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Apocalyptic Planet Field Guide to the Neverending Earth Craig Childs
Craig Childs takes readers on a firsthand journey through apocalypse, touching the truth behind the speculation. This book is a combination of science and adventure that reveals the ways in which our world is constantly moving toward its end and how we can change our place within the cycles and episodes that rule it. (Taken from book jacket.)
343 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2012
106 people are currently reading
1883 people want to read
About the author
Craig Childs
32 books398 followersCRAIG CHILDS is a commentator for NPR's Morning Edition, and his work has appeared in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Men's Journal, Outside, The Sun, and Orion. He has won numerous awards including the 2011 Ellen Meloy Desert Writers Award, 2008 Rowell Award for the Art of Adventure, the 2007 Sigurd Olson Nature Writing Award, and the 2003 Spirit of the West Award for his body of work.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 135 reviews
March 3, 2016
i don't know which to envy more: this guy's fitness level, his life, or his ability to write a stunningly beautiful sentence.
i came across this book while researching the probable effects of climate change, and it's a good read if you want to educate yourself on that subject. i learned more about desertification, for example, than in any other book i've read so far.
but the book totally lacks the doom & gloom quotient of other books, and contains a lot more besides.
Childs roams around the world in this book visiting extreme environments. in extreme ways. he doesn't just do a quick scientist interview and serve up the facts, he puts on a 70-pound backpack and walks out into it. the sensory detail in this book is astounding--sight, of course, but also touch sound taste feel smell and some lovely philosophizing on what's around him. if writing can ever make you feel you've been there, his writing does.
we learn a lot of the earth's history as well--geology, hydrology, what a Hadley Cell is, how environments migrate around. yet all the scholarship is folded into such beautiful descriptive language, it never feels like a slog.
sometimes the book's just plain terrifying: i'm going to have nightmares about his river trip in Tibet, and i've never done any white-water rafting.
but i will also have dreams of the sound of a salt pillar, what blue looks like inside a glacier, what the endless churn of volcanism says to we fragile creatures riding the skin of a burning ball in space.
amazing book. just amazing.
i came across this book while researching the probable effects of climate change, and it's a good read if you want to educate yourself on that subject. i learned more about desertification, for example, than in any other book i've read so far.
but the book totally lacks the doom & gloom quotient of other books, and contains a lot more besides.
Childs roams around the world in this book visiting extreme environments. in extreme ways. he doesn't just do a quick scientist interview and serve up the facts, he puts on a 70-pound backpack and walks out into it. the sensory detail in this book is astounding--sight, of course, but also touch sound taste feel smell and some lovely philosophizing on what's around him. if writing can ever make you feel you've been there, his writing does.
we learn a lot of the earth's history as well--geology, hydrology, what a Hadley Cell is, how environments migrate around. yet all the scholarship is folded into such beautiful descriptive language, it never feels like a slog.
sometimes the book's just plain terrifying: i'm going to have nightmares about his river trip in Tibet, and i've never done any white-water rafting.
but i will also have dreams of the sound of a salt pillar, what blue looks like inside a glacier, what the endless churn of volcanism says to we fragile creatures riding the skin of a burning ball in space.
amazing book. just amazing.
March 18, 2015
I've long been fascinated with apocalypse, although traditionally in fiction form. Nonfiction read on the topic seemed in order. This book won awards and it's easy to see why. The writing is quite excellent, impressively literary. So much so in fact that the book doesn't even have prerequisite photo section so many nonfictions tend to, the descriptions are vivid enough. Chapter by chapter the author sets off on what to a layperson seems like exceptionally masochistic trips in the world's most extreme, most desolate and most human unfriendly places and then chronicles his adventures in a concise intelligent highly informative fashion. This is a really good travelogue/science & nature hybrid, sort of a love letter to the stunning and dangerous planet that may not be around as long as we think and hope and all the ways it would end. To continue with a love metaphor, this is a 50 ways to leave your lover of sorts, with the world as we know it doing the leaving. Ok, considerably less than 50, but it's still quite something. Well written, entertaining and highly educational this was a very good read. Recommended.
May 10, 2018
I’m a sucker for apocalyptic places or weather. Growing up on America’s Eastern Seaboard, we would often experience hurricanes with torrential rain and incredible wind. I remember the urge to duck my head outdoors to feel what my ears were hearing (before my mom wisely pulled my butt away from the door on multiple occasions). As an adult I frequently on my vacations find some remote mountain to climb where visitors are few and I can experience what it might be like to be the last person on earth (until a volunteer/ranger tells me on multiple occasions that it’s too dangerous to be hiking there and to stop immediately. I rarely do.)
Craig Childs book “Apocalyptic Planet” takes us to these remote places and gives us a taste of how they came to be and how their disappearance in a rapidly changing environment could be disastrous for our future. Whether it is the melting glaciers of Greenland, violent river torrents in Tibet (why the hell is he kayaking these?!), the deserts of Arizona, or the volcanoes of Hawaii, Childs experiences these environments first hand in some truly thrilling and at times terrifying writing. While it’s hard to be positive about the future of the planet while watching massive chunks of ancient ice break away and melt into the sea tight before your eyes, he is ultimately still optimistic about our ability to survive in the face of some environmental cataclysm. Ultimately the story of the earth is about destruction and regeneration. We have been to the brink as a species and planet so many times in our history, and yet always manage to make it back. This is not to say that massive changes to how we interact with the earth shouldn’t happen, they clearly need to. However even in the worst case scenario, something, no matter how microscopic, will always survive and reproduce. It may take a generation or hundreds of millions of years, but like tiny ferns growing in the desolate lava pits of Hawaii, life in the end always wins out.
Craig Childs book “Apocalyptic Planet” takes us to these remote places and gives us a taste of how they came to be and how their disappearance in a rapidly changing environment could be disastrous for our future. Whether it is the melting glaciers of Greenland, violent river torrents in Tibet (why the hell is he kayaking these?!), the deserts of Arizona, or the volcanoes of Hawaii, Childs experiences these environments first hand in some truly thrilling and at times terrifying writing. While it’s hard to be positive about the future of the planet while watching massive chunks of ancient ice break away and melt into the sea tight before your eyes, he is ultimately still optimistic about our ability to survive in the face of some environmental cataclysm. Ultimately the story of the earth is about destruction and regeneration. We have been to the brink as a species and planet so many times in our history, and yet always manage to make it back. This is not to say that massive changes to how we interact with the earth shouldn’t happen, they clearly need to. However even in the worst case scenario, something, no matter how microscopic, will always survive and reproduce. It may take a generation or hundreds of millions of years, but like tiny ferns growing in the desolate lava pits of Hawaii, life in the end always wins out.
