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Grave Secrets of Dinosaurs: Soft Tissues and Hard Science
Many of us have seen dinosaur bones and skeletons, maybe even dinosaur eggs...but what did those fearsome animals really look like in the flesh? Soft-tissue fossils give tantalizing clues about the appearance and physiology of the ancient animals. In this exciting book, paleontologist Phillip Manning presents the most astonishing dinosaur fossil excavations of the past 100 years—including the recent discovery of a remarkably intact dinosaur mummy in the Badlands of North Dakota.
Bone structure is just the beginning of our knowledge today, thanks to amazing digs like these. Drawing on new breakthroughs and cutting-edge techniques of analysis, Dr. Manning takes us on a thrilling, globe-spanning tour of dinosaur mummy finds—from the first such excavation in 1908 to a baby dinosaur unearthed in 1980, from a dino with a heart in South Dakota to titanosaur embryos in Argentina. And he discusses his own groundbreaking analysis of "Dakota," discovered by Tyler Lyson.
Using state-of-the-art technology to scan and analyse this remarkable discovery, National Geographic and Dr. Manning create an incredibly lifelike portrait of Dakota. The knowledge to be gained from this exceedingly rare find, and those that came before it, will intrigue dinosaur-loving readers of all ages.
Bone structure is just the beginning of our knowledge today, thanks to amazing digs like these. Drawing on new breakthroughs and cutting-edge techniques of analysis, Dr. Manning takes us on a thrilling, globe-spanning tour of dinosaur mummy finds—from the first such excavation in 1908 to a baby dinosaur unearthed in 1980, from a dino with a heart in South Dakota to titanosaur embryos in Argentina. And he discusses his own groundbreaking analysis of "Dakota," discovered by Tyler Lyson.
Using state-of-the-art technology to scan and analyse this remarkable discovery, National Geographic and Dr. Manning create an incredibly lifelike portrait of Dakota. The knowledge to be gained from this exceedingly rare find, and those that came before it, will intrigue dinosaur-loving readers of all ages.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2008
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405 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews
June 23, 2016
Finding an intact skeleton of a dinosaur is rare enough: some of the famous specimens that look complete actually aren’t, with gaps filled in by guesswork, or from other skeletons. Partial finds are much more common — but even then, compared to all the dinosaurs that ever lived, the number that survive in some form as fossils is tiny. Every find provides new clues: an impression of skin, the hint of a feather, the presence or absence of marks which tell us how dinosaurs stood or walked.
This book is about the holy grail of paleontology: mummies, i.e. remains with soft tissue preservation. They can tell us an astonishing number of things about a corpse, and they can even include preserved biological molecules that can be tested — perhaps even DNA. This book goes through the past discoveries which have fuelled hope for soft tissue preservation, and given a lot of food for research in themselves, but the main point is an almost totally preserved specimen from Dakota. It includes background into the research and the discovery, and then a few chapters on what’s happening now. Frustratingly, it went to print before the research was complete, so readers might be left wondering if the Dakota mummy was ever successfully scanned, etc, and what that might have revealed.
It’s very much a work on an evolving situation: there’s more to learn from Dakota than is contained in these pages. That’s for sure. But that could be the case for years and years to come, so I’m glad this book exists and is accessible to laypeople.
Originally posted here.
This book is about the holy grail of paleontology: mummies, i.e. remains with soft tissue preservation. They can tell us an astonishing number of things about a corpse, and they can even include preserved biological molecules that can be tested — perhaps even DNA. This book goes through the past discoveries which have fuelled hope for soft tissue preservation, and given a lot of food for research in themselves, but the main point is an almost totally preserved specimen from Dakota. It includes background into the research and the discovery, and then a few chapters on what’s happening now. Frustratingly, it went to print before the research was complete, so readers might be left wondering if the Dakota mummy was ever successfully scanned, etc, and what that might have revealed.
It’s very much a work on an evolving situation: there’s more to learn from Dakota than is contained in these pages. That’s for sure. But that could be the case for years and years to come, so I’m glad this book exists and is accessible to laypeople.
Originally posted here.
