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Sahara: The Life of the Great Desert
"If you traveled across the United States from Boston to San Diego, you still wouldn't have crossed the Sahara," write de Villiers and Hirtle, painting a vivid picture of this most extraordinary place. They chart the genesis and course of Atlantic hurricanes, many of which are born in the Tibesti mountains of northern Chad, showing that the Sahara, which has a strong influence on weather patterns the world over, is much closer than it seems. They offer a description of the physics of windblown sand and the formation of dunes and describe in detail the massive aquifers that lie beneath the desert, some filled with water that predates the appearance of humankind on Earth. They marvel at the jagged mountains and at ancient cave paintings deep in the desert that reveal the Sahara was a verdant grassland 10,000 years ago; what's more, this cycle has been repeated several times, and may well repeat again.
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A glittering geographic tour of the astonishing history, peoples, climates, creatures, sights and sounds of the largest and most austere desert on earth.
Ten thousand years ago, the Sahara was a temperate grassland - petrified trees mark where forests used to stand, and former riverbeds are rich in the petrified bones of hippos, elephants, zebras, buffalo and gazelles. Then a slight shift in the earth's axis transformed it with astonishing speed, creating a vast desert where sand dunes arise virtually overnight.
Throughout the millennia, diverse populations have struggled to make this severe landscape home. Marq de Villiers and Sheila Hirtle chronicle the desert's nations and peoples and the legacies they have left to the sand: stone circles older than Stonehenge, Roman aqueducts, remnants of Greek fields and vineyards, and the ruins of palaces and temples from the great empires of Old Africa. Illuminated by written testimonies of past travellers, Sahara conveys the majesty, mystery and abundance of the desert's life in an evocative biography of the land and its people.
-----------
A glittering geographic tour of the astonishing history, peoples, climates, creatures, sights and sounds of the largest and most austere desert on earth.
Ten thousand years ago, the Sahara was a temperate grassland - petrified trees mark where forests used to stand, and former riverbeds are rich in the petrified bones of hippos, elephants, zebras, buffalo and gazelles. Then a slight shift in the earth's axis transformed it with astonishing speed, creating a vast desert where sand dunes arise virtually overnight.
Throughout the millennia, diverse populations have struggled to make this severe landscape home. Marq de Villiers and Sheila Hirtle chronicle the desert's nations and peoples and the legacies they have left to the sand: stone circles older than Stonehenge, Roman aqueducts, remnants of Greek fields and vineyards, and the ruins of palaces and temples from the great empires of Old Africa. Illuminated by written testimonies of past travellers, Sahara conveys the majesty, mystery and abundance of the desert's life in an evocative biography of the land and its people.
326 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
3 people are currently reading
175 people want to read
About the author
Marq de Villiers
29 books16 followersBorn in South Africa, Marq de Villiers is a veteran Canadian journalist and the author of thirteen books on exploration, history, politics, and travel, including Water: The Fate of Our Most Precious Resource (winner of the Governor General's Award for Non-Fiction). He has worked as a foreign correspondent in Moscow and through Eastern Europe and spent many years as editor and then publisher of Toronto Life magazine. More recently he was editorial director of WHERE Magazines International. He lives in Port Medway, Nova Scotia. [Penguin Canada]
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
February 7, 2017
_Sahara_ by Marq de Villiers and Sheila Hirtle is an interesting and thorough book on the natural and human history of the Sahara. Very informative and comprehensive in scope, the authors tackled a variety of subjects relating to a land known also as the Endless Emptiness or the Great Nothingness.
The Sahara is vast, stretching from the "dried-blood-red cliffs" of Mauritania on the Atlantic coast to the "bleached bone" of Egypt's Eastern Desert on the Red Sea, from the Atlas Mountains of Morocco to the Sahel in the south, a desert that covers 3,320,000 square miles. The Sahara one learns is not one vast sand sea (only about 15% is sand covered), though the dune fields (called ergs) can stretch for hundreds of miles. The desert also contains a nearly invisible network of watercourses, wadis, and riverbeds, as "faint and elusive as Martian canals" when seen in satellite photos, some that haven't born water on the surface for thousands of years; salt flats; dried lake beds; immense, grim gravel plains, utterly without feature; and massive mountain ranges, often the refuge of nomad groups, not unlike islands in the sea that is the Sahara.