April 26, 2013
When I picked up this book, I had more than one list in my head of what to keep handy in the event of planetary catastrophe. I wrote letters and protested oil pipelines, nuclear containment wells miles deep in the earth, crabbed about congressmen who pay homage to robber barons, and vote to end life on earth as we know it routinely, like brushing their teeth or taking out the garbage. Well. Turns out earth can take care of herself, thank you very much. Not only earth, but the solar system and beyond that, the universe. One of the more amazing books I've read, maybe the most amazing. I feel wonderful about earth right now, with the intensity you feel about a lover when that person demonstrates once more why you love. The book is divided into many ways the earth could end, and Childs walks, sleeps, eats in each one, and shares the experience in a way that is remarkable for its communication depth and breadth. Overrun by a Tibetan gorge river wave. Baked in a salt desert. Tiptoeing through a live lava flow. Staring out at the madness of snow and ice and nothing else but the horizon. We are reminded that our core is molten, radiation dense, overlain with tectonic plates that grind against each other and raise mountains and eat CO2 levels, create glaciers. And heal from cataclysmic assaults like the Late Heavy Bombardment. Childs writes with crystalline clarity and dreamlike bonding both; a poet explorer, a compelling literary combination of insanity and nirvana. I am humbled and awed, by the writing, the adventure and the awesome power of earth and its place in the galaxy. Life goes on. And will go on, even when I can no longer read about it.
April 28, 2017
I'm stretching it a little bit to give this book 3 stars. It does have some parts that are pretty fascinating and the author seems to know a lot about a lot of somewhat odd things. I have written notes about each chapter so I'm not going to be repetitious in this review. The guy writes well. Is this a travelog? An adventure story? Accurately scientific? He did occasionally make me want to get off my butt and go out and see the world again. He reminded me of some of the places in the world that I have actually been at some point in my life and that was nice. But what I mostly got out of this book was the realization that all of the things that threaten the earth like mostly what we hear about these days is climate change all of these things May very likely end life on earth but it is most likely that the earth itself will go on as it has for billions of years and many many changes some of which have been extraordinarily dramatic. For some strange reason I find that fact to be an enjoyable realization. The closest timeframe that the author suggests for the end of human life is 3000 to 10,000 years if we manage to melt all the ice. So I guess if you are reading this you can rest easy.
October 21, 2012
The fact that I went to see this author do a reading certainly adds to my experience of this book, but even if I were to ignore Child's excellent presentation, this book still gets 5 stars from me.
In Apocalyptic Planet: The story of the Everending Earth, Craig Childs looks at a series of planetary end scenarios. Each frightening and fascinating and most are events that have already happened on this planet at some point--asteroid strikes, super volcanos and the like. He describes the end scenarios in a series of on-location spots where the conditions/landscape is similar to end-like conditions. He goes to the Atacama, the Greenland ice sheet, the retreating glaciers of the Patagonia, the corn fields of Iowa, the lava fields in Hawaii, the mountains of Tibet (you get the idea) and from these locations he discusses possible end scenarios for our species.
I recommend this book for geology nerds of all stripes, environmentally concerned, preppers (you will quickly come to see how inadequate your prepping is), and anyone interested in natural history.
In Apocalyptic Planet: The story of the Everending Earth, Craig Childs looks at a series of planetary end scenarios. Each frightening and fascinating and most are events that have already happened on this planet at some point--asteroid strikes, super volcanos and the like. He describes the end scenarios in a series of on-location spots where the conditions/landscape is similar to end-like conditions. He goes to the Atacama, the Greenland ice sheet, the retreating glaciers of the Patagonia, the corn fields of Iowa, the lava fields in Hawaii, the mountains of Tibet (you get the idea) and from these locations he discusses possible end scenarios for our species.
I recommend this book for geology nerds of all stripes, environmentally concerned, preppers (you will quickly come to see how inadequate your prepping is), and anyone interested in natural history.
March 26, 2015
Craig Childs is a nature writer and globetrotting adventure hog. He’s been thinking a lot about apocalypse lately. It’s hard not to. The jungle drums are pounding out a growing stream of warnings — attention! — big trouble ahead.
The Christian currents in our culture encourage us to perceive time as being something like a drag strip. At one end is the starting line (creation), and at the other end is the finish line (judgment day). We’re speeding closer and closer to the end, which some perceive to be the final Game Over for everything everywhere. Childs disagrees. “We are not on a one-way trip to a brown and sandblasted planet.”
He was lucky to survive into adulthood still possessing an unfettered imagination, and he can zoom right over packs of snarling dogmas that disembowel most folks who attempt to think outside the box. In his book Apocalyptic Planet, he gives readers a helpful primer on eco-catastrophe. The bottom line is that Earth is constantly changing, and it’s not uncommon for change events to be sudden and catastrophic.
He purports that the big storm on the horizon today is not “The Apocalypse.” It’s just one more turbulent era in a four billion year story. Out of the pile of planetary disasters, he selects nine examples, travels to locations that illustrate each one, and then spins stories. Each tale cuts back and forth between his adventures at the site, and background information from assorted sources. It’s an apocalypse buffet.
Deserts are a quarter of all land, and many are growing now. History tells us that they can expand and contract rapidly, taking out societies in the process. Four out of ten people live in regions prone to drying up. New Mexico once experienced a drought that lasted 1,000 years. Beneath the driest regions of the Sahara, pollen samples indicate that the land was once tropical savannah and woodlands. A few years ago, Atlanta, Georgia (not an arid region) came close to draining its water supply during a long drought.
Glaciers are melting at rate that alarms people who think. Childs visited the Northern Patagonia Ice Field, where hunks the size of buildings were crashing down off the edge of the dying glacier. Enormous volumes of melt water are raising the global sea level. He also visited the Bering Sea, where the old land bridge is now 340 feet (103 m) underwater. Beringia was once a broad treeless steppe, home to an amazing community of megafauna. If climate change eliminates all ice, the seas could rise another 120 feet (36 m) or so, and major rivers will run dry from lack of melt water. About 40 percent of humankind resides near coasts. Nobody knows how fast the seas will rise, or how much.
The planet has been smacked countless times by asteroids. Many believe that the dinosaur era was terminated by the Chicxubal impact on the Yucatan Peninsula. There are many, many objects zooming around in space that could hit us, but Childs recommends that our time would be better spent worrying about catastrophic volcanic eruptions. There are daily eruptions from 200 active volcanoes. Extreme eruptions have loaded the atmosphere with dust, blocking out sunlight, leading to winters that lasted for years. Humankind once had a close call with extinction when Mount Toba erupted 73,000 years ago.
Climate change is likely to affect the movement of the planet’s tectonic plates. As glaciers melt and dam reservoirs evaporate, there will be less weight on the land below, allowing it to rise. Tectonic shifts can lead to earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, and altered ocean currents and weather patterns.
All civilizations are temporary outbursts of overbreeding and harmful lifestyles. On a visit to Mayan ruins in Guatemala, Childs discussed their collapse, the result of a combination of factors. “The issue, ultimately, was carrying capacity.” Over the years, I’ve often seen people sharing their opinions of the Earth’s carrying capacity for humans. Estimates usually range between 100 million and 15 billion, as if there is one correct answer.
Actually, the long-term carrying capacity is constantly changing, and these days it’s getting smaller and smaller. Ocean acidification, chronic overfishing, and other harms have sharply reduced the vitality of marine ecosystems. Chronic forest mining, soil mining, and industrialization have sharply reduced the vitality of terrestrial ecosystems.
The fossil energy bubble enabled a huge temporary spike in carrying capacity, but as we move beyond peak, we’ll discover that the long-term carrying capacity is far less than it was 10,000 years ago, when the ecosystem enjoyed excellent health. Climate change is likely to reduce it further still, as large numbers of plant and animal species go extinct.