January 9, 2020
honestly, this book was one of the overall least interesting dinosaur-related books i have read thus far (and i have read a fair few!!), and i think a big part of that was the narrative voice used here. at times, it felt like it was trying to dumb things down, but at others... i don't know. i just didn't like it! i also felt like the best pieces of interesting information were saved for the last few chapters, and at that point, i had tragically already stopped caring. :/
January 3, 2015
It was a laborious read, once he actually began talking about the processes and science behind the dig site. I was very disappointed that there wasn't much information about his actual find, which I thought the book was about to begin with, and that most of it was a literature review and study of previously discovered mummies and fossil discoveries. It took me 5 months to finish the book, mainly because I gave up halfway through and set it aside to read things that were better. My desire to start the new year off with no books started this year finally got me to trudge through the rest of it.
That said, some parts were very interesting, and I just wish that he had more discoveries and more to show for everything that it took to read it. My biggest problem with this book is that the end has nothing about the mummy, and he jumps back into his "this is what was done before" talk. If the research wasn't accomplished, then maybe he shouldn't have bothered to write a book about it yet.
That said, some parts were very interesting, and I just wish that he had more discoveries and more to show for everything that it took to read it. My biggest problem with this book is that the end has nothing about the mummy, and he jumps back into his "this is what was done before" talk. If the research wasn't accomplished, then maybe he shouldn't have bothered to write a book about it yet.
February 26, 2021
Some people will find this book boring because it contains a lot of dry descriptions. But I savored every bit when I read the book at a slow, sedate pace. Two things would have improved my reading experience even more. Firstly, more pictures would have been awesome -- colored ones! And, secondly, if they'd waited to publish the book after they had the results from the major portion of tests and research, that'd have been good for closure. In any case, I found this a fun read! It is a good example from scientific research that many people ignore or don't know about, i.e., so many factors have to be just right for major discoveries to happen or even exist!
July 12, 2013
I've been pretty out of the loop on dinosaurs for a while, and this book seemed like a cool place to jump back in. I appreciated the history of soft-tissue findings that filled the first chunk of the book, though they were presented in such a dry fashion that little of it really stuck. It was valuable for someone with no knowledge of the subject to fully appreciate how amazing Manning's particular find is. Most of the book was equally dry and somewhat disconnected, so it was definitely a slog to get through. More pictures would have been a huge help, as it was hard to visualize the processes he described, and I found myself constantly Googling species names. The best parts are toward the end, full of anecdotes about the quirky paleontologists on the project, and the challenges of trying to run a CT scan on a massive fossil chunk with NASA's help. The book seems to have been published prematurely, unfortunately, as after you drag yourself through the entire build-up, the author reveals that they have not actually done much analysis yet -- the secrets are still in the grave. Still, not a bad snapshot of the current knowledge of soft tissue fossils.
June 24, 2019
While it is very clear that the author is passionate that his field of study, perhaps this specific bind and this project should’ve been completed before the book was written. We get tons of background and historical and technical information, but in the end we don’t get to find out what else is in the big body block because the CT scan is not yet done. The ending is super anti-climactic and it seems silly to write a book about a project that is not complete yet. Review to come.
January 8, 2021
Grave Soft Tissues; Death of Dinosaurs
“One hundred percent of us die, and the percentage cannot be decreased” (C.S. Lewis 15). On January 8, 2008, the book Grave Soft Tissues Secrets of and Hard Science Dinosaurs was published. It is a nonfiction book written by the British scientist Phillip Manning, in the story it talks about the life of, Tyler Lyson. The decease of the dinosaurs was an atrocious occurrence, and the cause of it is still unknown to this day. Tyler was a young paleontologist who lived in North Dakota his entire life, he loved to explore as a child and showed curiosity in fossils, which later lead to his career in paleontology. One day, while Tyler was on way home from his Uncle’s land in the Hell Creek Formation of North Dakota, he noticed telltale shapes that indicate fossils. He immediately knew that he had found the bones of some kind of dinosaur, but he decided to leave the fossils alone for now since it was winter. He would come back for them. When he eventually dug them up he realized he had discovered something unbelievable. This book is a look into the world of dinosaurs, in an engaging way using facts and the real story of Tyler Lyson and his upbringing.
The setting and characters are what make the book as exciting as it was, without them the story would have been missing a key part. This story takes place in the Badlands of North Dakota, this is where Lyson found his first mummified dinosaur. The dinosaur was nicknamed Dakota for this reason. Our main character in the story is Tyler Lyson, he is a brilliant and very strong-willed young man. In an article written about Tyler, “Valley of the Last Dinosaurs” it states, “Tyler’s passion for paleontology took him to Yale University where he completed his Ph.D., before moving onto the Smithsonian Institution for a postdoctoral fellowship.” This is showing how his passion for paleontology took him all the way to Yale. Today Dr. Lyson continues to study animals his current projects include, “Early origins of turtles and other diapsid reptiles, America’s last dinosaurs, and Rise of the mammals” (Nature and Science). It takes a special kind of person to do the task that Tyler Lyson does, and he does an amazing job at it.
