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A review by shanaqui
Lapidarium: The Secret Lives of Stones by Hettie Judah
informative
medium-paced
4.0
Hettie Judah's Lapidarium is a really beautifully presented book. Not just the cover (though yes, that's gorgeous), but with the coloured tabs on the sides of pages, the organisation of it, the colour images, etc. I feel like the only thing is lacking there is more realistic images of the various stones, rather than just one canonical image -- and especially images of some of the sculptures and examples the stories refer to.
The text itself varies a bit: some stones are more interesting than others. It luckily doesn't feel like she's just shoehorning everything into the same space: some stones get a couple more pages than others, while some are short and sweet.
Overall, it's lovely to look at and there were some interesting titbits, but I feel like it gets more points for presentation than content! Not that the content is bad, either, but it's very bitty and disconnected, there's no overarching narrative, and that makes it a book designed for dipping in and out of more than anything.
The text itself varies a bit: some stones are more interesting than others. It luckily doesn't feel like she's just shoehorning everything into the same space: some stones get a couple more pages than others, while some are short and sweet.
Overall, it's lovely to look at and there were some interesting titbits, but I feel like it gets more points for presentation than content! Not that the content is bad, either, but it's very bitty and disconnected, there's no overarching narrative, and that makes it a book designed for dipping in and out of more than anything.