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3.98 AVERAGE
3.98 AVERAGE
Somewhere between a 3 and a 4 star... maybe a 3.5. Uninhabitable Earth is a tough read - it's depressing and at times harrowing... but it is a book about climate change - what do you expect? The book is well written, well structured and although the writing is very dry and fact-heavy, I found it easy to read. I already know a lot about the topic but I didn't feel like the book was repeating itself and each chapter had a good mix of fimiliarity, more common knowledge of the topic(s), and some unknown facts which were fascinating. I made slow progress on the book simply because of the topic, but for what the book is - a well-written book about climate change with an about right amount of optimism in the final chapter(s) - it was very good. If you're struggling to get through it, the third section of the book is the easiest to get through.
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
informative
tense
slow-paced
Going into this read I thought I would come out the other side informed and depressed. I was not wrong.
Spoiler alert: we have very little time to fix this problem that we've caused.
Excellent popular writing to present a complex and horrifying reality to the public.
Excellent popular writing to present a complex and horrifying reality to the public.
challenging
informative
reflective
tense
medium-paced
‘If humanity is the capacity to act meaningfully within our surroundings, then we are not really, or not yet, human’
Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. Although it took me about 2 years to finish, I enjoyed it so much. The sheer size of the research notes in this book shows just how much we have to learn about climate change and combatting it
dark
informative
reflective
medium-paced
Solid information. No disagreements from me. Criticisms: Overly flowery language, strange sentence structure, overuse of punctuation.
you might consider the title and indeed the whole approach of the book to be hyperbolical and in it way it is - Wallace-Wells is intentionally focussing on possible worst-case outcomes but it is also so much more than that. The first part is absolutely outstanding, an unflinching look at the potential impact of climate change (in varying scenarios of warming) across 12 different areas, which really hammers home to point of how bad things already are and how much worse they can still get. the second part (about reactions), is a bit less strong and I think has been done better and more substantially by others (think Naomi Klein) but they intellectual clarity of that first section is really unparalleled in climate writing for me.
Incredibly much needed read for everyone who thinks that there is time to make the change for the better climate slow. It is also incredibly well-written and researched. There is some repetition but it's only to make the facts more impactful. Wallace-Wells talks about how the climate change and rising temperatures will change the world we live in from the human point of view and that is what makes the book terrifying to read.
This was just a good way to multiply my anxiety about climate change... great. But seriously, this packs a bunch of information and it was so much that I feel like I want to reread it at some point, physically because I want to make sure I truly retain everything. Unless you are very prone to panic attacks and already have a lot of stress about climate change, I would recommend this.