Synopses & Reviews
Review
" " Simon Winchester, NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author of KRAKTOA
Review
"It's not just Californians who should pay attention to Dvorak.
Review
"Reads like a good sci-fi, with colorful characters making startling discoveries." The Honolulu Star
Review
"A welcome addition. Its chief strength lies in combining the lives and personalities of key geologists and seismologists, such as Lawson, Charles Richter, John Tuzo Wilson and Kerry Sieh, with the theoretical essentials and practical details of their scientific work, so that the former really do illuminate the latter." Geoscientist Magazine
Review
"The real strength of is the clear and comprehensive treatment of geology as well as history, and offers a fascinating up-close look at the often overlooked people and stories behind science. Lastly, the book leaves readers in California with a bottom line as sobering as it is unassailable: We might not know exactly what storms lie ahead, but during all of our lifetimes, we have only ever known the lull." Susan Hough, former director of the Seismology Laboratory at CalTech
Review
"Dvorak has done earthquake science sterling service by writing what is unarguably the best, the most comprehensive and compellingly readable book about the great fault that will one day affect all our lives." Simon Winchester, NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author of KRAKTOA
Synopsis
Ranging from Yellowstone in Wyoming to Mount Pelee in the Caribbean, from Bogoslof and Pavlov in Alaska, to Sakurajima in Japan, and, finally, to the massive volcanoes of Kilauea and Mauna Loa in Hawaii-- reveals the incredible journey of a man on a mission to understand the awesome power of volcanic eruptions.
Synopsis
Volcanoes have fascinated and terrified people for ages. They have destroyed cities and ended civilizations. John Dvorak, the acclaimed author of Earthquake Storms, looks into the early scientific study of volcanoes and the life of the man who pioneered the field, Thomas Jaggar.
Educated at Harvard, Jaggar went to the Caribbean after Mount Pelee exploded in 1902, killing more than 26,000 people. Witnessing the destruction and learning about the horrible deaths these people had suffered, Jaggar vowed to dedicate himself to a study of volcanoes. What followed was fifty years of global travel to eruptions in Italy, Alaska, Central America, Japan and the Pacific.
In 1912, he built a small science station at the edge of a lake of molten lava at Kilauea volcano in the Hawaiian Islands, with the goal of solving the mystery of why volcanoes erupt and how they could be predicted. Jaggar found something else at Kilauea: true love.
She was Isabel Maydwell, a widowed school teacher who came to Kilauea to restart her life. For more than twenty ears, she and Jaggar ran the science station, living in a small house at the edge of a high cliff that overlooked the lava lake. Maydwell would quickly becoming one of the world s most astute observers of volcanic activity.
Mixed with tales of myths and rituals, as well as the author s own experiences and insight into volcanic activity, The Last Volcano reveals the lure and romance of confronting nature in its most magnificent form the edge of a volcanic eruption.
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Synopsis
Volcanoes have fascinated--and terrified--people for ages. They have destroyed cities and ended civilizations. John Dvorak, the critically acclaimed author of Earthquake Storms looks in to the early years of volcanology and its father, Thomas Jaggar. Jaggar was the youngest of five scientists to investigate the explosion of Mount Pelee in Martinique, which leveled the entire city of St. Pierre and killed its entire population in two minutes. This explosion changed science forever, and Jaggar became obsessed with understand the force of nature that could do this. A colorful casts of scientists wind their way through this story, but the focus is on Jaggar, who was so obsessed by volcanology, that he moved to a small house overlooking the lava lake of Kilauea. With a widowed schoolteacher who shared his passion, the two devoted their lives to studying volcanic activity. From this precarious perch, they would discover a way to predict volcanic eruptions and tsunamis, promote geothermal energy, and theorize new ways to study the ocean bottom.
About the Author
John Dvorak, PhD, has studied volcanoes and earthquakes around the world for the United States Geological Survey. He has written cover stories for Scientific American, Astronomy and Physics Today. Dvorak lives in Hawaii, where he operates the telescope at Mauna Kea.