The main idea of this book was to share with readers about the story of Tyler Lyson and how he changed the world of dinosaurs at such a young age. According to North Dakota’s state magazine, “He has several papers in review with scientific journals. Only 26 years old, Lyson has a lifetime of discovery ahead of him in the field of paleontology.” As stated here, Tyler discovered something huge at such a young age. He has so much more ahead of him, and many people are excited to see what he can do next. The type of dinosaur that he found was known as a Hadrosaur. It was a herbivore, with a flat jaw like the bill of a duck, weighed around 15,000 pounds and was 30-35 feet in length. When Tyler found Dakota, the dinosaur was completely mummified, nothing that had ever been discovered before. This was a first, not only for Dr. Lyson, but for the rest of the world.
My opinion on the book was that it was a fascinating read if you are into scientific and very factual books. If you’re not into that kind of thing, this is not the book for you. It is a very difficult read, and it is sometimes hard to keep going, but if you do it will eventually get better. I believe that an older audience would enjoy this book. The language in the book is very mature, especially for an adolescent or child. Overall, the book was hard to keep up with, but at the end of the day it was a very good book.
“One hundred percent of us die, and the percentage cannot be decreased” (C.S. Lewis 15). On January 8, 2008, the book Grave Soft Tissues Secrets of and Hard Science Dinosaurs was published. It is a nonfiction book written by the British scientist Phillip Manning, in the story it talks about the life of, Tyler Lyson. The decease of the dinosaurs was an atrocious occurrence, and the cause of it is still unknown to this day. Tyler was a young paleontologist who lived in North Dakota his entire life, he loved to explore as a child and showed curiosity in fossils, which later lead to his career in paleontology. One day, while Tyler was on way home from his Uncle’s land in the Hell Creek Formation of North Dakota, he noticed telltale shapes that indicate fossils. He immediately knew that he had found the bones of some kind of dinosaur, but he decided to leave the fossils alone for now since it was winter. He would come back for them. When he eventually dug them up he realized he had discovered something unbelievable. This book is a look into the world of dinosaurs, in an engaging way using facts and the real story of Tyler Lyson and his upbringing.
The setting and characters are what make the book as exciting as it was, without them the story would have been missing a key part. This story takes place in the Badlands of North Dakota, this is where Lyson found his first mummified dinosaur. The dinosaur was nicknamed Dakota for this reason. Our main character in the story is Tyler Lyson, he is a brilliant and very strong-willed young man. In an article written about Tyler, “Valley of the Last Dinosaurs” it states, “Tyler’s passion for paleontology took him to Yale University where he completed his Ph.D., before moving onto the Smithsonian Institution for a postdoctoral fellowship.” This is showing how his passion for paleontology took him all the way to Yale. Today Dr. Lyson continues to study animals his current projects include, “Early origins of turtles and other diapsid reptiles, America’s last dinosaurs, and Rise of the mammals” (Nature and Science). It takes a special kind of person to do the task that Tyler Lyson does, and he does an amazing job at it.
The main idea of this book was to share with readers about the story of Tyler Lyson and how he changed the world of dinosaurs at such a young age. According to North Dakota’s state magazine, “He has several papers in review with scientific journals. Only 26 years old, Lyson has a lifetime of discovery ahead of him in the field of paleontology.” As stated here, Tyler discovered something huge at such a young age. He has so much more ahead of him, and many people are excited to see what he can do next. The type of dinosaur that he found was known as a Hadrosaur. It was a herbivore, with a flat jaw like the bill of a duck, weighed around 15,000 pounds and was 30-35 feet in length. When Tyler found Dakota, the dinosaur was completely mummified, nothing that had ever been discovered before. This was a first, not only for Dr. Lyson, but for the rest of the world.
My opinion on the book was that it was a fascinating read if you are into scientific and very factual books. If you’re not into that kind of thing, this is not the book for you. It is a very difficult read, and it is sometimes hard to keep going, but if you do it will eventually get better. I believe that an older audience would enjoy this book. The language in the book is very mature, especially for an adolescent or child. Overall, the book was hard to keep up with, but at the end of the day it was a very good book.
