My goal is to offer an ecological, fleshed-out view of these organisms and their biology during a time of terrible stress, and I’ve done my best to envision these species as living organisms rather than permineralized, distorted fossils. That’s the goal of paleontology, after all—to start with the offerings of death and work back toward life. [p. 15]
Excellent and very readable science writing, focussing on the asteroid impact that marked the end of the Cretaceous period and 'the worst single day in the history of life on Earth': Black focusses on the area that is now Hell Creek, Montana (because the fossil record there is unsurpassed), and the activities of various species of animal -- birds, fish and protomammals as well as dinosaurs -- before, during and after the catastrophe. After a brief sketch of Cretaceous life (parasite-plagued T Rex, the corpse of a triceratops, a Quetzalcoatlus soaring over the ocean) the book deals with the after-effects of the impact, which was effectively instantaneous: the asteroid was travelling at about 20 km per second, so there wouldn't have been a slow fireball streaking across the sky. There are chapters on 'Impact', 'The First Hour', 'The First Day', and so on, up to 'One Million Years After Impact'. And from Black's account it's clear that very little life, anywhere on the planet, was unaffected. First the earth tremors, then the firestorms: the tsunamis, the infrared pulse that raised the air temperature to 500o Fahrenheit, the acid rain, the three-year darkness of the impact winter. Those creatures that survived -- by burrowing, or beneath the water -- had to adjust rapidly to a world that had utterly changed, with a different ecology and a much lower temperature. Black is good at explaining the multiple factors affecting the survival of particular species, and at describing 'case studies'. She presents arguments for why beaked birds survived when toothed birds didn't; how the dinosaurs' demise led to the rise of the mammals; how other phenomena, such as volcanic eruptions in the Deccan traps, mitigated some of the impact aftereffects.
This is my favourite kind of science writing: lyrical and informal, not reliant on specialist knowledge or terminology (but with abundant references in the appendix, citing sources and indicating how much is speculation), and with a personal touch. ('My love was unconditional. You can’t be hurt by a friend who’s extinct.' [p. 195]). The Last Days of the Dinosaurs is at least as readable as a novel (more so than some!) and I found it utterly fascinating.
Fulfils the ‘Science’ rubric of the Annual Non-Fiction Reading Challenge.
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