There have been five mass extinction events in ages past, and we are now in the sixth. Childs takes us on an amusing visit to the site of a catastrophic mass extinction, the state of Iowa, where 90 percent of the ecosystem has been reduced to agriculture. He and a buddy spent two days hiking through fields, dwarfed by tall stalks of corn (maize), during a week of blast furnace heat.
They were looking for signs of life besides corn, and they found almost none. The ecosystem was once home to 300 species of plants, 60 mammals, 300 birds, and over 1,000 insects. “This had historically been tallgrass prairie, one of the largest and most diverse biomasses in North America where a person on horseback could not be seen for the height of the grass.” The sixth mass extinction is unlike the previous five, in that it is the result of human activities, an embarrassing accomplishment.
Yeast devours sugar and converts it into alcohol and carbon dioxide. When yeast are added to a vat of freshly pressed grape juice, they plunge into a sweet paradise, and promptly produce a bubbly population explosion. The alcohol in the vat will keep increasing until it reaches toxic levels, at which point the yeast experience a mass extinction event, the tragic consequence of living in an artificial environment constructed by thirsty alcoholics.
Childs believes that civilization and human domination of the planet waited until recently because we thrive in warm weather. Humans evolved in a tropical climate. Eventually, we migrated into non-tropical climates, and developed the skills and technology necessary for surviving in chilly weather, but the ice ages were a time of struggle, not a sweet paradise. Then, a freak thing happened. The weather got warm, and stayed warm, for 10,000 years. Suddenly, we were like yeast in grape juice. Yippee!
The 800-pound gorilla in this book is climate change, and concern about the decades that lie before us. Childs cites the views of a number of scientists, and they are all over the place. A loose cannon at the EPA says that global warming is a hoax, but the others agree that the climate is warming, and humans are the primary culprits. Some think that we’ve passed the tipping point, and all ice will soon be gone. Others think that if emissions are reduced, disaster might be avoided. One is sure that technology will fix everything — geoengineering will allow us to control the planet’s climate like a thermostat. Another says that humankind will be gone in 100 years.
Climate history tells us that global temperatures commonly swing up and down, sometimes as much as 10° to 12°C. Huge temperature swings lead to extinctions, but life on Earth has persisted. The current jump in temperature is unlike the previous ones in that it is the outcome of human activities. It is the result of a unique combination of factors, with no historical precedent. Humans are unique in being able to adapt to a wide variety of ecosystems, but ecosystems are far less adaptable to sudden climate shifts. Agriculture is on thin ice, as are seven billion people.
In a hut on the Greenland ice sheet, Childs had a long chat with José Rial, a chaos researcher and climate change scholar. Rial understands that nature is highly unstable, and quite capable of rapid and unpredictable changes. “What we study doesn’t always help us predict very much, but it helps us to understand what is possible.” Childs added, “He knows that the actual future is the one we never expect.”
The Christian currents in our culture encourage us to perceive time as being something like a drag strip. At one end is the starting line (creation), and at the other end is the finish line (judgment day). We’re speeding closer and closer to the end, which some perceive to be the final Game Over for everything everywhere. Childs disagrees. “We are not on a one-way trip to a brown and sandblasted planet.”
He was lucky to survive into adulthood still possessing an unfettered imagination, and he can zoom right over packs of snarling dogmas that disembowel most folks who attempt to think outside the box. In his book Apocalyptic Planet, he gives readers a helpful primer on eco-catastrophe. The bottom line is that Earth is constantly changing, and it’s not uncommon for change events to be sudden and catastrophic.
He purports that the big storm on the horizon today is not “The Apocalypse.” It’s just one more turbulent era in a four billion year story. Out of the pile of planetary disasters, he selects nine examples, travels to locations that illustrate each one, and then spins stories. Each tale cuts back and forth between his adventures at the site, and background information from assorted sources. It’s an apocalypse buffet.
Deserts are a quarter of all land, and many are growing now. History tells us that they can expand and contract rapidly, taking out societies in the process. Four out of ten people live in regions prone to drying up. New Mexico once experienced a drought that lasted 1,000 years. Beneath the driest regions of the Sahara, pollen samples indicate that the land was once tropical savannah and woodlands. A few years ago, Atlanta, Georgia (not an arid region) came close to draining its water supply during a long drought.
Glaciers are melting at rate that alarms people who think. Childs visited the Northern Patagonia Ice Field, where hunks the size of buildings were crashing down off the edge of the dying glacier. Enormous volumes of melt water are raising the global sea level. He also visited the Bering Sea, where the old land bridge is now 340 feet (103 m) underwater. Beringia was once a broad treeless steppe, home to an amazing community of megafauna. If climate change eliminates all ice, the seas could rise another 120 feet (36 m) or so, and major rivers will run dry from lack of melt water. About 40 percent of humankind resides near coasts. Nobody knows how fast the seas will rise, or how much.
The planet has been smacked countless times by asteroids. Many believe that the dinosaur era was terminated by the Chicxubal impact on the Yucatan Peninsula. There are many, many objects zooming around in space that could hit us, but Childs recommends that our time would be better spent worrying about catastrophic volcanic eruptions. There are daily eruptions from 200 active volcanoes. Extreme eruptions have loaded the atmosphere with dust, blocking out sunlight, leading to winters that lasted for years. Humankind once had a close call with extinction when Mount Toba erupted 73,000 years ago.
Climate change is likely to affect the movement of the planet’s tectonic plates. As glaciers melt and dam reservoirs evaporate, there will be less weight on the land below, allowing it to rise. Tectonic shifts can lead to earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, and altered ocean currents and weather patterns.
All civilizations are temporary outbursts of overbreeding and harmful lifestyles. On a visit to Mayan ruins in Guatemala, Childs discussed their collapse, the result of a combination of factors. “The issue, ultimately, was carrying capacity.” Over the years, I’ve often seen people sharing their opinions of the Earth’s carrying capacity for humans. Estimates usually range between 100 million and 15 billion, as if there is one correct answer.
Actually, the long-term carrying capacity is constantly changing, and these days it’s getting smaller and smaller. Ocean acidification, chronic overfishing, and other harms have sharply reduced the vitality of marine ecosystems. Chronic forest mining, soil mining, and industrialization have sharply reduced the vitality of terrestrial ecosystems.
The fossil energy bubble enabled a huge temporary spike in carrying capacity, but as we move beyond peak, we’ll discover that the long-term carrying capacity is far less than it was 10,000 years ago, when the ecosystem enjoyed excellent health. Climate change is likely to reduce it further still, as large numbers of plant and animal species go extinct.
There have been five mass extinction events in ages past, and we are now in the sixth. Childs takes us on an amusing visit to the site of a catastrophic mass extinction, the state of Iowa, where 90 percent of the ecosystem has been reduced to agriculture. He and a buddy spent two days hiking through fields, dwarfed by tall stalks of corn (maize), during a week of blast furnace heat.
They were looking for signs of life besides corn, and they found almost none. The ecosystem was once home to 300 species of plants, 60 mammals, 300 birds, and over 1,000 insects. “This had historically been tallgrass prairie, one of the largest and most diverse biomasses in North America where a person on horseback could not be seen for the height of the grass.” The sixth mass extinction is unlike the previous five, in that it is the result of human activities, an embarrassing accomplishment.
