One of the best dinosaur books I've ever read! I had no idea the history of discovery of dinosaurs in the Victorian era and this was such a fun and easy read.

Truly did not expect for a book about finding dinosaur fossils to be this entertaining and enthralling but alas here we are! Dolnick has a way of storytelling that makes you both excited and endlessly curious. Truly recommend, even if you think this topic isn’t for you— you will be pleasantly surprised

I love the cover of this book! I really enjoyed how this was written. It's easy to follow and is paced well. This is a informative, unique book I would recommend! Special Thank you to Edward Dolnick, Scribner and NetGalley for allowing me to read a complimentary copy in exchange for an honest review.

It just so happens that this was the third book I've read in recent weeks about evolution and how the discovery of dinosaurs in the Victorian-era changed the world.
In many ways this was my favorite - the way facts were presented was clever and memorable. Dolnick compares early 19th century people finding dinosaur tracks to Robinson Crusoe finding footprints on his desert island. He explains that the span from the age of Stegosaurus to the age of T. Rex was longer than the span from T. Rex to the iphone. He refers to French scientiost LeClerc as "a sneer in human form." I loved the writing and learned so much. I have one quibble though.
Dolnick states, over and over, that Victorian-era scientific discoveries proved that there was no God and that educated people would never again have anything to do with religion. He says that Darwin blasted into rubble the idea of a benevolent deity presiding over the world. This is obviously Dolnick's view, but I didn't see any logical evidence that scientific discoveries lead to this conclusion. He surely must be aware that many people agree with Darwin and know dinosaurs existed but still believe in God? Maybe not, because he seems quite puzzled that some scientists of the age, such as Lyell, seemed to keep their faith, in spite of humanity's diminished role in the world. I'm aware that many scientists are atheists, but I am not convinced that dinosaur fossils prove them right.
If you go in knowing he's got this slant, I still strongly recommend you read this book. It was quick reading, informative and entertaining.

An interesting read on how people in the Victorian Age "discovered" dinosaurs. Even though bones and footprints had been around before, the interest really began around the early 1800's. It was fun to read how the people of that time tried to reconcile the idea of dinosaurs with their religious beliefs. It led to some quite entertaining theories. Then, along came Darwin and blew all those theories away!
This is not a real scholarly read, you won't learn much about dinosaurs per se, but the social factors are an angle that I had never considered before. The book is an easy read, although somewhat repetitive. It could have used a good, strict editor, and then it would have been a better book.

I received this book for free from Netgalley. That did not influence this review.

Dinosaurs at the Dinner Party by Edward Dolnick sets out to answer the question: When did we learn that dinosaurs existed?

To my surprise, the answer (according to Dolnick) is 1802, when the first dinosaur tracks were discovered by a 12-year-old boy while plowing his father’s Massachusetts fields. Of course, the story is more complicated than that. No one knew what the tracks were. Dinosaur bones had to be found and studied; skeletons had to be imagined and reconstructed. The creatures had to be named and categorized. And finally, they had to be classified as “dinosaurs,” a word that did not exist before 1842.

Dolnick takes the reader on a trek through 19th century natural science (in England, primarily, but also in America), showing how well religion and science coexisted until Darwin took the stage. Men and women were enthusiastic fossil hunters. In fact, one of the foremost fossil-finders of the day was a young, impoverished Englishwoman, Mary Annings. While she was recognized by the great scientists of the day, she was not recognized as a great scientist. The occasional cooperation and more frequent competition among the great scientists makes for entertaining reading.

Of course, gigantic bones were discovered prior to 1802. But although these were eventually found to be prehistoric, they are practically modern-day compared to dinosaurs. Dolnick steps back in time to acquaint the reader with those spectacular finds as well.

This delightful and informative book does a wonderful job of placing the natural science debates of the Victorian age within the context of its time. It poses another question as well: What do you do when faced with the unimaginable?

A fun and informative niche history of the Victorian dinosaur craze.

Having read a fair amount on paleontology and the discovery of dinosaur bones, I was so excited to find this unique little history that focuses more on the *why* of Dinomania among Victorians than the science, and that does a wonderful job of explain this in the context of the way Victorians viewed science and discovery.

I’ve read a few of Dolnick’s books prior to this one and felt they were just ok, but this one is a real gem, both in the worthiness of the subject and the way Dolnick tells it.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This was a fascinating book. I enjoyed reading it a lot!

I thought that this book did a good job of introducing the characters involved at the beginning of the dinosaur craze. Some were quite eccentric. They had to grapple with fitting those huge bones into their strict and literal religious concepts. It resulted in some peculiar theories. Unable to accept the notion that God would create these creatures just to have them become extinct, someone proposed that God just created the old bones for us to find and scattered them about. The book ends when Darwin comes along and shakes everyone’s world.

