Reddit reviews Annals of the Former World

In addition to those mentioned I would add:

Colliding Continents by Mike Searle is a fantastic read! Both from a geology and mountaineering perspective.

Annals Of The Former World by John McPhee is also good, currently making my through it, very accessible and covers a lot of ground in North America.

Also, more for its humour value than anything: Exploration Days: An A-Z of Ways of Dying in Mineral Exploration by S.J. Waddell is a good, light read written by a former exploration geologist working in SE Asia in the 60's and 70's, can be had on iBooks for about $5.

Try the John McFee books:
http://www.amazon.com/Annals-Former-World-John-McPhee/dp/0374518734/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1299779185&sr=8-2

Annals of the Former World by John McPhee. McPhee is one of the best nonfiction writers out there, which helps a lot.

The core of the book is a series of encounters with prominent scientists who were deeply involved in making the discoveries he outlined. So it is powerful from the human interest angle but that is inextricable tied in with a deep exploration of the science involved. It's from a layman's point of view, but that is probably a great advantage if you are layman yourself, and it's far from superficial but a real attempt to deeply understand and explain the geology.

Incidentally, the book won the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction in 1999.

Take a look at this video as well - about one of the sections of Annals of a Former World.

https://www.amazon.com/Annals-Former-World-John-McPhee/dp/0374518734

Honestly if your not already well versed as a geologist (I’m not) you might find some sections to be a bit of a slog (I did) but my recommendation is that if you feel yourself struggling through a passage, just skip along until you find more readable prose. There’s a hell of a lot of book to get through, so even if you miss out on something the first time, you’ll still learn and enjoy a ton of it, and maybe you catch that piece you missed on a second reading a few years down the line

Annals of the Former World

When Life Nearly Died

Wonderful Life

John McPhee's geology books are quite entertaining. Annals of a Former World is four-books-in-one, tracing the geology of the US across the 40th parallel, more or less. You learn some geology, some geography, some personal history, and US history.

I'm a geologist by training. The best book I've ever read on geology (or possibly any other topic) is Annals of the Former World by John McPhee. (It's actually a compilation of five books, but they should really be read in order to get their full benefit). McPhee isn't a geologist, he's an essayist. Annals is a series of extended essays documenting his traversing of North America in the company of geologists; the author, as a geological layman, describes his experiences learning about the structure and history of the continent. There are also some related side stories about the people and towns he passes through, and how the local geology has affected the history of various places.

I can't believe nobody mentioned John McPhee. I enjoyed all of his geology books; the four were republished as one volume in Annals of the Former World. http://www.amazon.com/Annals-Former-World-John-McPhee/dp/0374518734

Genre: Science/Geology

Author: John McPhee

Title: Annals of the Former World (Amazon link)

A few quotes from the book to provide some food for thought:

> If you free yourself from the conventional reaction to a quantity like a million years, you free yourself a bit from the boundaries of human time. And then in a way you do not live at all, but in another way you live forever.

and:

> If by some fiat I had to restrict all this writing to one sentence, this is the one I would choose: The summit of Mt. Everest is marine limestone.

This isn't really what you're after but may do the job - http://www.amazon.com/Annals-Former-World-John-McPhee/dp/0374518734 (Pulitzer Prize).

Thanks! I just wish I could say there were more good things on the list.

And thanks for the Patton recommendation, I'll check that out.

I do recommend anything by John McPhee in the strongest possible terms. It's all non-fiction, and always interesting and often very funny, and about a tremendous range of topics.

Like fishing? Read The Founding Fish, which is all about the American Shad, and I mentioned before.

Like boats? Looking For a Ship is about the merchant marine.

Planes, trains, and automobiles (and more boats)? Uncommon Carriers deals with all of them, and why almost all lobster eaten in the US comes from Kentucky.

Care for tales about why New Orleans is doomed, pissing on lava , and debris flows in LA? The Control of Nature covers those.

Fruit? How about Oranges?

Geology? The Annals of the Former World is a compilation of several shorter books more or less following I-80 across the US.

Sports? Tennis (and basketball to a lesser extent). He's also written about lacrosse in various magazines.

...And a ton of other stuff, ranging from bears to farmers markets to nuclear energy to lifting body airplanes to Switzerland.

What part of geology are you interested in? Annals of the Former World is the go to book when this comes up on /r/geology

Ninja edit: I haven't read it, but it's on my list of things to read.