Yeast devours sugar and converts it into alcohol and carbon dioxide. When yeast are added to a vat of freshly pressed grape juice, they plunge into a sweet paradise, and promptly produce a bubbly population explosion. The alcohol in the vat will keep increasing until it reaches toxic levels, at which point the yeast experience a mass extinction event, the tragic consequence of living in an artificial environment constructed by thirsty alcoholics.
Childs believes that civilization and human domination of the planet waited until recently because we thrive in warm weather. Humans evolved in a tropical climate. Eventually, we migrated into non-tropical climates, and developed the skills and technology necessary for surviving in chilly weather, but the ice ages were a time of struggle, not a sweet paradise. Then, a freak thing happened. The weather got warm, and stayed warm, for 10,000 years. Suddenly, we were like yeast in grape juice. Yippee!
The 800-pound gorilla in this book is climate change, and concern about the decades that lie before us. Childs cites the views of a number of scientists, and they are all over the place. A loose cannon at the EPA says that global warming is a hoax, but the others agree that the climate is warming, and humans are the primary culprits. Some think that we’ve passed the tipping point, and all ice will soon be gone. Others think that if emissions are reduced, disaster might be avoided. One is sure that technology will fix everything — geoengineering will allow us to control the planet’s climate like a thermostat. Another says that humankind will be gone in 100 years.
Climate history tells us that global temperatures commonly swing up and down, sometimes as much as 10° to 12°C. Huge temperature swings lead to extinctions, but life on Earth has persisted. The current jump in temperature is unlike the previous ones in that it is the outcome of human activities. It is the result of a unique combination of factors, with no historical precedent. Humans are unique in being able to adapt to a wide variety of ecosystems, but ecosystems are far less adaptable to sudden climate shifts. Agriculture is on thin ice, as are seven billion people.
In a hut on the Greenland ice sheet, Childs had a long chat with José Rial, a chaos researcher and climate change scholar. Rial understands that nature is highly unstable, and quite capable of rapid and unpredictable changes. “What we study doesn’t always help us predict very much, but it helps us to understand what is possible.” Childs added, “He knows that the actual future is the one we never expect.”
November 19, 2012
I think the thing that pushed this book to a four star rating for me was the really unique way in which the author juxtaposed his musings on the upheavals that could end our civilization with descriptions of his travels in environments that mimic these upheavals on a smaller scale--the monoculture of a large Iowa farm, the tectonic majesty of a Tibetan river gorge, the blank ice fields of Greenland. It gave his work an immediacy that others lack.
June 26, 2014
More of a memoir of the author trying to envision life in various apocalyptic events than a "what if" type of book. It reminded me of the show IT COULD HAPPEN TOMORROW, but lacked possible survival methods for each scenario. Personally, I was expecting more facts and less personal history.
June 23, 2014
Am excited to go to a reading by Craig Childs at Changing Hands in Tempe on October 15th, 7pm.
May 19, 2019
I’ve always been fascinated with the idea of destructive forces and natural disasters. Books about the end of the world, although depressing, have always appealed to me and this book stood out in the amalgam of covers and titles in the geography section of my local library. I’m really glad that I picked this book up, and there were many things in this book that hooked me. Here I will discuss a few of them.
For starters, the use of language in this book is incredible. The picture the author paints with his words shows the beauty of a desolate landscape. The emotion invoked by his phrases showed comedy, sadness, confusion, frustration, and truth. Not the truth that someone else believes, but pure truth. That’s what struck me the most. If you’ve ever watched a musical number, the choreography is beautiful and inventive, but the most power always comes in the silence. It comes in the stillness, and unison. The truths the author conveyed in this book was that stillness, standing out from the elegant choreography of his word choices.
Another thing I noticed was the use of subjective and objective perspectives.
He tells his story, the places where his comrades came from, the experiences and connections he’s had with the places where he’s been traveling. Many of his experiences are pretty comedic, but some of them, such as the rafting in chapter 7, are absolutely gut-wrenching and they leave the reader wondering how the author is able to do all this when he describes himself as not being able-bodied! His use of the objective points to years of research done on geologic history, evolutionary anomalies, and the predictions of where we are heading in the next century.
The last thing that I noticed was his choice of exploration. He went to the weirdest places because he noticed things that others didn’t. Yes, maybe the reader would find it common to go to the Himalayas to explore moving mountains and changing environments, but who would expect anyone to go to the heart of Iowa because it could be the site of our next subsistence crisis? The author shows the reader that the reader can find subtle details of an apocalypse in places very close to him or her.
These two elements combine to create an interesting story and a very informative reading, because I know I certainly learned a lot. As a person who has been called a living Wikipedia, I always want to learn more and with this book, I know I certainly did.
For starters, the use of language in this book is incredible. The picture the author paints with his words shows the beauty of a desolate landscape. The emotion invoked by his phrases showed comedy, sadness, confusion, frustration, and truth. Not the truth that someone else believes, but pure truth. That’s what struck me the most. If you’ve ever watched a musical number, the choreography is beautiful and inventive, but the most power always comes in the silence. It comes in the stillness, and unison. The truths the author conveyed in this book was that stillness, standing out from the elegant choreography of his word choices.
Another thing I noticed was the use of subjective and objective perspectives.
He tells his story, the places where his comrades came from, the experiences and connections he’s had with the places where he’s been traveling. Many of his experiences are pretty comedic, but some of them, such as the rafting in chapter 7, are absolutely gut-wrenching and they leave the reader wondering how the author is able to do all this when he describes himself as not being able-bodied! His use of the objective points to years of research done on geologic history, evolutionary anomalies, and the predictions of where we are heading in the next century.
The last thing that I noticed was his choice of exploration. He went to the weirdest places because he noticed things that others didn’t. Yes, maybe the reader would find it common to go to the Himalayas to explore moving mountains and changing environments, but who would expect anyone to go to the heart of Iowa because it could be the site of our next subsistence crisis? The author shows the reader that the reader can find subtle details of an apocalypse in places very close to him or her.
These two elements combine to create an interesting story and a very informative reading, because I know I certainly learned a lot. As a person who has been called a living Wikipedia, I always want to learn more and with this book, I know I certainly did.
September 28, 2019
Got this book in the mail from my dad, with a note... "once you get through the first chapter, it seems to make more sense, so stick with it" ... So I thought I'd skip the first chapter altogether and start at a section that makes sense. That happened to be the chapter about the Bering land bridge and Savoonga, which was a great chapter to start with because that's the island where Dad had visited on a birding trip! And I always love hearing about other places in Alaska!
There's a lot of information to take in, so it took me a few weeks to get through the whole thing. I really appreciated Childs' description of every landscape, especially the Chilean desert. He describes everything so deeply, incorporating the natural and human histories of the land. It makes every place so much more meaningful than just a surface-level travelogue of "oh yeah it's pretty." Much appreciated!
There's a lot of information to take in, so it took me a few weeks to get through the whole thing. I really appreciated Childs' description of every landscape, especially the Chilean desert. He describes everything so deeply, incorporating the natural and human histories of the land. It makes every place so much more meaningful than just a surface-level travelogue of "oh yeah it's pretty." Much appreciated!
January 23, 2019
When good, this book really communicates possible futures for the planet. I found Childs recurring interest in timescales useful in thinking about what we mean when we say ‘future’. Childs was sometimes able to distill scientific theories or geological history for me, but more often I couldn’t find a way in. There were many times that I wished this book read less like a diary, with too many personal insights, and had included a glossary.