This book was a little repetitious and not as captivating as I had hoped. I love dinosaurs and have read other books about the early days of paleontology, so this wasn’t entirely new to me. The book has illustrations, end notes and an extensive bibliography.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

This book was such a surprise to me!
I could only imagine what an event that dinner party had to be.
How innovative the dinner party must have been - imagine walking into a party and seeing life sized dinosaurs!
Highly recommended for fans of lively history.

The title of this book is so bombastic that it begged to be requested [and will beg to be bought off the shelves in stores] and for someone who 1. knows little [almost nothing and most of it was from Jurassic Park LOL] about dinosaurs in general, 2. loves history [especially ones featuring those crazy Victorians], and 3. loves an excellent bombastic nonfiction book more than most things, it was really a no-brainer for me and I couldn't wait to dive in.

Yeah. Sigh.

Did I learn anything? Yes [though not nearly as much as I wanted NOR not what I thought I was going to learn]. Was the book engaging? Welllll...mostly. There were moments when I was not engaged, close to bored [there seemed to be a lot of repetition and that got old after awhile], and I did find that I thought I had missed something as the chapter/story would abruptly end and then move on to something else in the next chapter [this became really problematic for me and I finally had to stop rewinding the audiobook to see if I missed something and just became resigned to this odd writing trait of the author's. FYI, I am not a fan. At all. ]; it disrupted the flow of the book and left me wondering just what the rest of the story was [spoiler, we never find out].

While this was deeply researched [and I acknowledge the author's work here], and the writing is mostly [for me] engaging [minus the problems I had with it stated it above], it was just not enough for me and I wanted so much more.

If you do not mind repetition and a somewhat chaotic read, and as long as you aren't expecting a deep-dive into the Victorian love of fossils/dinosaurs, then this is the book for you. For me, I am truly disappointed in this book that just never lives up to its truly bombastic title.

Thank you to NetGalley, Edward Dolnick, and Scribner for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A fascinating look at the people who first discovered dinosaur bones and the continuing hunt for them during the Victorian period when even scientists couldn't picture a world where animals could go extinct or the world was even old enough for dinosaurs to have existed. So this isn't just about the fascinating people, though many of them were very colorful and interesting, to chase after the bones but how the interpretation of them by people caused a collision with theology and what people thought they knew about the Earth itself.

This is very readable and flows like a historical novel but is actually true. Not just is it full of information but lots of fun too. That is indeed a difficult blend to achieve. You don't have to be a die-hard dinosaur fan to enjoy this, but be real, there are tons of dinosaur fans at heart.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest opinion.

The image of Victorians is rather stodgy, right? Stiff clothes, dark and clutttered interiors and rigid viewpoints. Regarding the history of the earth they were complacent and why not? Their faith assured that God didn’t experiment. All life was as it always had been. Then very large bones of very strange animals made their appearance. What to make of this? Today many of the explanations are good for a laugh, but the strength of this book is educating the reader on why people thought as they did and how the discovery of dinosaurs offered radical ideas as to time, extinction and humanity’s place in creation. The writing is excellent, the characters involved were fascinating and I, for one, came away with a new respect for all the Victorian citizens who read, attended lectures and exhibitions and were intrigued. Just as many of these people had left agriculture for jobs in mills and factories, they stepped from an unchangeable history into one of uncertainty.

If you're looking for a carefully explained, well-thoughtout, and logical, chronological explanation of how the Victorians accidentally created paleontology, discovered dinosaurs, and rethought everything they knew about the world- this is not that book.

If you're just interested enough in the idea of discovering dinosaurs where the world had never acknowledged them before, and wondering how Victorian science dealt with that, where any book is a good starter, then Dolnick is probably as good a start as any.

I am by no means an expert on dinosaurs. But I'm a huge reader of everything related to Victorian history and hadn't come across a book devoted to describing the fossil craze of the Victorian period and how it changed the scientific thought process. So the title hooked me. From Mary Anning to William Buckland to Richard Owen, this book introduces you to the English (and one or two French) who thrilled in hunting fossils or those happier in museums trying to understand fossils. It explains the original Victorian view that nature, science, and religion all fit happily together. Fossils and the startling idea of dinosaurs began to erode those views, despite how hard a few clung to them. Before Darwin threw his new explanation of evolution onto the scene, people were already prepared for the change in thinking he was suggesting.

My problem wasn't the more simplistic approach Dolnick took in his explanations or way of writing. Everyone has their own style and the reader can get used to it if the story is good. Or the number of times he would lament about how if only those early scientists had had access to the kinds of equipment etc. that modern scientists have. Which seemed like kind of the point to me. When you're discovering something, you work with what you have. It was the unbelieveable amount of repetition in the book. Read a chapter and then had to take a break for a few days? No problem, you could read the next one and not have missed anything. Different words, saying exactly the same thing. It was like he couldn't figure out what version of a chapter he liked better, so he just left them all in. Occasionally new things would come in, a new person would be introduced, etc. Then they would get the same repeat treatment, hammering away at the reader until I had to skim sections to be able to move forward at all. By the time we got to the famous dinner party in the Crystal Palace dinosaur statues I was pretty numb to all of it.

