PLANET OCEAN, Dancing To The Fossil Record.

by Bradford Matsen

This is the paperback edition of the great pop-paleontology book with the fabulous art that inspired a show that toured the nation's natural history museums. In its own way it has inspired many people to take a new look at the fossil record and imagine creatures and things as they might have been—a blend of word and image unlike any other.

Genres: Nature, Nonfiction, Science, Art, Natural History, Biology

Paperback

First published November 1, 1994

About the author

Brad Matsen has been writing about wonders of the sea for forty years. He is the author of Jacques Cousteau: The Sea King; Descent: The Heroic Discovery of the Abyss, which was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in 2006; the New York Times bestseller Titanic's Last Secrets; Planet Ocean: A Story of Life in the Sea; and Dancing to the Fossil Record with artist Ray Troll; the award-winning Incredible Ocean Adventure series for children; and many other books.

He was creative producer for the Shape of Life, an eight-hour National Geographic television series on evolutionary biology, and has written on marine science and the environment for Mother Jones, Audubon, Natural History, and many other magazines.

Reviews

[Diane · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've spent a good portion of this year Dancing to the Fossil Record! After exploring the lives of Mary Anning and William Smith, I finally dove into Matsen and Troll's Planet Ocean. Truth be told, I became a Ray Troll fan in the late 90's when we visited the Newport Bay Aquarium in Oregon and experienced the Planet Ocean exhibit. By the next year, the exhibit came to Denver! We went to the opening of this exhibit and got to meet Ray Troll and Brad Matsen as my Planet Ocean book can now attest - signatures and artwork from the authors! I feel special. Anyway, an apology is definitely owed to Brad Matsen. I confess I initially purchased this book because of all of Ray's artwork. I kind of skimmed along with looking at the artwork. It took until this, my fossil history year, to sit down and read this book from cover to cover. Bravo Brad! Sorry it took me 16 years to dive in. Brad and Ray are the perfect fish/fossil obsessed duo to put this story together. More than once, I was wishing text books were written and illustrated like this. I enjoyed the stories and travels across the country from museums to quarries to mountains to plains. I got a kick out of the dreams, nightmare, and hallucinations (best quote attributed to Ray - "What color were the mosasaurs?") that brought beautiful gone creatures to life. Thank you for bringing perspective to my life and path on this planet. I appreciate all creatures that have gone before me. I marvel at the ever changing planet. I wish for a Tardis so I could see what happens next.

[Rowan · Rating 5 out of 5]

My dad gave me this book when I was about 7. It was far, far too advanced for me at the time, and unfortunately was misplaced during a move. But the few passages I could understand and the stunningly beautiful illustrations made a huge impression on me. I've been googling around with descriptions of remembered illustrations with almost no success, but saw Ray Troll's art featured in an article about Helicoprion sharks. I immediately recognized the art style and found the cover for Planet Ocean.

I can't, of course, really review a book I haven't seen in decades and never read. But I'm just so happy to have found this book again, I can't help it! I'm definitely going to be buying this book again.

[Julie · Rating 3 out of 5]

In a format that seems very much the precursor to "Cruisin' the Fossil Freeway" by Kirk Johnson and Ray Troll, this book takes you on a fossil finding road trip from the Burgess Shale in Canada, BC then to the Smithsonian and back through Kansas. Certainly, though the biggest trip is through the collective heads of Matsen and Troll, whose historical fictional accounts of swimming with the mosasaurs in the midwest gives scale to fright and flight. Troll's drawing as always are inspirational and whimsical, with the various quotes and asides to the text and drawings at least as much fun as the narrative.

[Valerie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really like this artist and his view of the prehistoric world.

[Terry Mulcahy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating to read, and the illustrations are colorful, detailed and lively. It is a fun look at the history of our planet's ancient lifeforms.