The authors point to the ample evidence that the Sahara was not always desert, notably the stands of petrified wood in Algeria, Niger, and Chad and the curious calcified reeds that once grew around now extinct lakes, odd glasslike structures that mark long vanished shorelines. In actuality the region in the last several tens of thousands of years has alternated between desert and moister climes, changing back and forth due to the complex mechanics of global climate and changes in the Earth's orbit. The writers discussed the waxing and waning of the desert (apparently some areas were always arid) over the millennia as well as debates about whether or not the desert is expanding south.
Sand itself is well covered in this book, the authors providing vivid examples of ruins, buildings, and entire towns lost to migrating dunes. The origins of Saharan sand, the physics of dune formation, the various types of dunes, and how one travels through these areas are all discussed.
The chapter on Saharan weather was especially interesting. The most powerful wind is the harmattan, known as the sirocco in Algeria, called by some Tuareg and Tubu clans the shahali or shai-halad or mother of storms, a wind so powerful it has been known to send powdery fine sand up to 500 miles distant, as far as England and northern Germany. In the desert its effects can be quite devastating; ninety-plus mile an hour winds, huge electrical disturbances, drops in humidity to 10 percent, and of course massive, frightening sandstorms.
Saharan wind systems are so strong that their effects are global; fully grown grasshoppers have been deposited in Antigua. Between 60 million and a billion tons of iron-rich sand blows across the ocean each year, in some cases beneficial (important for the nourishment of upper canopy orchids in the Amazon) but more often troublesome (it has been linked to the declining health of coral in the Caribbean and creating huge blooms of toxic red tide in Florida waters).
As dry as the Sahara is, water still exists. In addition to the mighty Nile and the Niger, massive deposits of "fossil water," laid down when the region was moister, would rival the American Great Lakes if they were on the surface. Yields from wells in some areas can be quite high - up to 25,000 cubic feet of water per hour - but there is considerable debate over whether this is a renewable resource or not. Some believe that these ancient aquifers are being renewed more frequently and at a greater volume than previously estimated, a theory that is discussed.
As noted mountains exist; the enormous Ahaggar Mountains cover an area as big as France, while the spectacular Air mountains cover an area the size of Switzerland. The mountains are fascinating regions, home to intricately carved rock, secretive mountain people, and in the Tibesti Mountains, still active volcanoes.
There is an overview of some of the animals of this harsh realm. Some of the more spectacular have vanished thanks to man - elephants were found near Timbuktu as late as 1787, but were since hunted out, while ostriches vanished from Algeria early in the 20th century and hartebeests from Morocco in World War II. Ostriches - and leopards - still survive in some areas, as well as dwarf crocodiles in remote oases, the striped hyena, huge tortoises in the Sudan, monitor lizards, jerboas, fennec foxes, caracals, sand vipers, addax (the desert's largest mammal), and scorpions (much more hazardous and common than any desert snake).
Early history of man in the Sahara is covered, including the famous rock art. Also, the rise and fall of the various empires of the region are discussed, including the Garamantes, Mali, and Songhai. I will have to say this was probably the driest part of the book, as some of the intrigue and various dynasties got a bit confusing at times.
There is excellent coverage of the various nomadic groups present today; the Bedouin, the Moors, the Tubu, the Chaamba, the Berbers, and in particular the fascinating Tuareg.
