The Ends of the World – Book Review

The Ends of the World

by Peter Brannen

If you are a reader who has traversed my blog and (hopefully) enjoyed my posts for quite some time, you must be aware of my unmistakable infatuation with the iconic fauna of the ancient past: dinosaurs. Devoting an enormous share of my life to learning about these fascinating creatures has inevitably led me (as I believe it would do to anyone else) to a more global picture of the veritable nature of life itself. Dinosaurs are part of the wondrous tapestry of life forms that have taken up residence on our planet and, thus, they, we, and all other organisms share the same, single story of occupancy on this celestial body. With that in mind, exploring the wonderful world of dinosaurs often means to take a further step to understanding more geological & paleontological facets, which can include the ultra-tragic events that have shaped the Earth into its current state. That's where The Ends of the World by Peter Brannen comes into play.

The Ends of the World is a glorious volume that explores and details the apocalypses that our planet has undergone in its history of complex life (this is the first book focusing on the subject I've ever read). Gaia is never steady and there have been five (5) mass extinctions pummeling our beloved planetary home and exterminating the majority of life at particular moments in time. These are known as the Big Five mass extinctions and include the (in)famous end-Cretaceous die-off, which wiped out our non-avian-dinosaur relatives, and the unimaginably grim & horrendous end-Permian massive annihilation, which nearly zapped all life on Earth to total extinction. An award-winning science journalist, Brannen hops from one spot to another to examine the reality of these planetary-scale mass deaths. In this book, you'll encounter many experts giving their takes on the horrific mega-events, which do not necessarily present agreeing views. The author has a brilliant knack of engaging readers with his deft use of words (and a modicum of humor), and his writing will teleport you to a realm where you can seamlessly marvel at the grandeur of the natural history of our planet, albeit it involves the macabre quality of global massacres.

Nevertheless, Brannen does not stop at that; his discourse also touches on other issues, such as whether or not we are currently experiencing a legitimate sixth mass extinction. Not only does The Ends of the World cover the past and present, but it also comments on the future fate of our planet, with the last chapter dealing with the ultimate extinction that will befall the Earth eons from now. There are certainly many things that people can learn from this book – two that I found intriguing are the fact that we actually live in an interglacial (i.e. a brief warm period sandwiched by ice ages) and the effect of agriculture on the explosion of the world's population. However, the most relevant one to our current situation undoubtedly has to do with the way we humans treat our sole home in the universe: whether we stick to the present careless & environmentally-damaging behavior or switch to more prudent attitude towards the Earth will determine its course for many, many years to come. Grab The Ends of the World and learn something new about our planet today.

Special thanks to Steve Brusatte (who is also featured in the mass extinction volume) for recommending this book! If you haven't, you must also check out his magnificent book on the history of the dinosaurian dynasty The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs (to read my review, click here).

Have you read The Ends of the World? What are your thoughts on this book? Share what you think in the comment section below!