September 11, 2025
"THIS IS A PALEONTOLOGICAL DETECTIVE STORY, a 65-milllion-year-old case so cold it's the hottest development in modern dinosaur-hunting. The victim, a hadrosaur, was discovered in ht e Hell Creek Badlands of North Dakota in 1999 by an enthusiastic fossil hound named Tyler Tyson. What seemed at first glance a solid but routine find would soon reveal itself to be one of the rarest of all specimens -- a dinosaur mummy, and not just any mummy, but perhaps the finest and most complete example ever unearthed.
"But this book is more than a window into the far-distant past; it's also an account of a century and more of paleontological pioneers and a vivid portrait of the state of the art in modern paleontology. Phillip Manning calls upon many scientific disciplines and employs such high-tech tools as electron microscopes, LIDAR, and the world's largest CT scanner, originally built to examine NASA spacecraft, now put to work imaging the enormous ancient creature that died hundred of millennia ago."
~~back cover
Since this book was written in 2008, some of the technology doesn't seem so newfangled anymore, but the history of the paleontological discipline is very informative, and provides a background that allows the reader to better understand the incredible significance of the find, the horrendous difficulties that had to be overcome to get it out of the ground and back to the lab, and the incredible amount of research, hard work, and scientific curiosity that went into finally presenting the world with such a magnificent specimen.
It's a bit of a difficult read because of all the scientific information that needs to be imparted to the reader, but the stickier parts can be skipped over without losing any of the overall threads.
"But this book is more than a window into the far-distant past; it's also an account of a century and more of paleontological pioneers and a vivid portrait of the state of the art in modern paleontology. Phillip Manning calls upon many scientific disciplines and employs such high-tech tools as electron microscopes, LIDAR, and the world's largest CT scanner, originally built to examine NASA spacecraft, now put to work imaging the enormous ancient creature that died hundred of millennia ago."
~~back cover
Since this book was written in 2008, some of the technology doesn't seem so newfangled anymore, but the history of the paleontological discipline is very informative, and provides a background that allows the reader to better understand the incredible significance of the find, the horrendous difficulties that had to be overcome to get it out of the ground and back to the lab, and the incredible amount of research, hard work, and scientific curiosity that went into finally presenting the world with such a magnificent specimen.
It's a bit of a difficult read because of all the scientific information that needs to be imparted to the reader, but the stickier parts can be skipped over without losing any of the overall threads.
January 24, 2023
Awful. Aimless, meandering, pandering, amazingly repetitive, overly detailed. Full of so much filler, you can tell that the authour was really struggling to fill pages so kept rehashing every point he made with slightly different wording and describing every aspect of every process with painstaking details. The worst part of this book was how the story he's telling, of the dinosaur mummy and its relevant scientific data: the information that the skin envelope can reveal about the Edmontosaurus, it's woefully incomplete. I guess he had a deadline for the book deal that he had with National Geographic, and the studies that needed to be done with the dinosaur skin are nowhere near finished, so the book got released anyway but with tons of extraneous details. This book was a struggle to get through and is written in a style that is simultaneously stylized like a dry textbook and an overly enthusiastic grade school report. Actual garbage.
August 1, 2022
A book which started off promisingly with the find of a mummified dinosaur fossil in the Badlands of North Dakota. The paleontologists had to get funding for the dig, and got it from National Geographic, which published this book. However, instead of the particular story of the dino fossil, it had to branch out into generalities of paleontology, because obviously Nat Geo had made as part of their funding the stipulation that there had to be a book within 18 months. This meant that they weren't able to get to the nitty gritty of the fossil in time for the book to be published so to fill the volume the author put in lots of scientific jargon which as a lay person totally lost me. I want to look up the information on the fossil now (the book was published in 2008) to see what has happened in the meantime. So unless you are a paleontologist, you might want to miss this one.
February 8, 2021
Really interesting look at the history of finding mummies, human and dinosaur! Diehard dinosaur fans will find this book fascinating, as it's a good glimpse at the profession of paleontology and what it takes to find, dig up, preserve, prepare, and display fossils. Some chapters got a bit too technical for my level (DNA, NASA CT-scanner, bio-something or other), but I was able to follow along with most of the book. I really enjoyed the cheeky stories of fossils hunters throughout the years.