January 21, 2023
There is not much discussion of further apocalypse and thinks I’m the Earth’s history. Still interesting to read in some parts, but it may be better to think of this as a catalogue of adventures in some of the harshest conditions on the planet. If you enjoy that sort of thing, then this will likely be an entertaining read for you.
December 15, 2018
This was quite brilliant. It is an intelligent travel book, the idea the author is exploring how the world would look in all the ways it could end is fairly flimsy, except really in the Iowa cornfields. I have forgiven the author for not saving the dog in Animal Encounters, or at least stopped thinking about it constantly. Each chapter can be savoured like a short story before accompanying the author on another wild ride or walk across somewhere you will likely never go. Intelligent travel writing with good dose of science.
April 23, 2022
Definitely the best Childs book I've read, a strong next read after Secret Knowledge. I read this mostly in the mornings, a French press by my side, dreaming of the places Childs has had the chance to visit, and the words describing these places are just marvelous. It's a captivating read, and one that tells a much more balanced story of the world, through climate change, through life and destruction. Dive in.
September 17, 2022
Six stars! This masterpiece is the pinnacle of nonfiction writing—the best prose and imagery ever written. And if you listen to the audible, you get to hear Childs tell you these stories like you’re sharing a beer at the local brew pub. This is my third audible by Childs and is the best so far!
April 30, 2025
A travelogue that discusses climate change. Some really interesting and important information here, but I find the writing style tedious and rambling. Skimmed through for book club, won't count it for my year.
August 28, 2013
I'm not sure what I expected from this book or this author. I'd never read anything by Childs before but had heard him on NPR in a background sort of way and recalled, vaguely, liking what I heard. I'm also planning a Big Trip by bicycle that includes parts of the desert southwest and his name came up in relation to those-who-write-about-the-desert and I thought I'd give him a go.
First, let me speak to the things I did NOT enjoy about his work.
Why are we treated to "sex on ice" not once but twice? I'm not a prude, far from it, but if I wanted to read about sex on a melting glacier I would look for a book that had that sort of thing as a major current throughout the work. Who knows? There may be a market for such a thing (and I may well take a thrust at writing it, pun intended).
What did this sly wink at sex on ice tell me? Well, 1) it's cold; 2) it's slippery, and; 3) it's wet, and not in a good way.
Revelatory it ain't.
Come to think of it, we get "sex on ice" three times, as the author specifically thanks the manufacturer of the crampons the little fuckers wore while learning those three points above. Nice . . . product placement where it counts.
Okay, I get it . . . a group of 20- and 30-somethings on expedition to the backside of nowhere in the austral regions of South America get a little horny and don't care who knows they are taking care of business. No problem. Except . . .
I don't care to know unless you spend a little (or a lot) more time on telling me about it. And drop the pretense of the "apocalyptic planet" while you're at it. Or do a better job of working that into the story. Better yet, leave it out and write a different book about sex in extreme climatological settings. "Woman in the Dunes," anyone?
Another thing I didn't like was the author's habit of appending prepositional phrases to his sentences WITHOUT the preposition. Just add a comma and " . . . a ghost in the night" or ". . . a red-hot poker of doom." Those aren't actual quotes from Childs but I hope you get my drift. The first time I ran across this it was as if I had actually run across it, as in barefoot across glass. Distracting and a bit painful. When it kept happening it actually hurt as I found myself gritting my teeth.
The final distraction was the overall tone of the work. The earth has gone through a number of mass extinctions, major geological changes, and death by global, icy, grip. We just happen to be here, sentient beings that we are, for this round of destruction. So . . . why get excited? Feh.
On the one hand I can see this. Sure, why get excited about the utter destruction of the surface of the planet? Given enough time, the whole thing is going to vaporize as our star morphs into a red giant followed by a nova . . . eventually. Just lie on the floor and remain calm. Maintain a "geological time-set" and don't worry about the next 100 years. "You" won't be here anyway, right? Who cares if the whole planet becomes some kind of uninhabitable rock, whether that uninhabitability be due to ice or heat or lack of water or asteroid impact or volcanism or . . . whatever.
Sorry, but I'm still vested in my ego-driven view of existence and it bothers me that we're likely doomed whether that means tomorrow or a century from now. I find it hard to see the writing on the wall and just shrug.
Now, what I did like, and I REALLY like, is how Childs can describe the environment around him. Whether it's a Mexican desert or an Arctic island or a blasted, lava-covered landscape, Childs really puts you there with him. It's not so much an attempt to describe the fine details of a place as it is capturing the feel of it, even - in the case of the Atacama - the taste of it.
He also does a fine job when it comes to the people around him. To my surprise he does an excellent job putting those two things together - the place and the people in it. He does, however, sometimes go a little overboard (as above with "sex on ice") but usually not TOO far overboard.
I learned a great deal without either having the information spoon fed to me or being patronized. That in itself is a grand accomplishment.
All in all I'd say "Apocalyptic Planet" is worth reading.
First, let me speak to the things I did NOT enjoy about his work.
Why are we treated to "sex on ice" not once but twice? I'm not a prude, far from it, but if I wanted to read about sex on a melting glacier I would look for a book that had that sort of thing as a major current throughout the work. Who knows? There may be a market for such a thing (and I may well take a thrust at writing it, pun intended).
What did this sly wink at sex on ice tell me? Well, 1) it's cold; 2) it's slippery, and; 3) it's wet, and not in a good way.
Revelatory it ain't.
Come to think of it, we get "sex on ice" three times, as the author specifically thanks the manufacturer of the crampons the little fuckers wore while learning those three points above. Nice . . . product placement where it counts.
Okay, I get it . . . a group of 20- and 30-somethings on expedition to the backside of nowhere in the austral regions of South America get a little horny and don't care who knows they are taking care of business. No problem. Except . . .
I don't care to know unless you spend a little (or a lot) more time on telling me about it. And drop the pretense of the "apocalyptic planet" while you're at it. Or do a better job of working that into the story. Better yet, leave it out and write a different book about sex in extreme climatological settings. "Woman in the Dunes," anyone?
Another thing I didn't like was the author's habit of appending prepositional phrases to his sentences WITHOUT the preposition. Just add a comma and " . . . a ghost in the night" or ". . . a red-hot poker of doom." Those aren't actual quotes from Childs but I hope you get my drift. The first time I ran across this it was as if I had actually run across it, as in barefoot across glass. Distracting and a bit painful. When it kept happening it actually hurt as I found myself gritting my teeth.
The final distraction was the overall tone of the work. The earth has gone through a number of mass extinctions, major geological changes, and death by global, icy, grip. We just happen to be here, sentient beings that we are, for this round of destruction. So . . . why get excited? Feh.
On the one hand I can see this. Sure, why get excited about the utter destruction of the surface of the planet? Given enough time, the whole thing is going to vaporize as our star morphs into a red giant followed by a nova . . . eventually. Just lie on the floor and remain calm. Maintain a "geological time-set" and don't worry about the next 100 years. "You" won't be here anyway, right? Who cares if the whole planet becomes some kind of uninhabitable rock, whether that uninhabitability be due to ice or heat or lack of water or asteroid impact or volcanism or . . . whatever.
