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Dinosaurs in the Attic: An Excursion into the American Museum of Natural History by Douglas Preston
yurienokida's review
5.0
I grew up loving natural history museums so this book was a real treat for me. Preston's writing style was really engaging so it was an enjoyable read. It was cool to learn about the more behind-the-scenes stuff that goes on in museums. Reading this book gave me a whole new appreciation for all the effort and attention to detail it takes to establish such an institution. It's mind blowing to even think about the magnitude of the collection housed at the American Museum of Natural History. I'm hoping to visit the museum in a couple weeks and I can't wait!
uberbutter's review
4.0
Dinosaurs in the Attic: An Excursion into the American Museum of Natural History by Douglas Preston
★★★★
Dinosaurs in the Attic is a chronicle of the expeditions, discoveries, and scientists behind the greatest natural history collection ever assembled – found at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. I love museums and I love books (obviously), so this was right up my alley. This book doesn’t delve into the most of the more known objects and people associated with the museum but those behind the scenes that made it what it is such as the collectors, explorers, and researchers. And what tales they are! Adventure, murder, and deceit – and that’s only in the first 60 pages. The first half of the book deals with the beginning of the museum while the second part deals with more “modern” technology and research. There were also 36 photos that were quite good and I enjoyed them.
It must be said that this book was written in 1986 so it is a little out of date and no doubt the museum has been updated to some extent since then not to mention the naming of some countries (for example, Zaire is mentioned in this book, a country that no longer exists). This was a very enjoyable book and I had trouble putting it down. It’s a subject that may sound boring to some but it was far from. My one annoyance was my Kindle copy I have. It’s fairly obvious that it didn’t convent properly in some places, such as words with “in” in them came through as “m” on my Kindle. So for example, “finalized” came out as “fmalized”. A minor bother that I was able to get through.
★★★★
Dinosaurs in the Attic is a chronicle of the expeditions, discoveries, and scientists behind the greatest natural history collection ever assembled – found at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. I love museums and I love books (obviously), so this was right up my alley. This book doesn’t delve into the most of the more known objects and people associated with the museum but those behind the scenes that made it what it is such as the collectors, explorers, and researchers. And what tales they are! Adventure, murder, and deceit – and that’s only in the first 60 pages. The first half of the book deals with the beginning of the museum while the second part deals with more “modern” technology and research. There were also 36 photos that were quite good and I enjoyed them.
It must be said that this book was written in 1986 so it is a little out of date and no doubt the museum has been updated to some extent since then not to mention the naming of some countries (for example, Zaire is mentioned in this book, a country that no longer exists). This was a very enjoyable book and I had trouble putting it down. It’s a subject that may sound boring to some but it was far from. My one annoyance was my Kindle copy I have. It’s fairly obvious that it didn’t convent properly in some places, such as words with “in” in them came through as “m” on my Kindle. So for example, “finalized” came out as “fmalized”. A minor bother that I was able to get through.
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