A lot of my geology books are college textbooks or detailed, complex explorations of specific topics in advanced geology. These really aren't suited for the casual or mildly interested reader. So I went through my geology library and came up with these books which are suitable for the casual reader, as basic introductions to one or another aspect of geology.
| The Roadside Geology books | Guides to rocks and minerals | Field guides for the amateur geologist | Various other topics within geology |
The "Roadside Geology" books are a series from Mountain Press Publishing which is very useful if you're an amateur geologist and you like to travel. Basically they're a tourist guide to geology of various states within the US. Each book includes a number of individual trips. Each trip discusses the geologic formations visible along a particular section of road or roads: what they look like, what they're made of, their history. I currently have five volumes from the series:
ROADSIDE GEOLOGY OF ARIZONA
Chronic, Halka
c.1983, Mountain Press
ISBN: 0-87842-147-5
Arizona is a geologic wonderland. No book can do full justice to it, but this one tries hard. The selected roads cover most of the major geologic attractions within the state: the southern deserts, the mid-state highlands, and the spectacular sights of the Colorado Plateau. Special sections discuss some of the state's national parks, such as Grand Canyon, Petrified Forest, Painted Desert, Sunset Crater/Wupatki, etc.
ROADSIDE GEOLOGY OF MONTANA
David Alt & Donald Hyndman
c.1986, Mountain Press
ISBN: 0-87842-202-1
ROADSIDE GEOLOGY OF NORTHERN AND CENTRAL CALIFORNIA
David Alt & Donald Hyndman
c.2000, Mountain Press
ISBN: 0-87842-409-1
As the title says, this book covers only northern and central California, from San Luis Obispo north. The descriptions are very good; I found this book to be very helpful when I did my driving trip of the Cascades, and even more useful when I was working on the webpages for it.
ROADSIDE GEOLOGY OF OREGON
David Alt & Donald Hyndman
c.1978, Mountain Press
ISBN: 0-87842-063-0
Another one that I found very useful on my Cascades trip.
ROADSIDE GEOLOGY OF THE YELLOWSTONE COUNTRY
Fritz, William
c.1985, Mountain Press
ISBN: 0-87842-170-X
An unusual one in the series, since it deals only with the geology of Yellowstone National Park. Not that that's a thin subject -- Yellowstone is a gargantuan volcano, and the rocks that currently exist within the Park tell the story of its violent history.
Books about rocks and minerals
These are guidebooks to rocks and minerals and rock formations, and how to identify them.
THE ILLUSTRATED ENCYCLOPEDIA OF MINERALS AND ROCKS*
Kourimsky
c.1977, Chartwell Books
ISBN: 1-55521-877-6
A detailed, thoroughly illustrated guide to most of the rocks and minerals that can be found on Earth's surface.
MINERALOGY
Sinkankas, John
c.1964, Van Nostrand Reinhold
ISBN: 0-442-27624-9
An advanced-amateur level text on mineralogy.
MINERALS OF OHIO
Carlson, Ernest
c.1991, ODNR
ISBN:
Rocks and minerals that can be found within the state of Ohio.
ROCKS AND MINERALS, A FIELD GUIDE TO
Pough, Frederick
c.1988, Houghton Mifflin
ISBN: 0-395-24049-2
A pretty good field guide to rocks and minerals. Part of the Peterson Field Guide Series.
ROCKS AND MINERALS, SIMON & SCHUSTER'S GUIDE TO
Prinz, Harlow, & Peters
c.1978, Fireside Books
ISBN: 0-671-24417-5
Well-written and -illustrated field guide to common rocks and minerals.
Field and lab guides for the amateur geologist
FIELD GEOLOGY ILLUSTRATED
Maley, Terry
c.1994, Mineral Land Publications
ISBN: 0-940949-03-2
THE FIELD GUIDE TO GEOLOGY
Lambert, David
c.1998, Facts On File
ISBN: 0-8160-3823-6
A FIELD MANUAL FOR THE AMATEUR GEOLOGIST
Cvancara, Alan
c.1995, John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0-471-04430-X
A fairly detailed description of basic field techniques for the amateur geologist.