Sorry, but I'm still vested in my ego-driven view of existence and it bothers me that we're likely doomed whether that means tomorrow or a century from now. I find it hard to see the writing on the wall and just shrug.
Now, what I did like, and I REALLY like, is how Childs can describe the environment around him. Whether it's a Mexican desert or an Arctic island or a blasted, lava-covered landscape, Childs really puts you there with him. It's not so much an attempt to describe the fine details of a place as it is capturing the feel of it, even - in the case of the Atacama - the taste of it.
He also does a fine job when it comes to the people around him. To my surprise he does an excellent job putting those two things together - the place and the people in it. He does, however, sometimes go a little overboard (as above with "sex on ice") but usually not TOO far overboard.
I learned a great deal without either having the information spoon fed to me or being patronized. That in itself is a grand accomplishment.
All in all I'd say "Apocalyptic Planet" is worth reading.
March 26, 2016
I think most people would probably like this more than I did. To me the whole idea of visiting the most inhospitable regions of the earth to visualize this planet's potential apocalyptic scenarios just felt like kind of a pointless gimmick, almost like he was just looking for a way to justify travelling to a bunch of unique locations. I really wasn't too interested in his personal adventure stories or in his clever metaphors for sunrises and flowers and shit. This is one of those books where the facts and statistics are strongly diluted with this stuff. Not what I'm into, but again I think this style is probably closer to what normal people prefer to read.
At first I was a little worried that this guy was pushing the idea that since mass extinctions and climatic shifts happened naturally there's no reason for people to worry about their impact on the planet. Thankfully though that's not his position. It actually kind of reminded me of reading Christopher Boehm's books on egalitarianism a while ago, seeming to word his arguments in ways that would trick Ayn Randish right-wingers into reading it and realizing how insane they are. For those of you who aren't familiar with Boehm's work, he presented egalitarianism as a "reverse hierarchy", which, although not how I would describe it, at least does get the attention of people stupid enough to think the rich are the ones being victimized. His view was more like yeah, humans generally work together to keep bullies from dominating the group they live with BUT that's not a bad thing. Craig Childs seems to be trying to attract those who blame volcanoes and solar flares for the disturbing trends in climate. In his case it's more like yeah, volcanic eruptions and many other natural phenomena do cause significant changes BUT our behavior has made things much more precarious, to the point where natural occurrences that otherwise wouldn't cause much damage could now be the straw that breaks the camel's back, and what would generally take thousands of years is now taking only decades. So he does get it. My biggest issue with this is just the lack of solutions. I mean, there are so many of these books out there right now, almost every single one endorsed by Bill McKibben, that have absolutely nothing to say about fixing anything. Human beings have known about passive solar houses, permaculture, the problems with infinite growth and planned obsolescence, and everything else for decades already. Yet even people who say they care about these problems are still building the same stupid "traditional" house designs, riding their stupid lawnmowers around, driving 30 minutes to buy their plastic-wrapped "food" from Walmart, and they think it's fine as long as the big screen TV is powered by solar panels and the car gets good gas mileage. And they believe that because it's basically what mainstream environmentalists are telling them. I'm sick of it! Having some good things to say about nature and science really doesn't make up for the lack of useful information.
At first I was a little worried that this guy was pushing the idea that since mass extinctions and climatic shifts happened naturally there's no reason for people to worry about their impact on the planet. Thankfully though that's not his position. It actually kind of reminded me of reading Christopher Boehm's books on egalitarianism a while ago, seeming to word his arguments in ways that would trick Ayn Randish right-wingers into reading it and realizing how insane they are. For those of you who aren't familiar with Boehm's work, he presented egalitarianism as a "reverse hierarchy", which, although not how I would describe it, at least does get the attention of people stupid enough to think the rich are the ones being victimized. His view was more like yeah, humans generally work together to keep bullies from dominating the group they live with BUT that's not a bad thing. Craig Childs seems to be trying to attract those who blame volcanoes and solar flares for the disturbing trends in climate. In his case it's more like yeah, volcanic eruptions and many other natural phenomena do cause significant changes BUT our behavior has made things much more precarious, to the point where natural occurrences that otherwise wouldn't cause much damage could now be the straw that breaks the camel's back, and what would generally take thousands of years is now taking only decades. So he does get it. My biggest issue with this is just the lack of solutions. I mean, there are so many of these books out there right now, almost every single one endorsed by Bill McKibben, that have absolutely nothing to say about fixing anything. Human beings have known about passive solar houses, permaculture, the problems with infinite growth and planned obsolescence, and everything else for decades already. Yet even people who say they care about these problems are still building the same stupid "traditional" house designs, riding their stupid lawnmowers around, driving 30 minutes to buy their plastic-wrapped "food" from Walmart, and they think it's fine as long as the big screen TV is powered by solar panels and the car gets good gas mileage. And they believe that because it's basically what mainstream environmentalists are telling them. I'm sick of it! Having some good things to say about nature and science really doesn't make up for the lack of useful information.
November 2, 2015
I've been a huge fan of Childs ever since I read the Secret Knowledge of Water. He has a way of telling stories that are so captivating that you can't put the book down until you're done. I love how he weaves a spiritual respect for nature & wildlife into his stories. And I really appreciate how varied his past experience has been.
This book had two firsts from my experience with Childs. Number one; this was the first book I've read from him in which he shared a lot of background about his family. He told stories about his mother, his upbringing, and even his own family. I enjoyed that.
Second, this was the first time I feel that Childs has truly taken the helm in the role of expert. In particular, the role of someone who understands science. Don't get me wrong, he certainly has moments of this in each of his other books. But this was the first book I've read from him in which this felt like the predominant role. The only downside to this is that I didn't feel as much of his role as storyteller in this book. It felt less exploratory and more commanding. This isn't necessarily a bad thing since there is a place for this. It's just not what draws me to Child's work. That being said I still found this book fascinating and highly recommend it to anyone interested in the natural wonders of this earth.
This book had two firsts from my experience with Childs. Number one; this was the first book I've read from him in which he shared a lot of background about his family. He told stories about his mother, his upbringing, and even his own family. I enjoyed that.
Second, this was the first time I feel that Childs has truly taken the helm in the role of expert. In particular, the role of someone who understands science. Don't get me wrong, he certainly has moments of this in each of his other books. But this was the first book I've read from him in which this felt like the predominant role. The only downside to this is that I didn't feel as much of his role as storyteller in this book. It felt less exploratory and more commanding. This isn't necessarily a bad thing since there is a place for this. It's just not what draws me to Child's work. That being said I still found this book fascinating and highly recommend it to anyone interested in the natural wonders of this earth.
December 12, 2017
A must read for anyone who is interested in understanding the bigger picture of earth’s moving forces on a large time scale (on which we are nothing more than a tiny spot) and mankind’s influence on those natural cycles. The book is packed with scientific facts and explanations, understandably set into context of actual natural phenomena and happenings, combined with Child’s own outdoor experiences, written in his inspiring and poetic language. An Hommage to this extraordinarily special planet we are able to call our home, and an urging reminder that we are a part of this system, and that we have to deal with serious consequences as we continue to influence it in a way no other species is capable of. Instead of lecturing, Childs simply explains the facts, combines it with an incredibly beautiful writing about earth’s phenomena and wonders that he has experienced firsthand - and let’s you do the thinking. Is this place - our only and so precious home - worth rethinking our perception of our own being?
