Earth Clock: The History of Our Planet in 24 Hours

by Tom Jackson, Nic Jones (Illustrator)

The entire history of Planet Earth as you've never seen it before. Our planet has been spinning in the blackness of Space for 4.5 billion years. People have only been around for a tiny part of it. But what happened before we arrived on the scene? Before animals, dinosaurs and even trees? Imagine if we could discover Earth's history in one day… Starting the clock from the formation of the Earth, discover each significant moment in time on the clock, counting down to midnight. Earth Clock covers the most interesting and high-impact moments of our planet's geological history with stunning, detailed illustrations, while charting the evolution of life on Earth, from ancient single-celled organisms to the species we know today, until modern humans appear – at just four seconds to midnight. What will tomorrow bring?

Genres: Nonfiction

64 pages, Hardcover

First published August 23, 2022

About the author

"I'm a non-fiction author and project editor (plus I do a bit of journalism). I'm available for project development, writing, project management and I also work as a packager. Click on the links above to see examples of my work.

But first some background: Over the last 20 years, I've written books, magazine and newspaper articles, for online and for television. I get to write about a wide range of subjects, everything from axolotls to zoroastrianism. However, my specialties are natural history, technology and all things scientific. I've worked on projects with Brian May, Patrick Moore, Marcus de Sautoy and Carol Vorderman and for major international publishers, such as Dorling Kindersley, National Geographic, Scholastic, Hachette, Facts on File and BBC Magazines.

I spend my days finding fun ways of communicating all kinds of facts, new and old, to every age group and reading ability. I live in Bristol, England, with my wife and three children. I studied zoology at Bristol University and have had spells working at the zoos in Jersey and Surrey. I used to be something of a conservationist, which included planting trees in Somerset, surveying Vietnamese jungle and rescuing buffaloes from drought-ridden Zimbabwe. Writing jobs have also taken me to the Galápagos Islands, the Amazon rainforest, the coral reefs of Indonesia and the Sahara Desert. Nowadays, I can be found mainly in the attic."
~http://tomjackson.weebly.com/

Reviews

[Frank Lang · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dieses Review bezieht sich auf die deutsche Übersetzung, die unter dem Titel im arsEdition Verlag erschienen ist (ISBN: 3845852224).

Der ein oder andere hat vielleicht hin und wieder schon mal gehört, dass die Menschen für lediglich ein paar Sekunden existieren, würde man die Erdgeschichte auf einen Tag reduzieren. Das klingt ganz schon abstrakt, vor allem für Kinder. Hier hilft dieses Bilderbuch „Wenn die Erde einen Tag alt wäre“. Die Erde ist in etwa 4,5 Milliarden Jahre alt. Dies entspricht den 24 Stunden. Jede Stunde dieser erdachten Erdenuhr entspricht 190 Millionen Jahre, jede Minute drei Millionen Jahre und jede Sekunde in etwa 50.000 Jahre.

In diesem Buch sind nun markante Momente der Erdgeschichte herausgenommen worden, um diese in diesen Kontext zu setzen. So entstand der Mond 13 Minuten nach der Entstehung der Erde. Die Erde ist schon 4 Stunden alt, als sich erste Lebensformen in der Ursuppe bildeten. Und man muss die Sekunden zählen, um die Zeitspanne zu bemessen, seit der moderne Mensch auf der Erde in Erscheinung tritt. Dann steht die Erdenuhr nämlich bei 23:59:59 (also eine Sekunde vor Mitternacht).

Die einzelnen markanten Stationen auf der Reise durch die Erdgeschichte sind mit großflächigen Zeichnungen untermalt, die einen ersten Eindruck davon vermitteln, was in der Zeit geschehen ist. Kurze Textblöcke erklären kindgerecht, was diese Zeit ausmachte. Falls mal ein Wort unverständlich ist, werden am Ende einige schwierige Begriffe erklärt. Ebenfalls am Ende des Buchs findet sich eine Übersicht, in der die Erdzeitalter auf einem Zeitstrahl dargestellt werden, was ebenfalls sehr hilfreich ist, um sich bewusst zu machen, wie alt die Erde ist und wie wenig Zeit der Mensch aufgebracht hat, um in wenigen hunderttausend Jahren diesen Planeten so nachhaltig zu verändern. Und das nicht zu seinem Vorteil.

