birds evolved from theropod dinosaurs akin to the celebrated Velociraptor. The book focuses on an evolutionary approach and presents current research and fossil discoveries. The book includes colored photographs of fossils and fossil localities, many of which have been rarely reproduced elsewhere and more than 220 illustrations. The book is an invaluable resource for every paleontologist, ornithologist, evolutionary biologist, geology and life sciences student. It is also exciting reading for people interested in dinosaurs and avian evolution and a general interest in the topic. Fossil Salamanders of North America (Life of the Past) (Hardcover) by J. Alan Holman $55.00 232 pages Indiana University Press ISBN-10: 0253347327 ISBN-13: 978-0253347329 J. Alan Holman is Professor and Curator Emeritus of Vertebrate Paleontology at Michigan State University and like his "Fossil Snakes of North America" and "Fossil Frogs and Toads of North America", Holman again covers a group of prehistoric animals rarely described. Salamanders are puzzling animals to most people. They come in forms that look like flattened fish with legs, like eels, like slimy lizards, or like lizards with toad-like skins. Their life history imitates the ancient evolutionary transition from aquatic to terrestrial vertebrates, though several groups remain permanently aquatic. Until now, no one has written about their ancient ancestors. Holman details the process of the identification and interpretation of the fossils of North America, illustrates and discusses the extinct salamanders, re-diagnosing or redescribing some on the basis of additional information and fossil material. He also gives the modern characteristics, ecological attributes, and modern rages of the fossil taxa that are still living. The book begins with an overview of the Caudata and describes their early evolution, follows the systematic and chronological accounts of the salamanders, and concludes with a discussion of the study of fossil salamanders as it relates to the development and classification of the group. Hollow Earth (Hardcover) by David Standish (Author) $24.95 303 pages, Perseus Books Group, ISBN-10: 0306813734 ISBN-13: 978-0306813733 The idea that another world exists below the surface of the Earth (sometimes inhabited by prehistoric animals) has captivated many science fiction and fantasy writers As Standish reveals, the theory has also been promoted by serious (if sometimes slightly wacky) scientists, beginning with the eminent Edmond Halley, who theorized that smaller concentric spheres were nested inside the Earth. Halley's conception of the subterranean realm spawned a recurring theme in science fiction (Jules Verne, Edgar Rice Burroughs, and L. Frank Baum all set novels inside the earth), as well as a small but enduring strain of true believers. Standish summarizes novels by the likes of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Standish jokes a lot but seems to have a genuine affection for his assorted crackpots and dreamers, and he provides an fun tour of their various underground Utopias. 65 b&w illus. Next (Hardcover) by Michael Crichton $27.95 448 pages HarperCollins ISBN-10:0060872985 ISBN-13:978-0060872984 Jurassic Park creator Crichton is back with another book on DNA and genetic engineering minus the dinosaurs. Is a loved one missing some body parts? Will true blondes be extinct within 200 years? Is everyone at your dinner table of the same species? Humans and chimpanzees differ in only 400 genes; is that why a chimp fetus resembles a human being? And should that worry us? There's a new genetic cure for drug addiction—is it worse than the disease? What's coming Next? See what Michael Crichton sees on the horizon in his latest novel. We live in a time of momentous scientific leaps, a time when it's possible to sell our eggs and sperm online for thousands of dollars and to test our spouses for genetic maladies. In Crichton's book we live in a time when one fifth of all our genes are owned by someone else, and an unsuspecting person and his family can be pursued cross-country because they happen to have certain valuable genes within their chromosomes... Next blends fact and fiction into a fast-moving thriller of a new world where nothing is what it seems and a set of new possibilities can open at every turn. Not one of Crichton's best but still, very interesting and definitely worth reading. The audio book of Next also includes an interview with Crichton in which he discusses Jurassic Park somewhat — mentioning how amazed he is that 15 years has passed since he wrote it. Dino Poop & Other Remarkable Remains Of The Past by Jane Hammerslough (Editor) $9.99 Ages 9-12, Turtleback: 96 pages (Scholastic) Tangerine Press ISBN-10: 0439852781 ISBN-13: 978-0439852784 From huge piles of million-year-old dinosaur dung to perfectly-preserved woolly mammoths, from gargantuan animal guts to nature-made mummies, "Dino Poop" explores some of the strangest stuff on earth and the amazing ways we are able to study it today. This