I loved this book. The writing style is very accessible and the illustrations are gorgeous. I'd love to frame some of them. I liked how each chapter was about a different behavior and the author was able to show fossil evidence for that behavior from various types of animals from dinosaurs to fish, insects to mammals. The fossils mentioned in the book are from a wide variety of time periods as well so that made it even more interesting to see behaviors developing and continuing through time. Seeing the same type of behavior from a variety of animals was fascinating and made each chapter dynamic and very readable. I would highly recommend this to anyone with an interest in paleontology whether you are well-versed in the field or are an interested lay-person.

An excellent laypersons book about ancient life and how fossils can be used to deduce how long gone animals such as the dinosaurs lived and functioned when alive. Well written and engaging read. The only thing that keeps this book from being a top tier, five star read is that the sample copy I received was full of errors like missing letters in words and missing numbers where numbers were suppose to be included. Usually I could figure out what a word was suppose to be, but the missing numbers were simply unknowns in the text. I am making a massive assumption that these errors will be corrected in the final released copy. It is a shame the editing was not done before this book was released for preview.

A fascinating look into daily life in a lost world. Dinosaurs are legendary creatures, but we know little about them. Lomax, a Paleontologist, changes that, explaining how he thinks they lived. Not only their legendary battles but also their mating rituals, childbearing, eating habits and even their waste disposal. What we can learn about prehistoric creatures (there are also mammals, fish and even insects) necessarily requires speculation, but Lomax builds scientific theories based on the last traces of these animals: fossils. From fights, to pregnant females, remains of smaller animals in the alimentary tract of larger creatures, to farts preserved by amber, the author gives readers an encompassing insight into the early life of our planet. The comparisons he draws with animals alive today, make for interesting reading. And the illustrations by Bob Nicholls make everything easier to grasp. In a world full of books about dinosaurs, this one is truly original and very interesting.
I chose to read this book and all opinions in this review are my own and completely unbiased. Thank you, NetGalley/Columbia University Press!

This book is an entertaining read for anyone who's interested in fossils, evolution, or prehistoric life. It shows what fossils can tell us about the timeline for when different adaptations first appeared. The fossils are brought to life in dozens of illustrations. The book is visually beautiful and easy to read in spite of the technical subject matter.

It's interesting to see how some fossils were originally misinterpreted. For instance, when tiny ichthyosaurs were found inside the bellies of adults, it was first thought that ichthyosaurs were cannibalistic. Later research determined that the fossils were pregnant females, indicating that the species gave birth to live young. I always enjoy seeing how new generations of scientists bring innovative perspectives to old data.

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

I loved this book. Dean Lomax writes with a conversational tone, with the occasional clever side comment. The writing just carried me along and the book was difficult to put down. Since the book is made up of short articles on various fossils, I fell into the trap of “I’ll just read one more”. It was never just one more. Also making the book great were the photographs of the fossil finds. But making this book outstanding were the amazing illustrations by Bob Nicholls. This is a book well worth reading and is an example of fabulous science writing and art. Thank you to Netgalley and Columbia University Press for the advance reader copy.

This is my favorite time travel book. Really. Dr. Dean Lomax brings prehistoric animals to life by exploring their death as it is captured in the fossil record. The book is written in a way that made me feel like I was hearing a friend talk about these animals. It is conversational and funny, making fossilized animals interesting and approachable. Also, the illustrations are incredible.

From the death march of a horseshoe crab to fossil farts and dinosaur pee, to hell pigs and ground sloths and everything in between, this book has a little something for everyone. Do yourself a favor and pick up a copy.

Locked in Time is an engaging layman accessible monograph on function and the behavior of prehistoric animals based on the fossil records written by Dr. Dean R. Lomax. Released 18th May 2021 by Columbia University Press, it's 296 pages and is available in hardcover and ebook formats.

This is a really beautifully illustrated and fascinating look at prehistoric animals' behaviors and lives from information gleaned from the fossil records they left behind. The book is layman accessible, and I found it a fascinating read. The chapter bibliographies are well annotated and make for fascinating further reading, but it doesn't get bogged down in overly academic language. This is popular science writing - not a textbook.

The photographs of fossils throughout are fascinating especially with the expert interpretation and extra notes from the author. The thing that elevated the whole book for me were the beautifully and realistically rendered illustrations.

This would make a superlative selection for library acquisition or for fans of science writing, especially those interested in paleontology.

Five stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

Let me start by saying this: this book will make you feel things about extinct animals that are normally reserved for your own pets. The 50 vignettes are not only incredible case studies, but they’re written about in a way that I’ve never seen done before— Lomax and Nicholls truly bring all of these animals to life by combining the hard fossil facts with present day animal analogs.

Every story is a little gem in itself, it gives you exactly what you need to know, with no room for the confusion or boredom that easily happens in an over-complicated non-fiction read. This book made me care deeply for a pregnant plesiosaur, ancient turtles caught Doing The Deed, dinosaur babysitters, and so much more. It is truly magical how a bunch of bones stuck in rocks came to life in these pages.

It’s amazing to have a book that can so easily reignite the wonder of dinosaurs and prehistoric life in a sea of nonfiction that makes it seem less fascinating and (at one time) alive than it is. Locked in Time genuinely filled me with so much joy and wonder about not just past animal life, but present-day animal life.

Thank you Netgalley and Columbia University Press for access to this arc.

All living things, from their bodies to their behavior, have evolved. “Locked in Time” seeks to show fossil evidence of this. Author Dean Lomax (who sold his Star Wars collection to fund his first trip to the US to study in Wyoming) chose 50 fossil examples to examine how dinosaurs, insects, birds, land living whales, turtles, and parasites (among others) developed and showed behaviors that helped them survive the cutthroat competition to get their genes into the next generation. And these aren’t just “here is the animal and what it looked like” or speculations about what these animals were doing at the moment of death and subsequent fossilization. By carefully studying the fossils and comparing them to modern animals and their behavior, Lomax shows that these fossils are early (in some cases half a billion years old) evidence that prove fish sex, that ichthosaurs gave birth to live “icklets” (as Lomax dubs them), or that SUE and other T Rexes suffered from similar jawbone infestations of parasites as modern birds, among other things.

The chapters are divided into broad categories such as reproduction; parental care and den building; migration and travel; hunting, eating and fighting; and a catch-all of weird stuff. Some fossils displaying these behaviors are 500+ millions of years old while others are as recent as just a few million years. Most of these examples are illustrated by (usually) multiple photos of the actual fossils as well as lovely artistic drawings. From fighting to mating, birthing to sleeping, and farting to peeing these amazing fossil finds prove that stuff we and other living beings do everyday began eons ago. Rather than being dry and academic, the writing style is immediate and accessible. This is truly amazing and fascinating stuff. B+