August 27, 2013
Back-pack porn? Perhaps. It certainly evoked the feeling of being on an outdoor adventure, as I vicariously lived it page by page, comfortably sitting on my commuter rail ass.
More, though, it's theme is perspective, and how difficult it is for us transient beings to fully appreciate geological Earth time (let alone MBTA time), and thus how we get our knickers in a twist over environmental change, however rapid it seems to us. Even he catches himself thinking of the now as a kind of "ending up" without realizing that, really, there is no ending.
There's definitely an elegiac quality to the writing, too, a nostalgia for what what is being created (deserts) has yet to vanish (glaciers).
Refreshingly, it eschews semi-mystical, ecotrite; it's at it's best in the bedrock of experience, so to speak, and pulls no punches. The man's a scientist, after all, AND a really good writer.
Oddly comforting for a book with this title.
More, though, it's theme is perspective, and how difficult it is for us transient beings to fully appreciate geological Earth time (let alone MBTA time), and thus how we get our knickers in a twist over environmental change, however rapid it seems to us. Even he catches himself thinking of the now as a kind of "ending up" without realizing that, really, there is no ending.
There's definitely an elegiac quality to the writing, too, a nostalgia for what what is being created (deserts) has yet to vanish (glaciers).
Refreshingly, it eschews semi-mystical, ecotrite; it's at it's best in the bedrock of experience, so to speak, and pulls no punches. The man's a scientist, after all, AND a really good writer.
Oddly comforting for a book with this title.
July 18, 2017
Having now read this book three times in two years, I am vexed by the realization that it's empirically one of my favorite books. Some might think it distasteful to enjoy a book that contemplates the end of civilization, yet I am delighted in the discourse.
The author presents at once the humorous anecdotes of a Bill Bryson novel with the intrepid candor of Doris Kearns Goodwin (high praise, to be sure), detailing the ups and downs of deep time in distant, grand locales that precious few would ever venture.
Craig Child's may not be the first name that you think of, if you do think of one, when you think of climate science or geology, but his thorough command of vast disciplines, and his humanist empathy with those that have come before us surely places him in the company of some of the finest writers of our day.
The author presents at once the humorous anecdotes of a Bill Bryson novel with the intrepid candor of Doris Kearns Goodwin (high praise, to be sure), detailing the ups and downs of deep time in distant, grand locales that precious few would ever venture.
Craig Child's may not be the first name that you think of, if you do think of one, when you think of climate science or geology, but his thorough command of vast disciplines, and his humanist empathy with those that have come before us surely places him in the company of some of the finest writers of our day.
September 16, 2016
Before you read this book you have to ask yourself what you want out of it, because if you want to read a book about the science of the apocalyptic potential of our planet, as I did, this is not the book for you. By far, about three paragraphs in four, this book is about the adventures of Craig Childs in different locales across the world. In every one of these places Childs gives the reader about a paragraph or two of scientific information and then goes back to retelling his personal trek through them. So unless you are more interested in reading about the author’s promenades throughout the world your interest will probably be better served by a different book.
August 14, 2016
Someone forgot that writing popular science takes effort and is not just a way to make tax deductable travels. Someone forgot that characters is brought to life by showing, not telling. Someone forgot that gaps in the science narration of a popular science book is not to be filled by inserting endless footnotes after each chapter, but should blend into the writing.
It is impressive, however, to write a book about science when you obviously did not study neither science nor scientific methods.
It is impressive, however, to write a book about science when you obviously did not study neither science nor scientific methods.
December 26, 2012
Not the kind of thing I typically choose to read, but my husband enjoys this author and he was a charming speaker at a Book Convention here in the Black Hills several years ago. I particularly enjoyed the chapter "Civilizations Fall" and only wish Childs had written more about these cultures that were once so mighty and are now so utterly gone.
January 22, 2021
This one hit close to home – it’s similar in a way to Underland and The Ends of the World, but I liked it more. Childs is an excellent, very descriptive writer – something akin to Underland in that he’s describing these very specific, but still somewhat vague spaces – salt flats, deserts, glaciers. In a broad scheme, it’s easy to picture these things but Childs gives a journalistic feel to the book (it’s the first I’ve read from him) and I found he had a strong vocabulary that went beyond the look of these places. I got the smell, taste, and sound as well. Just some beautiful writing along the lines of Ballard’s apocalyptic novels.
Which could be seen as scary or depressing but here’s where Childs succeeds – and puts him in a similar company of the two above writers as well as Chris Impey and even to some extent on Between the World and Me Ta-Nehisi Coates: Childs is approaching the planet from the reality of deep history, of humanity’s place in the grand scheme of the planet’s 4.6 billion year history and even the cosmos’s 13+ billion year history. There seems to be an effort by these writers to humanize humanity, similar to what the ground breaking original scientists (Copernicus comes to mind) were doing when they attempted to show their respective cultures that the earth revolves around the sun, not the other way around, and that the earth was not flat. These scientists did not come to these conclusions by traveling into outer space in the 15th or 16th centuries, but were using evidence from their experiments to show the reality of existence. Yes, it’s scary to think that in the broadest possible sense, we are insignificant, but there’s also a comfort to this, a way to appreciate the miniscule sense of existence, that you have the possibility to experience even enjoying a cup of coffee or tea in the morning – that’s actually miraculous. And that since that possibility exists, the mission should be to extend the possibility to everyone and every living thing on the planet. Because it is very aware that comfort is not a given in this world, not even in our country. By not only de-centering the universe, but also de-centering ourselves to see the processes under the skin, as it were.
So Childs goes to places that reflect where our planet has been and is going, coming to the conclusion in the Antarctic via a journey to a Chilean desert that life will transform, no matter what the circumstances of humanity’s present condition will be. Species die all the time. That is a given. We will die as well, and be compressed to a miniscule scratch in some substrata of rock. Or we will figure out a way to preserve and continue existence in outer space. But to do that we need to see ourselves globally – something Coates brings up in Between the World and Me – an astrobiological perspective.
I also “enjoyed” the chapter where Childs attempts to stay in a genetically modified cornfield in Iowa. Something designed to push growth at the sacrifice of the natural development of species to literally benefit the corporate interests that fund the fields. That reminded me of a similar scene in Greg Egan’s Teranesia where our main character starts to mutate due to a similar environmental shift. I’d love someday to see that The Beach House can be discussed in the context of Apocalyptic Planet or Teranesia! It really does fit in well with them.
Which could be seen as scary or depressing but here’s where Childs succeeds – and puts him in a similar company of the two above writers as well as Chris Impey and even to some extent on Between the World and Me Ta-Nehisi Coates: Childs is approaching the planet from the reality of deep history, of humanity’s place in the grand scheme of the planet’s 4.6 billion year history and even the cosmos’s 13+ billion year history. There seems to be an effort by these writers to humanize humanity, similar to what the ground breaking original scientists (Copernicus comes to mind) were doing when they attempted to show their respective cultures that the earth revolves around the sun, not the other way around, and that the earth was not flat. These scientists did not come to these conclusions by traveling into outer space in the 15th or 16th centuries, but were using evidence from their experiments to show the reality of existence. Yes, it’s scary to think that in the broadest possible sense, we are insignificant, but there’s also a comfort to this, a way to appreciate the miniscule sense of existence, that you have the possibility to experience even enjoying a cup of coffee or tea in the morning – that’s actually miraculous. And that since that possibility exists, the mission should be to extend the possibility to everyone and every living thing on the planet. Because it is very aware that comfort is not a given in this world, not even in our country. By not only de-centering the universe, but also de-centering ourselves to see the processes under the skin, as it were.