is a fun guide to the places we find ancient remains like peat bogs, tar pits, amber mines, frozen tundra, and yes, even fossilized vomit! In addition to fascinating facts, quizzes, timelines, and maps, you even get your very own piece of coprolite (a.k.a. "dino poop"!). Creatures of Accident: The Rise of the Animal Kingdom (Hardcover) by Wallace Arthur $25.00 272 pages Hill and Wang ISBN-10: 0809043211 ISBN-13: 978-0809043217 One of the main arguments for the intelligent design movement is that some organisms are simply too elaborate and complicated to have evolved by chance. Arthur, a professor of zoology at the National University of Ireland, Galway, aims to render this strain of cre-ationism unnecessary by "explaining, in a way that is accessible to a general readership, how the rise of complex creatures can be explained in terms of natural processes." Wallace advances the argument that the process tends toward greater complexity over time. As opposed to creationism and so- called intelligent design, he explains the view of biologist Richard Darwin, that evolution is simply an aimless series of micro and macro biological events without any bias toward complexity. Creatures of Accident makes this case through a series of easily intelligible, wordy chapters, offering a way of understanding the emergence of complex animals without resorting to either the idea that all life is essentially the same or the view that if animals are uniquely complex, then some intelligent designer must have made them so. Drawing ideas and examples from large animals to tiny cells, Arthur describes recent breakthroughs in the field of evolutionary development "evo-devo" to make the case that complexity can happen in nature quite simply. The Making of the Fittest: DNA and the Ultimate Forensic Record of Evolution (Hardcover) by Sean B. Carroll $25.95 288 pages W. W. Norton ISBN-10: 0393061639 ISBN-13: 978- 0393061635. Carroll, a professor of genetics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo-Devo), has written an interesting look at how DNA demonstrates the evolutionary process. Natural selection eliminates harmful changes and embraces beneficial ones, and each change leaves its signature on a species' DNA codes. Sensing that many people misunderstand evolution or don't believe it, geneticist Carroll here tries to teach the latest theory. He uses animals as his proof and selects specific creatures, beginning with bloodless fishes of the Antarctic seas which have no red blood cells; yet a fossilized gene for hemoglobin remains in its DNA, showing that the fish has adapted over 55 million years by losing the red blood cells that thicken blood and make it harder to pump in extreme cold. The fish has also developed other features that allow it to absorb and circulate blood without hemoglobin. Carroll points out that by examining the DNA of these ice fish species, it's possible to map its origins as well as the history of the South Atlantic's geology. He also uses dolphins, colobus monkeys and microbes to demonstrate how deeply evolution is etched in DNA. More particularly, Carroll focuses on specific genes carried by his cast of animals to demonstrate natural selection. Carroll considers the animals' most favorable adaptations, preserved in what he calls "immortal genes"; several hundred are common to all domains of life. Carroll then scales up to the macroscopic and considers traits such as color vision in monkeys; the vision and anatomy of fish, including the famous coelo- canth; and the sickle-cell trait in humans. In each case, Carroll explains how the DNA code of the gene responsible for the trait is inferred to be the result of natural selection working on mutations, which occur at a steady rate. Here is evolution clearly explained and bravely defended. Carroll offers some provocative and convincing evidence. 7 pages of color illus.; 50 b&w illus. Drawing Dinosaurs: Anatomy and Sketching with David rentz DVD from the Gnomon Workshop. Okay, now here is a product that EVERY artist reading PT MUST own. Dave is an extremely talented artist who works in the film world, probably best known for his work on Disney's Dinosaur movie and known to PT readers for his many amazing dinosaur sculptures. Dave is extremely talented, very experienced in the world of art and very knowledgeable of prehistoric animals so he has a lot to offer in his new DVD. On top of that he has a great love and fascination with extinct creatures that shows in his work and narration on this DVD. Basically, Dave sits and draws dinosaurs while narrating (occasionally taking breaks to show his sculptures too). He describes (and shows) exactly what he is doing and how you too can beautifully and accurately illustrate dinosaurs. And all the while is telling interesting facts about dinosaurs. In different sections Dave covers the head (how it is roughly shaped like a box with a triangle and circle on the front), torso, limbs, and vertebral column of many different types of dinosaurs (but especially meat-eaters), and then