Meteorology is my interest and career. Forecasting the occurrence of rain is not enough for us. We need to have an understanding of the nature of the surface that rain falls on, in order to estimate the effects it will have once it arrives. That means geology enters directly into our considerations.

I thought I had a pretty good idea of the geology of Florida. Now I know otherwise. The story of Florida over the last 35my is far more complicated than I imagined. Petuch and Roberts have outlined this story in great detail, and they tell it in a way unlike any other geology book I have read.

Their reconstructions of the state at intervals over this time period are illustrated with "simulated space shuttle photographs." These were created by using photos of analogous terrain existing today, pieced together according the geological data, then altered and retouched by digital techniques. These illustratins make it really easy to visualize the changes over time, and so far as I know they are unique.

The DVD accompanying the book takes the photos and captions in the text, and concatenates them into a movie-like sequence which goes even farther. These features together have raised the bar for future works of this type.

I bought the book for our office down here in Key West; I hope my colleagues find it as useful as I. Now where can I find a time-machine to take me back a couple million years? THAT Florida looks like a fascinating place for sailing, diving and fishing, especially if you like scallops!

Dave