So Childs goes to places that reflect where our planet has been and is going, coming to the conclusion in the Antarctic via a journey to a Chilean desert that life will transform, no matter what the circumstances of humanity’s present condition will be. Species die all the time. That is a given. We will die as well, and be compressed to a miniscule scratch in some substrata of rock. Or we will figure out a way to preserve and continue existence in outer space. But to do that we need to see ourselves globally – something Coates brings up in Between the World and Me – an astrobiological perspective.
I also “enjoyed” the chapter where Childs attempts to stay in a genetically modified cornfield in Iowa. Something designed to push growth at the sacrifice of the natural development of species to literally benefit the corporate interests that fund the fields. That reminded me of a similar scene in Greg Egan’s Teranesia where our main character starts to mutate due to a similar environmental shift. I’d love someday to see that The Beach House can be discussed in the context of Apocalyptic Planet or Teranesia! It really does fit in well with them.
December 10, 2018
Craig Childs's uses the topic of this book to do some serious travelling. The man will trek across lava fields and ancient deserts. also a sewer in Phoenix Arizona, which is less captivating.
Apocalyptic Planet is Childs's attempt to visit landscapes of apocalypse; they can be ancient ice-fields, they can be lands slowly being lost to a rising sea, and they can also be Mayan ruins. Each chapter is held together by one type of 'end of world'. Consumed by fire? World destroyed by lack of biodiversity? Each chapter involves some kind of trip, usually with a strange friend of Childs's choice. This makes for some interesting chapters, and less interesting chapters. Looking back I can recall some specifics about visiting wastelands (Atacama Desert, Greenland Ice sheet) but certainly less about others (the Global Warming chapter had Childs walking around melting glaciers with a film crew and 'Mountains Rise' involved Childs river rafting down an unknown river, for some reason). That said, I envy this man his social life and monetary funding that can send him on a research expedition to Greenland or, as stated previously, river rafting down a never-before-traversed flooding river.
Childs's prose is florid, which I initially loved and was exhausted by during the course of the book. I am all for my wilderness writing containing lush descriptions, but sometimes a sentence felt laughable (like 'crushing ice into lenses with our feet'). He travels with photographers in a few spots, and I think I would have liked a couple photos do go along with my edition of this book. Partly a pop science book, there are descriptions of Global Warming, long term Climate Change, and discussions of desertification. Although these are not the books draw, and certainly not Childs's strong point, I have never before been captivated by Milankovitch cycles. Apparently all it took was a trip to a magnificent frozen wasteland.
Hard to recommend this book, simply because certain chapters felt so disjointed (melting glacier film crew where people have sex on crampons, the damn Phoenix sewer chapter) but the majority of the wilderness backpacks are to a truly interesting habitat that speaks of a possible future for those of us on earth (Iowan Corn Fields). This book is definitely for people that enjoy their wilderness travel books. Childs's is willing to trek across arid deserts and bring us back tales of mineral springs and mummified animals. But he also does some stupid things like tossing out the map for an 'authentic experience'.
Did I also mention he rafts down a flooding river that has NEVER BEFORE been navigated? Damn.
Apocalyptic Planet is Childs's attempt to visit landscapes of apocalypse; they can be ancient ice-fields, they can be lands slowly being lost to a rising sea, and they can also be Mayan ruins. Each chapter is held together by one type of 'end of world'. Consumed by fire? World destroyed by lack of biodiversity? Each chapter involves some kind of trip, usually with a strange friend of Childs's choice. This makes for some interesting chapters, and less interesting chapters. Looking back I can recall some specifics about visiting wastelands (Atacama Desert, Greenland Ice sheet) but certainly less about others (the Global Warming chapter had Childs walking around melting glaciers with a film crew and 'Mountains Rise' involved Childs river rafting down an unknown river, for some reason). That said, I envy this man his social life and monetary funding that can send him on a research expedition to Greenland or, as stated previously, river rafting down a never-before-traversed flooding river.
Childs's prose is florid, which I initially loved and was exhausted by during the course of the book. I am all for my wilderness writing containing lush descriptions, but sometimes a sentence felt laughable (like 'crushing ice into lenses with our feet'). He travels with photographers in a few spots, and I think I would have liked a couple photos do go along with my edition of this book. Partly a pop science book, there are descriptions of Global Warming, long term Climate Change, and discussions of desertification. Although these are not the books draw, and certainly not Childs's strong point, I have never before been captivated by Milankovitch cycles. Apparently all it took was a trip to a magnificent frozen wasteland.
Hard to recommend this book, simply because certain chapters felt so disjointed (melting glacier film crew where people have sex on crampons, the damn Phoenix sewer chapter) but the majority of the wilderness backpacks are to a truly interesting habitat that speaks of a possible future for those of us on earth (Iowan Corn Fields). This book is definitely for people that enjoy their wilderness travel books. Childs's is willing to trek across arid deserts and bring us back tales of mineral springs and mummified animals. But he also does some stupid things like tossing out the map for an 'authentic experience'.
Did I also mention he rafts down a flooding river that has NEVER BEFORE been navigated? Damn.
July 8, 2020
Excellent read. The book isn't what you think ... yes, it speaks of climate change to a small degree, but it more addressed, as the subtitle notes, "the Everending Earth. The earth is in constant change, always destroying itself and building back up again. The long chapters in the book address matters like "Deserts Consume," "Seas Rise," "Mountains Move." The earth is, really, "everending." Always ending one phase and starting another.
The author, though, is really clever and quite irreverent, which made him more human to me. Also, is life was so damned interesting. He could BE the Dos Equis man in real life. The chapters find him and his varying often-unnamed colleagues in Mexico, in Patagonia, in Alaska (with his spunky mother), in Greenland, Hawaii as well. In each instance he records the relentless power of the planet.
So, what happen to our planet in the midst of human pressure? Will the ice melt in a thousand years? ten-thousand years? A hundred years? Fifty years? All those are speculated in the book. We are impacting and warming the globe. Yeah, that pretty much is a fact.
Yet, the upshot of the book is not about that. It is that the Earth is bigger than any catastrophe. The Earth will survive (at least until the sun runs out of hydrogen). But it will change. There will a rich future.
We humans just may not be there.
The author, though, is really clever and quite irreverent, which made him more human to me. Also, is life was so damned interesting. He could BE the Dos Equis man in real life. The chapters find him and his varying often-unnamed colleagues in Mexico, in Patagonia, in Alaska (with his spunky mother), in Greenland, Hawaii as well. In each instance he records the relentless power of the planet.
So, what happen to our planet in the midst of human pressure? Will the ice melt in a thousand years? ten-thousand years? A hundred years? Fifty years? All those are speculated in the book. We are impacting and warming the globe. Yeah, that pretty much is a fact.
Yet, the upshot of the book is not about that. It is that the Earth is bigger than any catastrophe. The Earth will survive (at least until the sun runs out of hydrogen). But it will change. There will a rich future.
We humans just may not be there.
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