Atlas of a Lost World

By: Craig Childs

Narrated by: Craig Childs

From the author of Apocalyptic Planet, an unsparing, vivid, revelatory travelogue through prehistory that traces the arrival of the First People in North America 20,000 years ago and the artifacts that enable us to imagine their lives and fates.

Scientists squabble over the locations and dates for human arrival in the New World. The first explorers were few, encampments fleeting. At some point in time, between 20,000 and 40,000 years ago, sea levels were low enough that a vast land bridge was exposed between Asia and North America. But the land bridge was not the only way across.

This book upends our notions of where these people came from and who they were. The unpeopled continent they reached was inhabited by megafauna - mastodons, sloths, mammoths, saber-toothed cats, lions, bison, and bears. The First People were not docile - Paleolithic spear points are still encrusted with the protein of their prey - but they were wildly outnumbered, and many were prey to the much larger animals. This is a chronicle of the last millennia of the Ice Age, the gradual oscillations and retreat of glaciers, the clues and traces that document the first encounters of early humans, and the animals whose presence governed the humans' chances for survival.

©2018 Craig Childs (P)2018 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Very interesting book

Not what I expected but found it thoroughly enjoyable. The way the subject is presented was quite refreshing.

Really 5 stars

A deeply connected audio experience. You can feel the author's experiences. Hear the sounds of hinting, smell the air and see the mammoths. Thanks!

An Ode to a Lost World

It's obvious from the first minutes of this work how much respect and even love the author has for the first settlers and explorers of what became known as the Americas. This makes it a mistake to approach Atlas of a Lost World as some kind of textbook about the settling of a new world. I enjoyed the work, once I accepted that it was really a paean to the people of this era and not a technical tome.

Interesting presentation of human history in the Americas.

I enjoyed the flow from the author’s personal experiences of hiking, kayaking or camping and into what early humans would have been seeing and experiencing in that area in an earlier time 10,000 - 20,000 years ago (or more).

Outstanding book!

The author very creatively weaves his modern outdoor experiences with what the paleo peoples of the Americas might have seen, heard, felt thousands of years ago. In addition, the author is very knowledgeable of Paleolithic tools and discovered archaeological sites. I was very impressed and thoroughly enjoyed listening to this book.