Overall, a fantastic idea for a research idea and book, very poorly and repetitiously executed. Definitely made me not want to pick up another book by this author, but did make me interested enough to look through his biblioghraphy to see if anyone had done a better job of writing on the subject.



I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review

"From the bestselling author of The Clockwork Universe and The Writing of the Gods, a historical adventure story about the eccentric Victorians who discovered dinosaur bones, leading to a whole new understanding of human history.

In the early 1800s the world was a safe and cozy place. But then a twelve-year-old farm boy in Massachusetts stumbled on a row of fossilized three-toed footprints the size of dinner plates - the first dinosaur tracks ever found. Soon, in England, Victorians unearthed enormous bones - bones that reached as high as a man's head. No one had ever seen such things. Outside of myths and fairy tales, no one had even imagined that creatures like three-toed giants had once lumbered across the land. And if anyone had somehow conjured up such a scene, they would never have imagined that all those animals could have vanished, hundreds of millions years ago. The thought of sudden, arbitrary disappearance from life was unnerving and forced the Victorians to rethink everything they knew about the world.

Now, in Dinosaurs at the Dinner Party, celebrated storyteller and historian Edward Dolnick leads us through a compelling true adventure as the paleontologists of the first half of the 19th century puzzled their way through the fossil record to create the story of dinosaurs we know today. The tale begins with Mary Anning, a poor, uneducated woman who had a sixth sense for finding fossils buried deep inside cliffs; and moves to a brilliant, eccentric geologist named William Buckland, a kind of Doctor Doolittle on a mission to eat his way through the entire animal kingdom; and then on to Richard Owen, the most respected and the most despised scientist of his generation.

Entertaining, erudite, and featuring an unconventional cast of characters, Dinosaurs at the Dinner Party tells the story of how the accidental discovery of prehistoric creatures upended humanity's understanding of the world and their place in it, and how a group of paleontologists worked to bring it back into focus again."

OK, so, I had something else to say but was derailed by William Buckland. HOW is he like Doctor Doolittle if he wants to eat them!?!

This historical nonfiction novel follows multiple people in the Victorian era in their pursuit of finding and identifying fossils primarily dinosaurs during a time that most people could never imagine that such creatures were not myth and actually roamed the earth. I found it to be a good general overview of the topic, which culminates with a famous dinner thrown on New Year’s Eve 1853 by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, a sculptor commissioned to create life size replicas of newly discovered dinosaurs, also depicted on the cover and used for the title.

The beginning of the book primarily focuses on the fossil collector Mary Anning, known for early findings and identification of ichthyosaur and plesiosaur skeletons, though men were often attributed with these discoveries as well as many of her other accomplishments. I first became intrigued by Anning when I read the historical fiction novel Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier and was pleased to read about this fascinating primarily self-educated woman making fascinating discoveries in a world where only men are recognized. Other notable figures followed and recognized for contributions over the course of the story include William Buckland, Gideon Mantell, Richard Owen and many more.

I found the story of the discovery and realization of dinosaur bones to be an interesting read. This was a lot for the common man to process, but especially for the actual scientists as most educated scientists of the time were also theologians. The mere existence of these creatures, much less the idea of extinction, went against most of their beliefs in the creation of the world. Reconciling their existence along with the other huge discoveries in science and technology at the time made for some intriguing theories.

Recommended for a general overview of the fossil collector craze of Victorian times and the interesting historical theories presented for their existence.

Thank you to Netgalley and Scribner for a copy provided for an honest review.

A thoroughly enjoyable read on the history of the discovery of dinosaurs and, really, of prehistory itself. Dinosaurs at the Dinner Party does not reveal new historical facts. Instead, what makes this book fascinating is the way that the author helps the reader to see the world and the unfolding of history through the eyes of those who were living it.
I have studied biology and evolutionary biology and scientific history for decades and yet this book helped me to see the principals in the history of dinosaur discovery in a much more forgiving light for not seeing the facts that we now think of as right in front of their faces.
Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the opportunity to read an advance copy of this book.

In the early 1800s, the discovery of dinosaur fossils shattered the world’s understanding of natural history. The unearthing of giant bones in England forced Victorians to confront the idea of extinct creatures and a world far older and less stable than they imagined. This book reveals the early days of paleontology, as scientists pieced together the story of dinosaurs and revolutionized our understanding of the planet’s past.

This unique book stresses how the Romantic movement of the early 19th century had consequences for the rising field of paleontology during the Victorian era. The worship of nature led to resistance to the implications of the new discoveries. With all the changes of the Industrial Revolution, people clung to nature as something eternal they could rely on—and paleontology upended that sense of security.