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June 19, 2019I appreciate the description of the technical aspects of scientific research of these incredible beasts. However, I also found it rather tedious reading. Can’t rate it because it does what it said it would do very well. I just didn’t enjoy it.
May 30, 2022
Really disappointed. Little of it was about the findings as was implied, instead it was brief overviews on other findings and very long bits about the excavation and processed that will hopefully eventually give us data. So there were whole chapters about processes with no payoff for a dull read.
November 26, 2018
A worthwhile library read, but unfortunately won't tell you a lot about what was learned from the particular dinosaur mummy that is its subject.
March 15, 2019
Perfect book for geeking out on dinosaurs. Lots of technical stuff and some adventure.
October 28, 2020
Boring
August 21, 2017
How do those people know what something that died so long ago looks and acts like? I'm not a student, nor very scientifically minded, just curious. Reading this answered some of the questions I had and threw in an entertaining read.
A few spots may have lost me but now I want to know more. I enjoyed this book.
A few spots may have lost me but now I want to know more. I enjoyed this book.
June 22, 2015
I came across "Grave Secrets of Dinosaurs" the day after seeing (and despite all improbabilities, loving) "Jurassic World". So how could I resist this story of a young hadrosaur nicknamed "Dakota" by its discoverer, a teenage fossil hound, on his family's property in North Dakota? British scientist Phillip Manning tells the story of his own improbable meeting with the youthful paleontologist, and the exhumation of is believed to be one of the most complete "dinosaur mummies" ever unearthed.
Dinosaur mummies, by the way, are still fossils, but fossils that were preserved so soon after death that even major parts of their non-bony tissues were mineralized. Dakota, for instance, is believed to have most of its skin envelope intact, as well as tendons/ligaments and other tissues. From the excavation of a separate tail portion of the dinosaur, Manning and others have recovered biological fragments. Before raising our hopes of seeing a real life Jurassic Park, he assures us that these molecules are not DNA. Instead they are apparently the amino acids (protein building blocks) the dinosaur's DNA coded for.
Manning spends most of the book dealing the hard science of extracting the several ton block of sediment encasing Dakota from the Badlands of North Dakota and searching for a peek inside. Even a NASA scanner proved unable to completely penetrate the mass, and Dakota is still not completely unearthed to this day. In the meantime, Manning's teams have teased out enough information to solve one question dino-fanatics long to know: could a herbivorous hadrosaur like Dakota run fast enough to escape a T. rex? The answer is a resounding "yes"!
Dinosaur mummies, by the way, are still fossils, but fossils that were preserved so soon after death that even major parts of their non-bony tissues were mineralized. Dakota, for instance, is believed to have most of its skin envelope intact, as well as tendons/ligaments and other tissues. From the excavation of a separate tail portion of the dinosaur, Manning and others have recovered biological fragments. Before raising our hopes of seeing a real life Jurassic Park, he assures us that these molecules are not DNA. Instead they are apparently the amino acids (protein building blocks) the dinosaur's DNA coded for.
Manning spends most of the book dealing the hard science of extracting the several ton block of sediment encasing Dakota from the Badlands of North Dakota and searching for a peek inside. Even a NASA scanner proved unable to completely penetrate the mass, and Dakota is still not completely unearthed to this day. In the meantime, Manning's teams have teased out enough information to solve one question dino-fanatics long to know: could a herbivorous hadrosaur like Dakota run fast enough to escape a T. rex? The answer is a resounding "yes"!
October 2, 2008
This book was extremely frustrating to get through. While it did provide a nice overview of many past dinosaur "mummy" finds and went into a lot of detail regarding how paleontologists work, there was very little information on the actual dinosaur this book was supposed to be about, a complete Edmontosaurus with mineralized skin. The reader is left hanging at the very end of the book, with no clue as to whether the body block of the dinosaur was going to get a complete CT scan. This was after reading through two thirds of the book just to get past the historical and biographical info. As such the author had very little topic-related information to provide, and even explained at one point that he could not wait to see what happened before writing about it because the book was due to the publisher! Other authors have successfully pushed back their deadlines so I'm not sure why Manning couldn't, except that this appears to be his first book and he must be unfamiliar with the publishing world. This book could have waited a good two more years and the reader would be much better off for it.