The final parts of the book look at Saharan commerce and travel, examining the routes taken by caravans, the nature of caravans themselves, and the chief commodities that are bought and sold. Also great information on the all-important camel, an animal that arguably without which there would have been no Saharan civilization. The long vital salt and gold trades are well examined (the salt trade is particularly interesting), but regrettably the most profitable element of Saharan commerce was the slave trade. Until well into the 19th century half the value of Saharan traffic was in slaves. Even more unfortunately, slavery still exists; in many areas slaves weren't officially freed until the late 1960s, though unofficially they are still kept. Slavery was outlawed in Mauritania in 1980 but upwards of one hundred thousand are still slaves.
The Sahara is vast, stretching from the "dried-blood-red cliffs" of Mauritania on the Atlantic coast to the "bleached bone" of Egypt's Eastern Desert on the Red Sea, from the Atlas Mountains of Morocco to the Sahel in the south, a desert that covers 3,320,000 square miles. The Sahara one learns is not one vast sand sea (only about 15% is sand covered), though the dune fields (called ergs) can stretch for hundreds of miles. The desert also contains a nearly invisible network of watercourses, wadis, and riverbeds, as "faint and elusive as Martian canals" when seen in satellite photos, some that haven't born water on the surface for thousands of years; salt flats; dried lake beds; immense, grim gravel plains, utterly without feature; and massive mountain ranges, often the refuge of nomad groups, not unlike islands in the sea that is the Sahara.
The authors point to the ample evidence that the Sahara was not always desert, notably the stands of petrified wood in Algeria, Niger, and Chad and the curious calcified reeds that once grew around now extinct lakes, odd glasslike structures that mark long vanished shorelines. In actuality the region in the last several tens of thousands of years has alternated between desert and moister climes, changing back and forth due to the complex mechanics of global climate and changes in the Earth's orbit. The writers discussed the waxing and waning of the desert (apparently some areas were always arid) over the millennia as well as debates about whether or not the desert is expanding south.
Sand itself is well covered in this book, the authors providing vivid examples of ruins, buildings, and entire towns lost to migrating dunes. The origins of Saharan sand, the physics of dune formation, the various types of dunes, and how one travels through these areas are all discussed.
The chapter on Saharan weather was especially interesting. The most powerful wind is the harmattan, known as the sirocco in Algeria, called by some Tuareg and Tubu clans the shahali or shai-halad or mother of storms, a wind so powerful it has been known to send powdery fine sand up to 500 miles distant, as far as England and northern Germany. In the desert its effects can be quite devastating; ninety-plus mile an hour winds, huge electrical disturbances, drops in humidity to 10 percent, and of course massive, frightening sandstorms.
Saharan wind systems are so strong that their effects are global; fully grown grasshoppers have been deposited in Antigua. Between 60 million and a billion tons of iron-rich sand blows across the ocean each year, in some cases beneficial (important for the nourishment of upper canopy orchids in the Amazon) but more often troublesome (it has been linked to the declining health of coral in the Caribbean and creating huge blooms of toxic red tide in Florida waters).
As dry as the Sahara is, water still exists. In addition to the mighty Nile and the Niger, massive deposits of "fossil water," laid down when the region was moister, would rival the American Great Lakes if they were on the surface. Yields from wells in some areas can be quite high - up to 25,000 cubic feet of water per hour - but there is considerable debate over whether this is a renewable resource or not. Some believe that these ancient aquifers are being renewed more frequently and at a greater volume than previously estimated, a theory that is discussed.
As noted mountains exist; the enormous Ahaggar Mountains cover an area as big as France, while the spectacular Air mountains cover an area the size of Switzerland. The mountains are fascinating regions, home to intricately carved rock, secretive mountain people, and in the Tibesti Mountains, still active volcanoes.
There is an overview of some of the animals of this harsh realm. Some of the more spectacular have vanished thanks to man - elephants were found near Timbuktu as late as 1787, but were since hunted out, while ostriches vanished from Algeria early in the 20th century and hartebeests from Morocco in World War II. Ostriches - and leopards - still survive in some areas, as well as dwarf crocodiles in remote oases, the striped hyena, huge tortoises in the Sudan, monitor lizards, jerboas, fennec foxes, caracals, sand vipers, addax (the desert's largest mammal), and scorpions (much more hazardous and common than any desert snake).
Early history of man in the Sahara is covered, including the famous rock art. Also, the rise and fall of the various empires of the region are discussed, including the Garamantes, Mali, and Songhai. I will have to say this was probably the driest part of the book, as some of the intrigue and various dynasties got a bit confusing at times.
There is excellent coverage of the various nomadic groups present today; the Bedouin, the Moors, the Tubu, the Chaamba, the Berbers, and in particular the fascinating Tuareg.
The final parts of the book look at Saharan commerce and travel, examining the routes taken by caravans, the nature of caravans themselves, and the chief commodities that are bought and sold. Also great information on the all-important camel, an animal that arguably without which there would have been no Saharan civilization. The long vital salt and gold trades are well examined (the salt trade is particularly interesting), but regrettably the most profitable element of Saharan commerce was the slave trade. Until well into the 19th century half the value of Saharan traffic was in slaves. Even more unfortunately, slavery still exists; in many areas slaves weren't officially freed until the late 1960s, though unofficially they are still kept. Slavery was outlawed in Mauritania in 1980 but upwards of one hundred thousand are still slaves.
July 21, 2013
The following quotes represent what I sought ... the writing by Villiers and Hirtle flowed clearly, encouraging me to read far more than intended.
“In Chad … shells as large as dinner plates litter the former riverbed, as do the fossilized bones of fish six feet or more in length. Paleolithic fishing settlements dating back fifty thousand years … stone harpoon-heads … desert ancient bottoms of Lake Chad …
Nile: “The end of the last glacial period, about fifteen thousand years ago, was everywhere marked by a tremendous increase in rainfall. The Sahara had been a desert throught the Ice Age, but during this early Holocene period, as the ice melted and the rainfall increased, lake levels in America, Europe, and everywhere else, including Africa, peaked approximately twelve thousand years ago (the so-call Allerod Warm Stage) and then again about nine thousand years ago (the Boreal Warm Stage). The record of the Nile sediments is similar. The Nile, and probably the Niger River too, became completely blocked with drifting sand during the latter arid years of the Pleistocene, when glaciers gripped the continents north of the tropics.
When solar radiation increased and the glaciers began their retreat, the rains came back; the tremendous increases in the Nile flows, and therefore its sediments, also occurred twelve thousand and again nine thousand years ago.
“These fecund Holocene years showed increased monsoonal rains. Once again, the Sahel, the southern desert boundary, was four to five degrees of latitude farther north than it is now, and contained a series of lakes that flooded annually with water draining from the Saharan highlands. Savanna grasses spread across the desert; the lakes and wadis filled up, and rivers teemed with fish. Lake Chad was fifteen times its present size. Forests appeared: Atlas cedar, sycamore, ash, linden, and willow grew throughout the modern Sahara …
“In the mid-Holocene period, mean average temperatures were two or three degrees hotter than today (four degrees in Arctic and sub-Arctic regions). These were ideal conditions for the flowering of human cultures. The summers were balmy and the growing seasons extended a month each way …
“Then, six, seven, eight thousand years ago the Sahara began to dry up again, transforming itself … sinto the greatest desert on earth
“In Chad … shells as large as dinner plates litter the former riverbed, as do the fossilized bones of fish six feet or more in length. Paleolithic fishing settlements dating back fifty thousand years … stone harpoon-heads … desert ancient bottoms of Lake Chad …
Nile: “The end of the last glacial period, about fifteen thousand years ago, was everywhere marked by a tremendous increase in rainfall. The Sahara had been a desert throught the Ice Age, but during this early Holocene period, as the ice melted and the rainfall increased, lake levels in America, Europe, and everywhere else, including Africa, peaked approximately twelve thousand years ago (the so-call Allerod Warm Stage) and then again about nine thousand years ago (the Boreal Warm Stage). The record of the Nile sediments is similar. The Nile, and probably the Niger River too, became completely blocked with drifting sand during the latter arid years of the Pleistocene, when glaciers gripped the continents north of the tropics.
