Monday, February 18, 2013

Don't Know Much About Geography: Everything You Need to Know About the World but Never Learned

[August 2009] The basis of this book is an outline of general geographic terms. Each discussion is usually introduced with a some playful question that is then properly explained. After providing a brief answer, the author then tends to go off in some direction, adding facts and opinion related to that subject. Sometimes this discussion is merely an encyclopaedia-like enumeration of geographic features. At other times, he goes rambling off in tangentially related discussion (such as a long war discussion.) Nearly all discussions are filled with wit and opinion. Some of these discussion were quite enjoyable, while others are a mere waste of paper. The book is more than a decade old, so some discussion (especially is diversions into current events and politics) seem quite dated.

While there is a very lose narrative, each section is fairly independent, making it easy to read any given section. However, some of these independent sections seem to be a little too rambling to be used as a 'bathroom' book.

The book is certainly more enjoyable than a geography textbook, however it will take a lot longer to get through than a simple encyclopaedia article.

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