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Weather –

August 2009, Vol. 64, No. 8

Book reviews

This wide-ranging but valuable contribution

to the current debate on climatic change

arose from an Open Science Meeting held at

University College London in June 2006. The

editors state that …the book aims to place the

past few decades of warming in the context

of longer term climate variability. As such it

aspires to and succeeds in being more than a

reiteration of presented papers.

Excluding the editor’s introduction, it con-

tains nine chapters that embrace themes

as varied yet related as Holocene climate

research; the role of people in the Holocene;

modelling the Holocene; the early to mid-

Holocene thermal optimum; evidence of

solar and other forcings; combining proxy

data and model simulations; latitudinal link-

ages in the late-Holocene moisture- balance;

rapid land cover changes; and, finally,

Holocene perspectives on future climate

change. This is an ambitious range of mate-

rial yet it succeeds in meeting the demands

and expectations of both research clima-

tologists and informed student readers.

The opening substantive chapter (Chap-

ter 2), deals with some originality with the

history of Holocene-related research and,

whilst not profound science, it provides an

excellent introduction to the following con-

tributions and demonstrates the progress

towards our present level of understanding

and evidence on which our knowledge is

based. Its often biographical character does

much to bring the theme to life.

At a time when human interactions

with the environment are seen as a ‘new’

phenomenon, Chapter 3 reminds us that

anthropogenic interference is possibly nei-

ther new, nor is it fully understood and it

remains an area of rich debate. Does the

age of human interference with climate

extend back far further than many of us are

led to believe? Indeed, are there lessons to

be learned from those societies popularly

believed to have succumbed to past climatic

changes? These questions are profitably dis-

cussed here and remind us of the intimate

yet complex nature of society’s relationship

with the environment.

Chapter 4 is concerned with modelling

the Holocene and is the least successful of

the contributions, but this is a difficult field

and although the author starts off well with

a lucid account of the basis of ‘chaos’, the

chapter then becomes a little more esoteric.

Although informative, it is oddly unsatisfy-

ing, leaving the reader wanting to know a

little more of this important area and how it

relates to the Holocene.

On the other hand, Chapter 5, on the

theme of the mid-Holocene thermal opti-

mum, is well handled and this reviewer par-

ticularly enjoyed the manner in which this

and many of the later chapters dealt with

the mechanisms and consequences of solar

forcing and how the arrangements of the

Milankovitch cycles may lead to different

climatic responses, sometimes more, some-

times less sensitive to their impositions.

This is nowhere more so than in Chapter 6,

which is specifically dedicated to this topic

but which recognizes also other forcings,

such as the volcanic. The discussion of the

biological record that provides evidence for

such activity is particularly well handled.

Chapter 7 is concerned with proxy data

and modelling and falls into the same class

as Chapter 4. Whilst generally informative,

it presupposes a degree of familiarity with

modelling that may be unrealistic for more

than a small proportion of the readership.

Chapter 8 promotes the rather unpre-

possessing topic of moisture-balance

variations. Do not be put off: it is a remark-

ably cogent and welcome, if not overdue,

account of global scale activities in this

area and their possible causes and observed

consequences. It succeeds in drawing wel-

come attention to this less widely discussed

phenomenon. Given the often Eurocentric

nature of Holocene discussions, frequent

references to the tropical latitudes are to be

applauded.

The chapter leads naturally to the contribu-

tion on rapid land cover changes (Chapter 9),

which brings the reader firmly up-to-date

on the question of spatial sensitivity to such

variations. Again abundant exemplification

from other parts of the world, in this case

North Africa, is a timely reminder of the global

span of climatic changes and their possible

consequences.

The final contribution (Chapter 10) is rel-

atively short and whilst not attempting,

wisely, to summarize what has gone before,

is a valuable synthesis of our current under-

standing and brings the volume to a satisfy-

ing conclusion.

Each chapter is comprehensively refer-

enced, with many recent items usefully

included. The illustrations and diagrams

are excellent throughout in this notably

well-produced volume. The abundant use

of bold colours brings many of the dia-

grams to immediate and useful attention.

The pages are engagingly set out, the text

mostly easy to read and the style clear. This

reviewer recommends this edited volume

to researchers wanting to know more of the

Holocene, to students perhaps embarking

on such a study, and to the general reader

concerned to grasp the nature and com-

prehend the evidence and possible causes

of climatic change beyond those of the last

few decades that have, rightly or wrongly,

preoccupied our thinking and concerns.

Dennis Wheeler

DOI: 10.1002/wea.428

Natural Climate Variability and Global Warming. A Holocene Perspective

Edited by Richard W. Battarbee and Heather A. Binney

Wiley-Blackwell 2008276 ppHardback £55ISBN 978 1 4051 5905 0

Great British Weather Disasters

By Philip Eden

Continuum, 2008Hardback £16.99351ppISBN 978-0-8264-7621-0

Philip Eden is arguably Britain’s premier cli-

matologist and, as well as being a frequent

radio forecaster, he has written countless

articles on the weather and climatology for

newspapers, especially on a regular basis

for The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Tele-

graph and on an ad hoc basis in response

to newsworthy weather events. As he indi-

cates in the foreword to this book, this has

sometimes been a frustrating experience.

Journalists and politicians often have, at

best, a low regard for the facts in whatever

realm they are dealing and the weather is

no exception. Many times in his articles,

Philip has sought to bring perspective to