When solar radiation increased and the glaciers began their retreat, the rains came back; the tremendous increases in the Nile flows, and therefore its sediments, also occurred twelve thousand and again nine thousand years ago.
“These fecund Holocene years showed increased monsoonal rains. Once again, the Sahel, the southern desert boundary, was four to five degrees of latitude farther north than it is now, and contained a series of lakes that flooded annually with water draining from the Saharan highlands. Savanna grasses spread across the desert; the lakes and wadis filled up, and rivers teemed with fish. Lake Chad was fifteen times its present size. Forests appeared: Atlas cedar, sycamore, ash, linden, and willow grew throughout the modern Sahara …
“In the mid-Holocene period, mean average temperatures were two or three degrees hotter than today (four degrees in Arctic and sub-Arctic regions). These were ideal conditions for the flowering of human cultures. The summers were balmy and the growing seasons extended a month each way …
“Then, six, seven, eight thousand years ago the Sahara began to dry up again, transforming itself … sinto the greatest desert on earth
December 14, 2025
Ten thousand years go the Sahara was sparsely populated temperate grassland. A shift in the earth’s access transformed this grassland into the world’s largest desert which forced most of the Saharan population to the valleys of the River Nile River. Sahara: the life of the great desert makes an understanding of this huge geographic entity and its peoples and empires accessible to the general readers. De Villiers and Hirtle who reside in Lunenburg Nova Scotia have the rare ability to make geography and history of this poorly understood region amazing and exciting and demonstrate its importance to global climate and the development of western civilization.
The first section on geography includes the reiteration of the correct description in the 14th Century by Leo Africanus of major five deserts which constitute the Sahara. It is possible to grasp the modern countries which make up the Sahara by their description in clusters. In the north Algeria Libya with Tunisia and Morocco as lesser presence, to the south Mali, Niger and Chad, to the West Mauretania and Western Sahara and in the east Sudan and Egypt. I was surprised that sand only makes up 15% of the Sahara and fascinated by the fact of the sand's origin Saharan lakes, how dunes are formed and how small sand particles moves by a jumping action called saltation and larger particles by impact creep. The global impact of the Harmattan and other Saharan winds including the birth of hurricanes some of which devastate the new world, the aquifers’ rivers, mountains (Massifs) and ancient and current life forms of the Sahara all make the Sahara more interesting.
The book’s second section reviews peoples and empires; including the great ancient empires of the southern Sahara and the population shifts from the Sahara to the shores of the river Nile which made the Pharonic Egyptian civilizations possible. The trade of gold, salt, slaves along the caravan routes, the types of camels and the modern nomads in particular the Turareg are well described.
Sahara the life of the great desert is makes an understanding of this huge geographic entity accessible. This desert is significant to world climate and can no more be ignored than the polar ice caps or the Amazon rain forests. It is also critical to an understanding of African history. Not only for the countries that are part of the Sahara but also the 10 countries have that made up the Nile basin. It is likely that the “Nilotic” peoples who inhabit the countries from Egypt to Burundi originated from the Saharan grasslands as they were transformed into deserts.
This book is highly recommended but is not a light read. If you are going to read anything about the Sahara Desert this is where you should start. To understand Africa, you need to understand the Sahara and to understand ancient Egypt you must also understand the Nilotic migrations.
The first section on geography includes the reiteration of the correct description in the 14th Century by Leo Africanus of major five deserts which constitute the Sahara. It is possible to grasp the modern countries which make up the Sahara by their description in clusters. In the north Algeria Libya with Tunisia and Morocco as lesser presence, to the south Mali, Niger and Chad, to the West Mauretania and Western Sahara and in the east Sudan and Egypt. I was surprised that sand only makes up 15% of the Sahara and fascinated by the fact of the sand's origin Saharan lakes, how dunes are formed and how small sand particles moves by a jumping action called saltation and larger particles by impact creep. The global impact of the Harmattan and other Saharan winds including the birth of hurricanes some of which devastate the new world, the aquifers’ rivers, mountains (Massifs) and ancient and current life forms of the Sahara all make the Sahara more interesting.
