Knoll's condensed saga of planet Earth and its existence is fascinating and Knoll's ability to explain phenomena in a digestible way is welcome to those unfamiliar with the subject matter. With helpful charts, graphs, maps, and illustrations, Knoll opens up the complexities and nuances of our planet to readers everywhere.

Andrew Knoll's A Brief History of Earth is a solid body of accessible popular science, a panoramic perspective on Earth's past, related with a tasteful sprinkle of wry humor and folksy metaphor. Starting from the detritus of prior generations of stars in the young universe that eventually congealed in our :"neighborhood" to form the solar system, Knoll continues through clearly delineated eras and periods. Every aspect of our planet that makes it a life-sustaining home corresponds to an interesting development in the geological past. Here are among the best lucid explanations in science writing for lay readers of 1) why Earth came to have an oxygen-rich atmosphere, 2) why the continents formed and drift and how plate-tectonics works, 3) why dinosaurs tended to larger bodies than mammals and how that relates to birds' bodies and lungs, 4) how we came to know the dinosaurs and many contemporary life forms were suddenly extinguished by a meteorite, and 5) how we know the planet is rapidly warming to heat not seen in millions of years and how we know our civilization is largely responsible. Distinguished in its focus on HOW modern scientists know what they expound, rather than simply presenting a list of facts with textbook authority, A Brief History of Earth does much to invite readers on the journey of our expanding knowledge of our world, its origins, and the options for our destiny on it. An engrossing, enlightening pleasure.