July 11, 2008
Rather than revealing a major discovery, this book seems to be a basic synopsis of "what paleontologists do". It seems as though the author nearly missed his publication deadline so the book became 90% facts about paleontology, 5% information about the Dakota mummy, and 5% biographical info on himself. If only he'd waited a few years, he could have published his findings solely about the dinosaur mummy.
You will be disappointed by this book if you are hoping there are major revelations within. You won't be disappointed by this book if you have no prior knowledge about paleontology (because, let's face it, paleontology is rad).
You will be disappointed by this book if you are hoping there are major revelations within. You won't be disappointed by this book if you have no prior knowledge about paleontology (because, let's face it, paleontology is rad).
August 29, 2013
I was disappointed in this, I have enjoyed Paleontology since I was a kid and so I have continued in an amateur way to follow the field and so I wasn't surprised in a lot of the techniques described in the book. I suppose what I found the least helpful was that the book, I'm sure to make publishing deadlines, came out prior to a lot of the results of the particular dig in questions results being completed and so there was really very little concrete addition to the overall understanding of dinosaurs and in particular Edmontosaurus (the excavation of the dinosaur with soft tissue the book is centered around)because much of the results still needed to be processed.
January 15, 2015
I'm starting to realize that my reading of science books parallels my experience with science classes in college. I was great at the labs, the practical stuff, and I love reading about the actual digs and prep work. When they get into the deeper book stuff, I wander a little bit. That isn't helped in this book's case by the fact that Manning can go really far afield with stuff that only minimally ties back into the story of Dakota.
Not a bad book, but I'd recommend the hour long documentary Dino Autopsy as a more definitive experience.
Not a bad book, but I'd recommend the hour long documentary Dino Autopsy as a more definitive experience.
May 10, 2008
What a let down. The book is ok. However, the whole interest is what was learned from the fossilized skin and other soft tissues. Manning tells you too much about himself and too little about the reason you picked up the book. Then, oops, I am up against my editor's deadline and we have not finished out studies to begin to tell you (the reader) about the fossilized skin or soft tissues. What a let down.
November 17, 2009
Non-fiction 567.9
One of the best science books I’ve read this year. Manning is an English paleontologist with a lovely sense of humor and a fine writing style for the armchair scientist. A fossil hunter in North Dakota discovered the tip of a “mummified” dinosaur. “So what,” you say. A mummified dinosaur is an incredible find and Manning tells us why and details all the different people needed to translate the information recovered. Absolutely fascinating.
One of the best science books I’ve read this year. Manning is an English paleontologist with a lovely sense of humor and a fine writing style for the armchair scientist. A fossil hunter in North Dakota discovered the tip of a “mummified” dinosaur. “So what,” you say. A mummified dinosaur is an incredible find and Manning tells us why and details all the different people needed to translate the information recovered. Absolutely fascinating.
June 13, 2013
I enjoyed the book because it touches on two of the things I enjoy: paleontology and technology. While the book doesn't go into much about "Dakota," the dino mummy, it does detail much in the background of the work involved in getting the fossil out of the ground as well as a history of paleontology. I hope at some point a second volume is written to finish the tale of "Dakota," because it ends with the story unfinished.
May 19, 2015
Very educational book. I learned a lot about dinosaurs, where they have been found, and the forensic nature that scientist can use to figure out how they died. Really makes me want to experience a dig. The fact that this book describes a mummified fossil is very exciting and very rare. It was also located not far from where we live now. Good read for scientist and curious dinosaur lovers alike.
October 6, 2017
Very interesting book, showing how paleontology works today. It also gives a brief overview of other dinosaur mummies. Unfortunately, the book ends before work on the Dakota mummy ends (and the author fails to explain why this was done). Also, dinosaur (and other) fossils are explained from an evolutionary viewpoint (such as dinosaurs "evolving" into birds).
October 7, 2009
I think this book was delivered to contract as much of the research was still going on by the time it was published. Basically I felt a bit cheated once I got to the end of it as the conclusions just were not there
December 23, 2015
It was well-done and gave a good view into paleontology. It lacked in two main areas. First, the underlying facts needed to be gathered first to complete it. Secondly, the blanket overview of all of paleontology detracted from Dakota.
April 19, 2014
I really enjoyed this book and I even found myself getting excited as they discovered more and more about their mummified dinosaur.
It was an interesting read and I would highly recommend this book to all dinosaur lovers out there.
It was an interesting read and I would highly recommend this book to all dinosaur lovers out there.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews