Looking through a glass darkly

Fantastic flight through time unimaginable. The author brings the deep past into context linking it seamlessly into lessons for our modern world. Narrated in a really first class fashion it kept me hooked from beginning to end.

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Informative and enjoyable

An informative and enjoyable listen. The only issue I had was that, as the writer wrote the descriptions of past times in present tense, but then discussed our present day in the next sentence- it was a bit confusing at times when the "now" being discussed actually was!

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Evocative snapshots of prehistory.

Wonderfully descriptive writing brings the distant past of the earth into focus, gradually going back millions of years of life on this planet.

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A journey through deep time - mind blowing

- In this remarkable book, the author takes us on a journey through deep time, taking us in reverse order through time to a describe how animals, fauna and landscapes have changed due to ever changing conditions such as changes in climate, the planet and time. These worlds are almost alien in description and completely different to this current world.
- it's a remarkable fact that everything we know about the past and the lives that lives that came before us has mainly came from the death of creatures and the fossils they have left behind. This book looks over successive periods of time as a snapshot working in reverse order to tell us who we were, where we came from. In the snapshot pictures poetic descriptions and fascinating and you could learn a lot about who we were and where we came from over a large period of time.
- One of the approaches that I use to describe deep time is by measuring from my nose to an outstretched hand to the side and asking people what amount of my hand would need to be removed to wipe out the entire history of humans on this planet. All I need to do is put a nail fail across my finger and the crumbs form my nail would represent the time man has been on this planet. This book tells of all the events that have occurred before this time (though the first two parts do include humans or descendants of humans).
- “if all 4.5 billion years of earth's history were to be condensed into a single day and played out, more than three million years of footage would go by every second. We would see ecosystems rapidly rise and fall of the species that constitute their living parts appearing become extinct. We would see continents drift, climatic conditions change in a blink, and sudden dramatic events overturned long lived communities with devastating consequences. The mass extinction event that extinguished all the non- bird dinosaurs would occur 21 seconds before the end. Written human history would begin in the last thousandth of a second".
- “This book is an exploration of the earth that it used to exist, the changes that have occurred during its history and the ways that life has found to adapt stop each chapter is guided by the fossil record, visiting the plants and animals that immersed themselves in the landscape. And through this we can learn about our own world from these extinct ecosystems.”
- In ‘Otherworlds’ we go through the history of life you in reverse order, looking at different snapshot of the time, by starting in the Pleistocene age and moving through Palaeocene, Cretaceous, Jurassic, Triassic, Permian, Carboniferous, Devonian, Silurian, Ordovician, Cambrian ages amongst others. We finally come to a world where the land is completely different to our own, days are only 22 hours long and tsunamis are frequent due to the closeness of the moon which is gradually moving away from Earth.
- A wonderfully explored final coda that looks at what we need to do to ensure our own survival, a message of hope regarding what is happening in our world, how we can change the future and if we don’t do anything, it will have consequences, just like anyone in the in past period where lives have undergone mass extinction. We now live in a world where 60% of all the birds that live are chickens and birds are incredible because they are the only true survivors of the dinosaur error and are related to dinosaurs.
- An excellent and fascinating read that can take you back to ‘other worlds’ – and Halliday paints and describes these different worlds on planet Earth beautifully.

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Mind blowing!

I would make this book compulsory reading in every school. The depth of knowledge is outstanding. While it is incredibly scientific, the information is easily accessed. Beautifully written and beautifully read. I have listened to it 3 times already.

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1 person found this helpful

Fab

Some strange pronunciation eg a hard 'g' in Pangea. Otherwise really informative and well put together.

Happy to recommend.

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Fascinating Journey through time

Enjoyed the imaginative way in which the author moved through each epoch; chapter by chapter you learned many things and it was entertaining

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Wonderful premise, marvellously executed

I’ve listened to this book several times and would thoroughly recommend it. The writer takes you on fantastic journeys, factually interesting while igniting the imagination.

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Thoughtful, poetic, and extremely insightful

The author is incredibly skilful in showing the immense diversity of life throughout the past 600 million years, and the narrators touch brings a calming serenity to the scenes that the author invokes. This is a beautiful work and something I think everyone should read to get a good view on life’s permanence and impermanence.

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Totally enthralling

This book is gripping. There is so much information here I will have to listen to it again and I plan to buy the written work so that I can make notes.

I have seen Thomas Halliday talk about his work at a local literary festival and he gives a fascinating presentation.

This book would make an amazing TV series.

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