This unique convergence of historical factors helped create the binary between science and religion that remains with us today. The book is informative, fun to read, and helped me see the world in a new way.

Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.

I have read many of Dolnick's books (he is my first cousin once removed) and this may have been my favorite. He often concentrates on periods in the history of science in which the proverbial apple cart got upset. This book deals with the idea that dinosaurs existed millions of years ago and the discovered fossils (often in England, it seems) called into question the biblical interpretation of history (which Dolnick enjoys poking at it - I enjoy that too). Much like The Writing of the Gods, the book is quite willing to take time to examine somewhat off topic elements, but it is richer for these discursions.

Dinosaurs at the Dinner Party, by Edward Dolnick, is an engaging and entertaining look at how the discovery of dinosaur bones in the 1800s and the subsequent explanations of their origins overturned the Victorian view of the world in a host of ways, leading to our more modern conceptions of things such as evolution, time, and our place in the universe.
Dolnick begins in 1802 with a young boy in Massachusetts discovering a set of footprints that would late turn out to be a dinosaur trackway and ends with the famous 1853 New Year’s Eve party held inside a reconstructed dinosaur skeleton. The book often bursts the boundaries of the intervening 50 years though, skipping around in time to centuries earlier and years later, placing those middle years in their larger context. Honestly, this structure meets with mixed success I’d say, sometimes offering up fascinating juxtapositions or adding insightful context while at other times it can feel a bit chaotic and disorienting.

Lots of books obviously have been written about dinosaurs, but what makes this addition stand out is that rather than focus on the paleontology — the digging up of the bones, the piecing them together, the science of their evolution and role in the environment, etc. — Dolnick focuses far more on the change in worldview these early discoveries caused and how disruptive they were. As Dolnick puts it early on:
Every once in a great while, people going about their ordinary lives have looked up and seen something they never imagined. A ship with towering masts and billowing sails materialized on the horizon, for instance, in waters that had never known a vessel bigger than a canoe. Or a stranger turns up in a valley so remote that its inhabitants had thought themselves alone in the world. Of all such first encounters, none ever topped the moment when humans first stumbled on bones, footprints, and other evidence that dinosaurs had once roamed the earth Dolnick actually details several worldviews the discovery of dinosaurs overturned. One was how people “had taken for granted that the world had always looked much as it still did, with the dogs and daffodils and oaks and horses that we all know.” Another was that “no one had ever dreamed that a species could die … The thought of permanent arbitrary disappearance from the ladder of life was as unnerving for our forebears as would be the news, for us, that whole groups of people going about their everyday lives … might suddenly vanish into nothingness.” The idea of deep time combined with all those older ages being inhabited by creatures unobserved by humans also called into question the view that “humankind occupied a special, distinguished niche in the creation … that nature existed to serve human needs.” And obviously, the whole concept of evolution blew up the long-held conception of how the world/life worked and was also seen as blasphemous.

Of course, all of these long-held conceptions weren’t overturned by new concepts just falling out of the sky. And so along the book’s journey we meet a number of those people responsible for shifting everyone else’s views of how the world works. Thus we get wonderfully engaging and detailed looks at Mary Anning, who at 12 (with some help from her younger brother) was the first discoverer of an ichthyosaur and, astonishingly, several years later, also a plesiosaur; Robert Hooke, “a bad-tempered, far-ranging English genius who did pioneering work … in astronomy, mathematics, physics, and half a dozen fields besides”; Gideon Mantell, a handsome, charming country doctor who had been obsessed with fossils since childhood and who discovered, among others, megalosaurus and iguanosaurus; the “brilliant anatomist” George Cuvier; Richard Owen — “brilliant, backstabbing, charming, and manipulative”; and William Buckland, the president of the Geological Society who introduced megalosaurus and who also made it his mission to eat every animal in the world (the list of attempts was long and included hedgehog, crocodile, mole, and bluebottle fly). Dolnick brings all these people to life in entertaining and sometimes moving fashion.

Another strength in the book is the way the women are brought forward. Mary Anning of course played an integral role in the early days of fossil discovery and analysis (though far too rarely given the credit she deserved at the time), but Dolnick also highlights the role other women played, such as Caroline Owen who “from the start was a partner and ally … intelligent, interested in everything, and unflappable…, and a skilled illustrator.”

My only two quibbles with the book were the aforementioned issue with the time-jumping sometimes being a bit disjointed and that the book felt like it ended a bit abruptly. Beyond those minor nitpicks, Dinosaurs at the Dinner Party is an enjoyable, informative, and engaging exploration of the early days of dinosaur discoveries and takes a fascinating slant on the topic by focusing on the psychological impact of said discoveries. Strongly recommended.