Cold: Adventures in the World's Frozen Places
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.17 (543 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 0316042919 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 304 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2013-03-14 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
. Rather than giving the reader a dry, academic lecture on snow, glaciers, wind-chill factors and icebergs, he delivers a poetic, anecdotal narrative complete with polar expeditions, Ice Age mysteries, igloos, permafrost and hailstorms. This is a wonderful collection of one man's first-rate observations and commentary about the history and importance of cold to the earth and its occupants. Two of the most fascinating segments are the arduous task of scientific reconstruction of past climates and the magical navigation of migratory birds to warmer lands. Streever, who chairs the North Slope Science Initiative's Science Technical Advisory Panel, writes of the frostiest experience: We fail to s
If You Learn Absolutely Zero From This Book Then Your Brain Must Be Frostbitten Richard Dicanio This book is a refreshing blast of cold air.For someone who is familiar with much of both Arctic and Antarctic issues, I was impressed with obtaining more information on both supra and subnivean topics. Weather,climate,animal migration and winter habits,permafrost and various other sundry topics polar and non- polar are touched upon.Global warming was also addressed in a non threatening circuitous way as well as exploration past and present . Warmth for Cold With so much heat in our future -- global warming, Dante's Inferno, the aging Sun enlarging to swallow the Earth -- why should cold be such a fascinating topic? In long, long time, a leading theory of the end of the universe called "heat death" says that absolute cold is the fate of us all -- or at least of our atomic remains. Cold, in other words, is the natural order of things.Streever does a great job of describing the effects of this ine. Taking Forever I haven't yet finished this book, and I will edit this review after doing so. The author sets up his adventure by leading forward month by month. He begins in July. This is what I have to say: I am in the middle of his November and he has yet to experience weather that could be considered truly cold by a good number of Americans, including New Yorkers and New Englanders and those who live in the Dakotas. We find him alternately in Scotland,
From avalanches to glaciers, from seals to snowflakes, and from Shackleton's expedition to "The Year Without Summer," Bill Streever journeys through history, myth, geography, and ecology in a year-long search for cold--real, icy, 40-below cold. In July he finds it while taking a dip in a 35-degree Arctic swimming hole; in September while excavating our planet's ancient and not so ancient ice ages; and in October while exploring hibernation habits in animals, from humans to wood frogs to bears.A scientist whose passion for cold runs red hot, Streever is a wondrous guide: he conjures woolly mammoth carcasses and the ice-age Clovis tribe from melting glaciers, and he evokes blizzards so wild readers may freeze--limb by vicarious limb.