The book’s second section reviews peoples and empires; including the great ancient empires of the southern Sahara and the population shifts from the Sahara to the shores of the river Nile which made the Pharonic Egyptian civilizations possible. The trade of gold, salt, slaves along the caravan routes, the types of camels and the modern nomads in particular the Turareg are well described.
Sahara the life of the great desert is makes an understanding of this huge geographic entity accessible. This desert is significant to world climate and can no more be ignored than the polar ice caps or the Amazon rain forests. It is also critical to an understanding of African history. Not only for the countries that are part of the Sahara but also the 10 countries have that made up the Nile basin. It is likely that the “Nilotic” peoples who inhabit the countries from Egypt to Burundi originated from the Saharan grasslands as they were transformed into deserts.
This book is highly recommended but is not a light read. If you are going to read anything about the Sahara Desert this is where you should start. To understand Africa, you need to understand the Sahara and to understand ancient Egypt you must also understand the Nilotic migrations.
May 29, 2023
This book paints a vivid picture of the Sahara, fundamentally re-writing our interpretation of the greatest desert on earth. From mountains and dunes to tribes and traditions - this is a history of place and people over a timescale impossible to comprehend. I found myself learning new things almost constantly along this journey. Should I give my water to the traveler dying of thirst? How many camels should I bring along with me for the journey? Where are mirages more than just visions? Which languages are known? Which histories are forgotten? How is all of this linked to global trade and Florida hurricanes? It's easy to get lost within the marvel of a truly epic story with endless scope.
For all fascinating minutiae, the Sahara is first and foremost an opportunity to learn more about one of the world's least known and most misunderstood regions.
I was stunned to learn about the environmental history of the Sahara and the rapid changes which have transformed it. I marvel at the enormous mountains among the sands larger than France and Switzerland combined. It's fascinating to get insight into commerce, travel, and nomadic life - in particularly the beliefs and traditions of the Tuareg.
The book shines brightest when it asks questions that we often take for granted -- "where is all of the sand from, anyway?"
However, the book has a tremendously wide scope - in it's description of nature I felt rewarded, but in the intricacies of tribes, nations, cities, and histories this book can be daunting.
For all fascinating minutiae, the Sahara is first and foremost an opportunity to learn more about one of the world's least known and most misunderstood regions.
I was stunned to learn about the environmental history of the Sahara and the rapid changes which have transformed it. I marvel at the enormous mountains among the sands larger than France and Switzerland combined. It's fascinating to get insight into commerce, travel, and nomadic life - in particularly the beliefs and traditions of the Tuareg.
The book shines brightest when it asks questions that we often take for granted -- "where is all of the sand from, anyway?"
However, the book has a tremendously wide scope - in it's description of nature I felt rewarded, but in the intricacies of tribes, nations, cities, and histories this book can be daunting.
November 13, 2024
Just finished reading this book esp since I was visiting friends in Mahone Bay and the author now lives nearby in Lunenburg, NS. His focus on Mauritania is excellent as i had recently worked there as an ESL teacher in Nouakchott. It was a hardship posting but the city itself is in the Sahel region but the Sahara is close enough and from time to time the city is engulfed by never ending sandstorms from the Sahara. I wondered why he had not listed Michael Asher's book on his trek across the Sahara from West to East.
Nevertheless, the book is brilliant.
Nevertheless, the book is brilliant.
July 25, 2019
An absolutely beautiful portrayal of the vast geography and cultures embraced within the boarders if the Saraha. The authors ask questions that I never would have even considered. "Where is all of the sand from, anyway?" among the ones that stood out to me.
Highly recommend, especially ahead of any trip that you might be taking to one of the region's nations. If only to give yourself a great background on the desert's geography and ecology.
Highly recommend, especially ahead of any trip that you might be taking to one of the region's nations. If only to give yourself a great background on the desert's geography and ecology.