Fazit
Ich finde die Darstellung, die Erdgeschichte auf einen Tag zu beziehen sehr treffend. Ich kannte diese Darstellung schon bevor ich dieses Bilderbuch gelesen habe, kannte bis jetzt aber keine kindgerechte Darstellung dieses Sachverhalts. Es fällt uns Menschen sowieso recht schwer, sich diese langen Zeiträume vorzustellen. Da ist es sehr hilfreich, sich dieses kleinen Tricks zu bedienen. Und als Nebeneffekt kann man bei Kindern (und deren Eltern) eine Reflexion in Gang zu setzen, über das, was der Mensch auf der Erde veranstaltet hat, angesichts der kurzen Zeitspanne, seit er in Erscheinung getreten ist.

[Wren · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tom Jackson writes an information-rich book about the history of the earth and its life forms. The concept of a clock creates an overarching metaphor to help young people conceptualize the age of the earth, given that modern humans show up 23:59:59. Before then, there are a lot of processes that took place to create the earth as we know it: formation of land and sea, early life on a small scale, the development of sea, land, and air creatures, and then after a long time, the development of dinosaurs that most school-aged children can name.

The concluding pages bring up issues of pollution, including the problem of plastics. After seeing how long it took life to form, it's more dramatic to see how modern humans are quickly destroying what took eons to build.

Nic Jones creates lush illustrations that are more informative than poetic, and these help illustrate the description of what occurred during various time periods. The back matter consists of a timeline that explains the differences between and relationships among an eon, era, period, MYS (millions of years ago) and the clock--as displayed in a table that is read like a tower with the bottom containing the oldest time and the top referring to the most current era (Cenozois), period (Quaternary), MYA (0-2.588) and hour on the 24 hour clock (23:59:24:00). Oh, there is also an index of about 100 terms, such as chemicals of life, Great Dying, Neanderthals, and Spriggina.

While even small children can get something by looking at the illustrations of life becoming more complex period by period, I see this book as most appropriate for children ages 9 through 13 because it contains a lot of information, some of it in smallish print (maybe 10 point font?).

[Brooke - TheBrookeList · Rating 3 out of 5]

Earth Clock takes in the whole history of Earth science, packing it into a timetable as though the creation and formation of the earth and all things leading to us were one 24 hour clock. It. Is. A. Lot. I feel like my head is spinning with all the things I don't know, words I've never seen, creatures I'll never understand, and ages past we can hardly dream of. I almost can't fathom how scientists have come to know or think we know so many things about this complex and complicated Earth we call home. And after all that it's been through, how could we ever hope to help guide it through what's to come? This is a BIG picture book, with gorgeous and bold illustrations, lots of fascinating text boxes and content galore. It certainly left me feeling a tad insignificant in the massive scheme of existence. Earth Clock is heavy on the science and heavy on color and visual interest. The quality is so impressive - certainly feels like a gift book.

The text of this title is a little more heavy than many similar nonfiction science picture books, which are broken into smaller text boxes. I'd suggest it would really only appeal to older elementary or middle grade readers (except for its visual appeal).

Read as a nomination in the nonfiction book award category as a panelist for Children's and Young Adult Bloggers' Literary Awards (Cybils Awards).

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cool idea -- big book, huge spreads, as you walk through the history of the earth using a 24 hour clock as the unit of time from the start until the present. It was competently but not spectacularly executed. The big problem of course is that the most of the day happens before life even appears, and then stuff like mammals/humanity happen in the last couple of seconds. I was hoping to see some cool stuff down helping me navigate the clock, but it just ciked along and it was hard to tell the difference.

The illustrations were OK but not great, a bit muted. The spread of information was fine but rarely excited me.

[WaywardCrow Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting read, especially as someone who spent my early science years receiving Christian education. I always feel like evolutionary biology is too big for my mind to comprehend. Only the most recent periods of our eon feels somewhat tangible to comprehend. But it was fun to read about lots of different species I won’t remember 😂 And I was proud I could still recognize some terms from my anthropology course in college.

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very good book that I would recommend to others but unfortunately didn't finish myself because I have my own issues (32/63 pp.) I have very strong arachnophobia (pp.32-33) and definitely anticipated seeing some, both ancestors of modern day spiders and today's, but didn't get far enough without accidentally throwing the poor book across the room. Still, very highly recommended for those who can handle that. Maybe one day I'll get over my irrational fears.

Update: I finished it very carefully :D and it was definitely worth it!