describes the importance of proportions, muscles, comparative anatomy and how to show motion. You get to "sit with Dave" as he draws the beautiful African meat-eater shown on the front of the DVD box from start to finish including taking the near completed artwork into Photoshop to spruce it up and give it a professional, finished appearance. Wow, what a valuable tool for dino artists of all ages and experience. Get your copy now. I gladly give Dave's DVD the PT guarantee of satisfaction! Check out: www.thegno-monworkshop.com The Discovery And Mystery of a Dinosaur Named Jane by Judith Williams (Author) $23.93 Ages 9-12 48 pages Publisher: Enslow Elementary ISBN-10: 0766027309 ISBN-13: 978-0766027305 An informative new book chronicling the discovery of a dinosaur nicknamed Jane, written for children. Digging in the Hell Creek badlands of Montana, scientists and volunteers from the Burpee Museum of Natural History excitedly discover the fossil of a dinosaur. Is it a tyrannosaur or possibly a completely different species altogether? That is the 64,000 dollar question. Some believe Jane is an adult Nanotyrannus where others like Mike Henderson of the Burpee think she is a young tyrannosaur. There are pretty good arguments for both opinions. Neither would be bad news as both are incredibly rare finds in paleontology. Beautifully illustrated and packed with photos, dino lovers of all ages will enjoy this book and the mystery it reveals. Supercroc Found, Sabertoothed Cats, Woolly Mammoths plus Armored Dinosaurs, Giant Meat-Eating Dinosaurs & Giant Plant-Eating Dinosaurs $5.95 & $6.95 48 & 32 pages Millbrook Press/Lerner Books. This assortment of new paperback books on prehistoric animals for young readers is really colorful and informative and we highly recommend them all. In bookstores now. Some are written by dino expert Don Lessem with fantastic John Bindon art. Dinosaur Comics - The Secret Origin of Pot-Belly T-rex by Andrew Sarchus is the latest in this series of comics from Andrew Simpson's Trilobite Comics. A fun and original story, Sarchus uses photos of Marx toy dinosaur figures in "prehistoric" settings to tell the wild story of how the slender Marx T-rex got to be a pot belly. Available along with past issues at TrilobiteComics.com Check out www.dinosaurmoviefans.com The purpose of the website is to make available a science fiction fantasy DVD, entitled, Supersimian Island. Yancey Hendrieth is the writer/producer/director. Besides directing this film, Yancey plays Buddy the Gorilla, son of the giant King Kong size ape, Supersimian. The plot of this fun filled story is for all ages 8 to 80: On a moonlit night, a battleship collides with a sailboat and leaves a young couple, Anna and Alex washed up on a prehistoric island inhabited by ferocious dinosaurs, man eating cannibals, Supersimian and a lost civilization of Warrior Horsewomen, who worship their captured Tyrannosaurus Rex as a God. Prehistoric Park DVD Set and book 5.99 book $29.95 DVD I hope most of you got to join zoologist and wildlife expert Nigel Marven as he traveled back in time to capture the most amazing creatures ever to exist recently when it aired on the Animal Planet channel. We got to step into the hostile climates of the Cretaceous, Pleistocene and Paleozoic time periods, and learn what killed these incredible creatures as Marven brings them back to modern times to the most incredible zoo never to exist, Prehistoric Park. In one episode he coaxes two baby Tyrannosaurs through the portal and into the park -naming them Terence and Matilda in the process. Next Marven travels 10,000 years back to the ice age, in search of the last remaining woolly mammoths. After an unexpected encounter with a cave bear, he successfully returns with an injured female mammoth he calls Martha. In "Bird House" we head 135 million years back to prehistoric China on a search for the winged dinosaur called Microraptor. Next Marven leaves on an expedition to prehistoric South America to search for the legendary Sabre-Tooth cat as they face extinction. In the next episode he goes back 300 million years to prehistoric Scotland to capture a giant dragonfly, millipede and scorpion. And finally, we go back 75 million years to prehistoric Texas for a Deinosuchus, the largest crocodile ever to have lived! Marvin lures the Deinosuchus through the portal back to Prehistoric Park. When the fantastic "Walking with Dinosaurs" premiered on TV marking the beginning of many computer-generated dinosaur TV documentaries, the main criticism was that the show portrayed the dinosaur's behavior as if it were scientific fact when, of course, we actually know very little about dinosaur behavior. Well, Prehistoric Planet is even more guilty of this but the show is well done and fun, so pick up the DVD and kid's book to enjoy it again and again. The DVD is available at www.discovery.com in the Discovery Store there along with many other dinosaur DVDs. The book should be available in books stores. |
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