Prehistoric Mammals

by Alan Turner, Mauricio Antón (Illustrator), Richard L. Cifelli (Introduction)

Written by one of the world's foremost paleontologists, Prehistoric Mammals gives children a rare glimpse at a world gone by in a stunningly illustrated, incredibly comprehensive reference book.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Animals, Biology, Palaeontology, History, Reference

192 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2004

Reviews

[Last Ranger · Rating 5 out of 5]

A View of the Past.

This book is a visual feast for any one interested in nature, paleontology and especially in the evolution of mammals. The first thing that catches your eye is, of course, the stunning pictures by artist Mauricio Anton whose work graced the pages of Alan Turner's "The Big Cats and Their Fossil Relatives" and Xiaoming Wang's "Dogs: Their Fossil Relatives and Evolutionary History". In Prehistoric Mammals Anton is joined by fellow artist; Israel Sanchez and Martin Camm but most of the art-work is Anton's. The main body of the book is jam-packed with color pictures of an amazing variety of extinct mammals. There are some photographs but most are pencil and oil paint on canvas or translucent paper. Most of the animals listed get one or two pages of text and some kind of color rendering. Many of the paintings are two page spreads that give you an idea of what life was like for the animal featured. The text is by paleontologist Alan Turner who gives you a brief essays on the Age of Mammals, animal behavior, how the reconstructions are done and other subjects leading up to the animals themselves. There are too many animals listed to go into detail here but I can't imagine anyone being disappointed with what's offered. In many ways this book reminds me of Charles R. Knight's "Life Through The Age" from the 1940s. Both books offer informative text and stunning art work that gave you the latest information on the animals pictured (up to date, that is, for their respective publication dates). I thought it odd that National Geographic chose to published this work as a "children's book". While this is not an in-depth work on paleontology it certainly is not on the "see spot run" level. What we have here is a kind of Field Guide and a very basic book on the subject matter. Is it suitable for children? Yes, depending on the child. Is it suitable for adults? Yes, depending on the adult and what that adult is looking for. For me it was just right and made for enjoyable reading.

Last Ranger

[Andrew · Rating 2 out of 5]

This National Geographic book was fulfilled with lots of great illustrations, but admittedly had a fairly superficial treatment of the topic. It covered all of the usual suspects: mammoths, mastodons, wholly rhinos, saber-toothed cats, ground sloths, glyptodonts, etc. It also highlighted some less well-known prehistoric mammals. Not bad if you're looking for an unusual coffee table book, but not very in depth if you're looking for lots of scientific info.

[Melissa Embry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Alan Turner's Prehistoric Mammals is an easy-to-read primer on the evolution if mammals that requires minimal scientific background to enjoy. It includes discussions of how the appearance of animals in life can be reconstructed from fossil records and how these records also allow scientists to make inferences about their behavior and diet. The brief (one- to two-page) profiles of dozens of mammals include the stunning full-color illustrations by Mauricio Anton, as well as timelines, a reference on relative sizes, and where their fossils were discovered. I especially appreciated consultant Richard L. Cifelli's information on mammals of South America in which he specializes.

[Kate prefers books to people · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this with the kids. The art is amazing. I loved the layouts. There is so much information packed in here that I think we could have stretched reading this book out much longer and gone more in depth with older kids. It was very nice to have a book that doesn't focus on dinosaurs, especially since we live right next to a site in Southern California where a lot of these prehistoric mammals were discovered.

Why it's not 5 stars: the binding is garbage for the price. This book has thick, high quality pages that are perfect for the illustrations. Unfortunately that makes it too heavy for the spine. With any serious use you'll end up needing to tape it together.

