Guns, Germs, and Steel
I'm actually already about half finished with my paper ... and my brain's about to die on me, so I'm taking a break. ;-)
Now that I'm finished with it, I'll admit that I really did like the book. Or, at least, I'm pretty sure that I'll like it once I have time to reread it at my own pace without having to worry about marking pages that might be helpful for the paper I have to write on it.
It also gave me some fairly neat ideas for some original fiction. *grin* There's one chapter in the book that goes into detail on how the Americas would have looked during the Ice Age:
"About 15,000 years ago, the American West looked much as Africa's Serengeti Plains do today, with herds of elephants and horses pursued by lions and cheetahs, and joined by members of such exotic species as camels and giant ground sloths."
(And it also made me want to reread The Clan of the Cave Bear, which I haven't read in ages, but that's another story altogether.)
I've always been intrigued by the Ice Ages and the now-extinct megafauna of the world, so reading those chapters was definitely neat. =)
Then there was another line that just made my day:
"Had Africa's rhinos and hippos been domesticated and ridden, they would not only have fed armies but also have provided an unstoppable cavalry to cut through the ranks of European horsemen. Rhino-mounted Bantu shock troops could have overthrown the Roman Empire."
It's really neat to think "what if?" *grin* Especially when you have a really overactive imagination.
Now that I'm finished with it, I'll admit that I really did like the book. Or, at least, I'm pretty sure that I'll like it once I have time to reread it at my own pace without having to worry about marking pages that might be helpful for the paper I have to write on it.
It also gave me some fairly neat ideas for some original fiction. *grin* There's one chapter in the book that goes into detail on how the Americas would have looked during the Ice Age:
"About 15,000 years ago, the American West looked much as Africa's Serengeti Plains do today, with herds of elephants and horses pursued by lions and cheetahs, and joined by members of such exotic species as camels and giant ground sloths."
(And it also made me want to reread The Clan of the Cave Bear, which I haven't read in ages, but that's another story altogether.)
I've always been intrigued by the Ice Ages and the now-extinct megafauna of the world, so reading those chapters was definitely neat. =)
Then there was another line that just made my day:
"Had Africa's rhinos and hippos been domesticated and ridden, they would not only have fed armies but also have provided an unstoppable cavalry to cut through the ranks of European horsemen. Rhino-mounted Bantu shock troops could have overthrown the Roman Empire."
It's really neat to think "what if?" *grin* Especially when you have a really overactive imagination.