Books for late summer: from genius genes to tyrannosaur musings

Science News,  August 5, 2006  by J.A. Miller

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Kolbert touches on many elements in the current climate debate: melting glaciers, climate models, changes in animal ranges, ice-core data, signs that ancient civilizations collapsed during climate changes. Then, she gets to the politics of reducing carbon emissions and planning for climate change. She visits the Netherlands, which has at least a quarter of its land below sea level. The government is preparing for higher water in the years ahead by devising scenarios that expand water surge--protection areas. She drops in on Dutch families living in experimental floatable houses that can rise with the storm waters and then settle gently as the floods recede. Side by side, with curved metal tops, the homes look like a row of toasters, says Kolbert. Compared with Europe, the United States doesn't seem to be taking the issue seriously, Kolbert reports. U.S. federal policy seems to share Arrhenius' misguided nonchalance.

This is a sobering book, but it's not without hope. Engineer Robert Socolow compares cutting carbon emissions with the challenge that the United States once faced in wiping out child labor. He tells Kolbert: "I think it's the kind of issue where something looked extremely difficult, and not worth it, and then people changed their minds."--S. MILIUS

Murder and Old Bones TYRANNOSAUR CANYON

DOUGLAS PRESTON Forge Books, 2005

Veterinarian Tom Broadbent rides his horse through a remote New Mexico canyon one evening in search of peace and quiet. Four shots ring out nearby. When he takes a quick detour to investigate, he discovers a man, apparently a prospector, shot in the back and lying facedown in the sand. Broadbent momentarily revives the mortally wounded man, and after the prospector realizes that he's not in the grip of his killer, he forces Broadbent to take a small, leather-bound notebook filled with page after page of cryptic numbers. "It's for Robbie.... My daughter ... No one else ... For God's sake not the police ... You must ... promise."

Thus begins the novel Tyrannosaur Canyon and a fervent race to locate what would be a historic paleontological find. The cast of characters includes an assistant museum curator who yearns to redeem his career with a fantastic discovery, the bright yet unappreciated female postdoc who does all the glory-grabbing curator's lab work, illegal fossil hunters and distributors, and an ex-CIA-cryptologist-turned-novitiate at the local monastery--a character quite handy for a veterinarian who needs to decode a notebook full of numbers.

Broadbent has trouble convincing detectives that he's not involved in the prospector's death. Meanwhile, the prospector's murderer, in his quest to retrieve the notebook, makes life difficult for Broadbent and his wife. Near the end of the chase come the guys from a shadowy government unit that flies black helicopters and missile-equipped drone aircraft. Gradually, the book's prologue about a missing moon rock begins to make sense.

To accompany all this action, the book often flashes back 65 million years to describe the thoughts of one of the largest tyrannosaurs ever to have walked the planet.