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From the outback of Australia to the Gobi Desert of Mongolia and the savanna of Madagascar, award-winning science writer and dinosaur enthusiast John Pickrell embarks on a world tour of new finds, meeting the fossil hunters working at the frontier of discovery. He reveals the dwarf dinosaurs unearthed by an eccentric Transylvanian baron; an aquatic, crocodile-snouted carnivore bigger than T. Rex, which once lurked in North African waterways; a Chinese dinosaur with wings like a bat; and a Patagonian sauropod so enormous it weighed more than two commercial jet airliners.
List of contents
World Map
Foreword, by Philip Currie
Introduction: A New Golden Age for Dinosaur Science
1. Monster from the Cretaceous Lagoon: The Sahara, Egypt
2. All Hail the Dino-Bat: Hebei Province, China
3. Dwarf Dinosaurs and Trailblazing Aristocrats: Transylvania, Romania
4. Horny Ornaments and Sexy Ceratopsians: Alberta, Canada
5. The 'Unusual Terrible Hands': Gobi Desert, Mongolia
6. Scandalous Behaviour and Enfluffled Vegetarians: Siberia, Russia
7. Cretaceous Creatures of the Frozen North: Alaska, United States
8. The Hidden Treasures Down Under: Lightning Ridge, Australia
9. Record-breaking titans: Patagonia, Argentina
10. Southern Killers Set Adrift: Mahajanga Basin, Madagascar
11. Polar Pioneers and the Frozen Crested Lizard: Transantarctic Mountains, Antarctica
Future Potential
Glossary
Further Reading
Acknowledgments
Notes
Credits
Index
About the author
John Pickrell is an award-winning journalist, the editor of
Australian Geographic magazine, and the author of
Flying Dinosaurs: How Fearsome Reptiles Became Birds (Columbia, 2014). He has worked in London, Washington, D.C., and Sydney for publications including
New Scientist, Science, Science News, and
Cosmos. His articles can also be found online and in print at
BBC Wildlife, National Geographic, Scientific American, Focus, and the ABC. He studied biology at Imperial College in the United Kingdom and at the Natural History Museum, London.
Summary
Weird Dinosaurs examines the latest breakthroughs and new technologies radically transforming our understanding of the distant past. Pickrell opens a vivid portal to a brand new age of fossil discovery, in which fossil hunters are routinely redefining what we know and how we think about prehistory's most iconic and fascinating creatures.
Report
"This history of the discovery of some of the most outlandish creatures that ever lived, and the excitement of paleontological research, will be sure to both entertain and instruct. No other such historical narrative focused on weird extinct beasts exists." Spencer Lucas, author of Dinosaurs: The Textbook, Sixth Edition