[Абрахам Хосебр · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Тварини дольодовикового періоду"
Алан Тарнер, Маурісіо Ентон

Ось я й прочитав книгу про доісторичних звірят.
Найбільше сподобалися, звісно котячі. Смілодони, гомотерії, мегантереони та інші.
Найбільше шокували гігантські лінивці Мегатерії завдовжки 6 метрів і вагою, як два слони.
Але окрім них познайомився з до того не знайомими для мене велетенськими... Вомбатами Дипродонами. Тваринки ростом у два метри і вагою в кілька тон...
Все ще дивуюсь химерним виглядом броненосців Глиптотеріїв.
Дізнався також про існування сумчастих левів Тилаклео.
Але пальму першості отримує найбільший хижак із наземних ссавців Ендрюзархус, котрий ще й належить до парнокопитних кондиляртр!
Ілюстрації в книзі просто божественні, це той пік, котрого можна досягнути в ремеслі. Знімаю капелюха перед художником Маурісіо Ентоном.
Тексти лаконічні та цікаві, наявні карти, фото кісток і що найголовніше - порівняльні силуети людини біля кожної тварини, щоб можна було уявити собі їх розміри.
Якісний друк та папір, книга вийшла ще у 2013 році і тоді я її чомусь пропустив. Але прекрасно, що існує олх.
Енциклопедія не є дитячою, це прекрасний ілюстрований посібник для будь-якого віку.
І під кінець, в книзі також описується найнебезпечніші звірі та їх еволюція - гомініди.

[Michael Cagle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fairly concise discussion about mammals from the Cretaceous to Peilocene.

[Kirsten · Rating 4 out of 5]

This gorgeously illustrated book has an intended audience of upper middle- and highschool readers, but it's chock full of really great information and I felt like I got a lot out of it. The text covers individual prehistoric mammals and families of creatures, as well as topics like taxonomy, evolution, and fossil reconstruction. The illustrations include artist's conceptions of the animals, as well as photos and drawings of fossils and photographs of modern-day relatives of the extinct creatures. The text is immensely detailed, but organized in such a way that it's not overwhelming. I felt like I learned a lot from it! My only real complaint was that a few of the drawings made it difficult to get a sense of just how large the animals were; most of them did a really great job of providing reference points, but one in particular gave me the impression that the creature was immense, when in reality it was only about 18" at the shoulder.

[Traummachine · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars:
It'd been close to 4 years since my last book on prehistoric beasties, so I'd been looking forward to this one for a long time. This was strictly on fossil mammals, which are probably my favorite family of ancient critters. My only complaint about this book? Too short!

It was divided into sections based on Order and sometimes Family below that. This was a great way to get a feel for what living and extinct animals were related to each beast, and I really liked it. The book was from 2005, so I picked up some new things about how they arrive at the fleshy shapes in illustrations based solely on skeletons, and similar trains of thought for social behavior and details in their diets. It also has gorgeous illustrations, each drawn to scale with man-sized silhouette (or in some cases, a silhouette of a man's ankle). Extremely interesting, and I've gotta admit that it reminds me a lot of being a kid again.

[Lou Cadle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gorgeous.

One of the physical books I bought myself when I began writing my Dawn of Mammals series of novels, this served not only as reference but as inspiration. Mauricio Anton is a top paleo illustrator, one of those artists who visits the fossil bones in museum as well as studies how modern mammals are put together and builds up the animal from the bones out. (colors and markings are guesses, but intelligent ones).

There are illustrations of individual mammals, a few of them 'in action' and some illustrations of an epoch/region where several animals are in the painting.

It's aimed at high school kids, but it's a nice encyclopedia of extinct mammals for anyone to browse. Short on the science, long on the illustrations, but there are plenty of text-heavy materials to read elsewhere if you wish. This has some but it primarily a visual delight.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think that it's really interesting. It has all these crazy mammals that we don't see today.

[Katy Pool · Rating 4 out of 5]

My favorite was the armadillo the size of semi-truck

[Emma Mattson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this, I adore it, the illustrations are stunning and make it clear that these were living animals. The fossils are made alive with the excellent illustrations