August 7, 2019
I enjoyed the chapters about the physical nature of the Sahara much more than the chapters about the peoples of the Sahara. I think that it came down to an impossible task, which was to summarize the histories of dozens of different tribes, invaders, and cities all in a single section of a single book. By necessity the coverage of each group/city had to be brief, and this gave very little feeling for what they were really like. The nature chapters, however, were outstanding.
May 1, 2013
This was a wonderful read - at least for one with a (healthy!) obsession with the Sahara. The life of the great desert, as its subtitle goes, is divided into two parts: The Place Itself which is about the geography and natural history and The People which is rather self-explanatory.
The part on geography is especially notable for debunking several myths about the desert - especially that it is just a huge sea of sand (sand in fact covers only c.15% of the Sahara and the rest is mountains and massive plains of gravel and stone) and that it is empty and pretty much lifeless.
The second part describes the old kingdoms of the area and the people living there now and of the trade and trade routes.
Even the pocketbook edition has good maps and black and white photographs. A great read.
The part on geography is especially notable for debunking several myths about the desert - especially that it is just a huge sea of sand (sand in fact covers only c.15% of the Sahara and the rest is mountains and massive plains of gravel and stone) and that it is empty and pretty much lifeless.
The second part describes the old kingdoms of the area and the people living there now and of the trade and trade routes.
Even the pocketbook edition has good maps and black and white photographs. A great read.
June 2, 2013
Forgive me for saying this, but it's a bit...dry.
The authors clearly intend to conjure the sweep of the Sahara through languorous prose, piling descriptor after descriptor onto each sentence, sometimes adding random facts, or backtracking and changing the topic of the sentence entirely, leading to something overstuffed with information and yet oddly incomplete, no thought having been fully developed, only the haze of romanticized description remaining to mask the essential infodump nature of the text, to say nothing of the syntax.
You get the idea.
Lots of information in here, but most of it speeds by so fast and in so little depth that it feels more like a highlight reel on fast-forward. Perhaps the topic is simply too big.
The authors clearly intend to conjure the sweep of the Sahara through languorous prose, piling descriptor after descriptor onto each sentence, sometimes adding random facts, or backtracking and changing the topic of the sentence entirely, leading to something overstuffed with information and yet oddly incomplete, no thought having been fully developed, only the haze of romanticized description remaining to mask the essential infodump nature of the text, to say nothing of the syntax.
You get the idea.
Lots of information in here, but most of it speeds by so fast and in so little depth that it feels more like a highlight reel on fast-forward. Perhaps the topic is simply too big.
July 8, 2011
Natural history of the Sahara; fascinating read. Author is a journalist with a definite geographic bent to his nature. This is one of several of his and his often co-author Sheila Hirtle's books that I have read. If you are interested in natural history, geology, anthropology and/or geography, you will enjoy this book - you will also enjoy it if you are just naturally curious about the wider world in which we live.
May 16, 2008
This book lives up to its title. The authors re-tell the story of the Sahara from earliest times to the present. Did you know that there are massive amounts of evidence that show the Sahara, as recently as 13,000 years ago had a climate like the American/Canadian great plains or even moister? The salt trade still flourishes. The Tuareg are still blue. Read this book and find out.
October 19, 2007
Well-written summary of the entire Sahara region -- geography, history and ethnography. Great place to start if you have a general interest, but if you want more in-depth information (or if you've already watched several Discovery/History Channel specials about it), you'll want to look elsewhere.
August 27, 2014
Very thorough and well-written overview of the Sahara - not only its natural history (how it was formed, etc), but the history of its people and cultures. A good place to start when researching the Sahara for the first time.
September 16, 2008
interesting topic, but not the smoothest read...
put-aside
August 25, 2014This book requires more maps. Somewhat frustrating to read without maps to give me a sense of place.
November 15, 2014
Fascinating.
July 25, 2012
Beautiful images, fascinating natural history. I loved this book!
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews