Unearthing the Underworld

"""Earth's early history is writ large in the stories encap-sulated in cliffs, roadsides, seaside quarries, and wherever the underworld has reached the light, McNamara contends, likening rocks to fascinating little books.""-- ""Explorers Journal"" ""An idiosyncratic and informative celebration of the rocks that underlie our human world, showing how they record the history of the planet and underpin the narrative of life, even though their role is too often unacknowledged. Engrossing field excursions into the wildernesses of Western Australia illuminate the stories McNamara has to tell; he explains the lithic histories embedded in everything from prehistoric monuments to the Stone of Scone. The dramas of the early history of life, extinction, evolution and climate change are all deciphered through the rock record. These wise and entertaining 'sermons in stones' pay proper respect to the billions of years of earth history that lie beneath us everywhere.""-- ""Richard Fortey, author of ""The Earth: An Intimate History"""" ""Earth scientist McNamara focuses on palaeontology and evolution. His appealing book about rocks and their lessons--illustrated with fine photographs of fossils--leaves aside igneous and metamorphic rocks, and the wonders of mineralogy. It concentrates instead on sedimentary rocks: mudstones, siltstones, sandstones and limestones, scattered over three-quarters of Earth's surface in 'endless piles.' As he jokily advises: 'Ignore rocks at your peril.'""-- ""Nature"" ""McNamara finds incredible worlds preserved in stones we tend to ignore as he explores life's rocky roads.""-- ""New Scientist"" ""Illuminating. . . McNamara (Dragonsʼ Teeth and Thunderstones) explores how sedimentary rocks form and what they can teach about the evolution of life on Earth.""-- ""Publishers Weekly"""