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EARTHQUAKE STORMS

Name: EARTHQUAKE STORMS
Author: John Dvorak
ISBN: 978-1-60598-495-7

THE FASCINATING HISTORY AND VOLATILE FUTURE OF THE SAN ANDREAS FAULT

by John Dvorak ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 12, 2014

Although almost entirely focused on California, this is a fine popular primer on the subject, lucidly written and no more...

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A thoroughly rewarding explanation of earthquakes built around the famous San Andreas fault, which runs the length of California.

Science writer Dvorak emphasizes that it was barely 50 years ago when scientists agreed that earthquakes were not the result of exploding underground gases, volcanism or a wrinkling of the Earth’s surface as it slowly cooled. Much of their enlightenment occurred in California, and the author turns up half a dozen intrepid, eccentric and largely unknown geologists (Grove Gilbert, Andrew Lawson, Charles Richter, Harry Fielding Reid) whose insights began to converge after the devastating 1906 San Francisco earthquake. In the massive studies that followed, scientists could not fail to notice the long San Andreas fault, a crack in the Earth’s surface soon found to extend the entire length of the state. No one doubted that movement along this fault had occurred during the quake since roads, pipes, rails and fences that crossed the line had shifted as much as 20 feet and always in the same direction. This was considered an effect, not a cause of the quake, and the few perceptive observers who disagreed were dismissed. It’s a rule of science that facts mean little in the absence of a good theory to explain them. This finally arrived in the 1960s with plate tectonics, which asserted that vast, floating segments of the Earth’s crust are creeping horizontally past each other. One segment often sticks fast against its neighbor; pressure builds over decades until it breaks loose, producing one or a series of quakes. “[T]he San Andreas Fault and its many subsidiary faults are slowly tearing California apart,” writes the author, “so that much of what is California today will be transformed into a collection of islands that are destined to be rafted northward across the Pacific.”

Although almost entirely focused on California, this is a fine popular primer on the subject, lucidly written and no more technical than necessary.

Pub Date: March 12, 2014

ISBN: 978-1-60598-495-7

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Pegasus

Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2014

Categories:

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

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MAKING THE CORPS

by Thomas E. Ricks ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 1, 1997

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Wall Street Journal Pentagon correspondent Ricks effectively combines a vivid account of the rigorous basic training received by US Marine recruits with commentary on what separates the demanding, disciplined culture of America's military elite from the more permissive culture of its civilian society. The author tracks the 60-odd volunteers who comprised Platoon 3086 at Parris Island i 1995 through the challenging 11-week course known as boot camp. Unlike their counterparts in other branches of the US military, aspiring marines do not train alongside women; nor do they have access to alcohol, automobiles, candy, cigarettes, drugs, or various other diversions dear to the hearts of young American males. Ricks offers anecdotal evidence on what USMC recruits must endure in the way of indoctrination from fearsome (but no longer gratuitously brutal) drill instructors in the deep piney woods where apprentice warriors get their first taste of what combat is like, and in other invariably sweaty venues. He goes on to review the washout rate of 14 percent or so (which thins 3086's ranks to 55 by graduation day), the ongoing debate on ever-tougher entrance requirements (which probably cost the corps some superior fighting men), and the army's purposefully ``user-friendly'' training regimen (which reportedly neither instills esprit nor prepares soldiers to do battle). Covered as well is the risk that alienation could induce cream-of-the-crop troops like marines to take a more forceful role in the governance of the nation they are pledged to protect, if not engage in an outright coup. The author argues that it behooves America's largely oblivious middle and upper classes to take a more direct interest in their military. A revelatory briefing on what sets the USMC apart and the consequences of its superiority during a postCold War era when, for all the talk of peace dividends, the wider world remains an armed and dangerous place. (16 pages photos, maps, not seen) (Radio satellite tour)

Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1997

ISBN: 0-684-83109-0

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Scribner

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1997

Categories:

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

- BOOK REVIEW
WAGING A GOOD WAR
by Thomas E. Ricks

- BOOK REVIEW
FIRST PRINCIPLES
by Thomas E. Ricks

- BOOK REVIEW
CHURCHILL AND ORWELL
by Thomas E. Ricks

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DARK SUN

THE MAKING OF THE HYDROGEN BOMB

by Richard Rhodes ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 8, 1995

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Appearances to the contrary, this is not a remake of The Making of the Atomic Bomb, Rhodes's very successful technical chronicle of the Manhattan Project. In that book, which was honored with a National Book Award, a National Book Critics Circle Award, and a Pulitzer Prize, Rhodes stuck closely to his topic. Here, it is not until halfway through the book, literally, that he begins to talk specifically about the hydrogen bomb. Up to then he mainly discusses Soviet atomic espionage and the early history of the Soviet atomic bomb program, a subject covered much more authoritatively and concisely in David Holloway's Stalin and the Bomb (1994). One has the impression that Rhodes just wants to show off what he has learned from the newly opened Soviet archives. Only well into the book does it become clear that what mainly interests him is the battle between J. Robert Oppenheimer and Edward Teller over the development of the hydrogen bomb and the direction national policy would take in the 1950s: Their battle for the soul of the American public was Oppenheimer's tragic undoing, stripped him of his security clearances, and removed him from US policy-making; Teller's semi- Pyrrhic victory left him a virtual pariah in the world of physics. Rhodes brings to that story sound judgment, a sharp eye for intrinsically fascinating detail, andnot leasta nice way with words. His down-to-earth manner also leads Rhodes to nose out little-remarked nuggets, telling us, for example, that the famous atomic spy Klaus Fuchs and mathematician John von Neumann filed a patent together for the H-bomb in 1946. This big book is not necessarily the best place to get the big picture. But who cares? Rhodes manages to fit in a wealth of interesting detail without worrying too much about how it all hangs together. (First printing of 100,000; first serial to the New Yorker; Book-of-the-Month Club/History Book Club alternate selections; author tour)