If climate change means more violent weather, this will make a good primer for those not already vulnerable to the wrath of...
A ferocious day of twisters spotlights the fight to boost survival odds in Oklahoma’s “Tornado Alley.”
Debut author Mathis documents in depth a single day—May 3, 1999—when what meteorologists called an “outbreak” of severe storms and tornadic activity buffeted the same wide swath of the state that comes under threat every year. Moving roughly from southwest to northeast Oklahoma, 71 tornadoes were documented. At least one was on the ground for 11 hours running, and at one point, four were touching down simultaneously. The twister labeled A9 had winds of more than 300 mph and was the strongest ever recorded. Yet when the day’s statistics were reckoned, Mathis notes, they revealed something of a grim victory for the warning systems implemented by weather professionals, local media and administrators. While some 11,000 homes were destroyed, fatalities directly associated with the storm system totaled just 47. The author provides plenty of background on why the Central Plains have always been a prime breeding ground for the “super cell” thunderstorms most likely to produce tornadoes. She also relates the spotty history of the National Weather Service, whose forecasters for decades had such limited ability to predict the where and when of funnel clouds that they were forbidden to use the word “tornado,” for fear it would spark needless panic. Mathis pays tribute to the late Tetsuya “Ted” Fujita, creator of the Fujita Scale for tornado wind-speed ranges, whose pioneering research during the ’50s and ’60s into violent wind and weather events included early identification of the “microburst” phenomena that can bring down airliners.
If climate change means more violent weather, this will make a good primer for those not already vulnerable to the wrath of Mother Nature.Pub Date: March 6, 2007
ISBN: 0-7432-8053-9
Page Count: 256
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2007
A tiny book, not much bigger than a pamphlet, with huge potential impact.
A collection of articulate, forceful speeches made from September 2018 to September 2019 by the Swedish climate activist who was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.
Speaking in such venues as the European and British Parliaments, the French National Assembly, the Austrian World Summit, and the U.N. General Assembly, Thunberg has always been refreshingly—and necessarily—blunt in her demands for action from world leaders who refuse to address climate change. With clarity and unbridled passion, she presents her message that climate change is an emergency that must be addressed immediately, and she fills her speeches with punchy sound bites delivered in her characteristic pull-no-punches style: “I don’t want you to be hopeful. I want you to panic. I want you to feel the fear I feel every day. And then I want you to act.” In speech after speech, to persuade her listeners, she cites uncomfortable, even alarming statistics about global temperature rise and carbon dioxide emissions. Although this inevitably makes the text rather repetitive, the repetition itself has an impact, driving home her point so that no one can fail to understand its importance. Thunberg varies her style for different audiences. Sometimes it is the rousing “our house is on fire” approach; other times she speaks more quietly about herself and her hopes and her dreams. When addressing the U.S. Congress, she knowingly calls to mind the words and deeds of Martin Luther King Jr. and John F. Kennedy. The last speech in the book ends on a note that is both challenging and upbeat: “We are the change and change is coming.” The edition published in Britain earlier this year contained 11 speeches; this updated edition has 16, all worth reading.
A tiny book, not much bigger than a pamphlet, with huge potential impact.Pub Date: Nov. 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-14-313356-8
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Penguin
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
Not light reading but essential for policymakers—and highly recommended for the 40 million people who rely on the Great...
An alarming account of the “slow-motion catastrophe” facing the world’s largest freshwater system.
Based on 13 years of reporting for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, this exhaustively detailed examination of the Great Lakes reveals the extent to which this 94,000-square-mile natural resource has been exploited for two centuries. The main culprits have been “over-fishing, over-polluting, and over-prioritizing navigation,” writes Egan, winner of the J. Anthony Lukas Work-in-Progress Award. Combining scientific details, the stories of researchers investigating ecological crises, and interviews with people who live and work along the lakes, the author crafts an absorbing narrative of science and human folly. The St. Lawrence Seaway, a system of locks, canals, and channels leading to the Atlantic Ocean, which allows “noxious species” from foreign ports to enter the lakes through ballast water dumped by freighters, has been a central player. Biologically contaminated ballast water is “the worst kind of pollution,” writes Egan. “It breeds.” As a result, mussels and other invasive species have been devastating the ecosystem and traveling across the country to wreak harm in the West. At the same time, farm-fertilizer runoff has helped create “massive seasonal toxic algae blooms that are turning [Lake] Erie’s water into something that seems impossible for a sea of its size: poison.” The blooms contain “the seeds of a natural and public health disaster.” While lengthy and often highly technical, Egan’s sections on frustrating attempts to engineer the lakes by introducing predator fish species underscore the complexity of the challenge. The author also covers the threats posed by climate change and attempts by outsiders to divert lake waters for profit. He notes that the political will is lacking to reduce farm runoffs. The lakes could “heal on their own,” if protected from new invasions and if the fish and mussels already present “find a new ecological balance.”
Not light reading but essential for policymakers—and highly recommended for the 40 million people who rely on the Great Lakes for drinking water.Pub Date: March 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-393-24643-8
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: Jan. 3, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