THE PRACTICAL GEOLOGIST
Dixon, Dougal
c.1992, Fireside Books
ISBN: 0-671-74697-9
An excellent introduction to the basic concepts of geology. Very good illustrations and simple, clear explanatory text. One of a series, all titled "The Practical _________."
Various other topics within geology
These are all from my "general geology" collection, just books about different topics within geology that can be read and understood by any interested reader.
THE ABYSS OF TIME*
Albritton, Claude C.
c.1986, Jeremy P. Tarcher Inc
ISBN: 0-87477-389-X
This is a survey of how human concepts of geology and geologic time have changed over the past few centuries, from the 6000 years of the biblical literalists to the 4,700,000,000 years that's currently accepted as the age of the Earth.
ANNALS OF THE FORMER WORLD
McPhee, John
c.1998, Farrar, Straus, & Giroux
ISBN: 0-374-51873-4
An omnibus collection of John McPhee's four famous books on North American geology, presented in order of publication. A fifth section, which completes the cross-continent journey, was written specially for this volume. Put together, the five books describe the geology of the United States via an east-to-west journey along Interstate 80.
- Book 1, Basin and Range, describes the theory of plate tectonics and applies it specifically to the region that geologists call the Basin and Range, which covers most of the state of Nevada and part of western Utah, very roughly the area between the Rockies and the Sierra Nevada, south of the Oregon/Idaho border and north of the Colorado Plateau.
- Book 2, In Suspect Terrain, covers the geology of the East Coast and the Appalachian Mountains, focusing mostly around the Delaware Water Gap.
- Book 3, Rising from the Plains, uses the geology of the state of Wyoming as a microcosm of the eastern face of the Rocky Mountains.
- Book 4, Assembling California, is about the insanely complicated geology of California.
- The new section, Crossing the Craton, completes the story via a discussion of the geology of Nebraska and eastern Colorado, where rocks of the mid-continent lowlands can be found.
THE DATING GAME: One Man's Search for the Age of the Earth
Lewis, Cherry
c.2000, Cambridge Univ. Press
ISBN: 0-521-79051-4
DICTIONARY OF GEOLOGICAL TERMS (3rd Edition)
Bates and Jackson (ed.)
c.1984, Anchor Books
ISBN: 0-385-18101-9
A very useful reference for an amateur like myself: the official definitions of over 30,000 terms used by geologists. Checked and published by the American Geological Institute.
EXPLORING OUR LIVING PLANET
Ballard, Robert D.
c.1988, National Geographic Society
ISBN: 0-87044-760-2
A look at modern geologic processes: volcanos, earthquakes, plate tectonics, continental drift, seafloor spreading. The link is to the Revised Edition.
FROM STONE TO STAR: A View of Modern Geology*
Allegre, Claude
c.1992, Harvard Univ. Press
ISBN: 0-674-83867-X
A HISTORY OF GEOLOGY
Gohau, Gabriel
c.1990, Rutgers Univ. Press
ISBN: 0-8135-1666-8
A history of the science of geology, how it developed and how it's changed over the past few centuries.
LANGUAGE OF THE EARTH*
Rhodes & Stone (ed)
c.1981, Pergamon Press
ISBN: 0-08-025980-4
An unusual sort of geology book, this contains a selection of both fiction and nonfiction works that concern geology in one way or another. The authors were trying to get around the dry, clinical tone of so many geology books and instead evoke the sense of wonder and discovery that motivates most geologists.
THE MAP THAT CHANGED THE WORLD
Winchester, Simon
c.2001, Harper Collins
ISBN: 0-06-019361-1
In 1793, an English canal digger named William Smith noticed a pattern to the rocks that he was digging through. He believed he had made a major discovery, and for the next twenty years he traveled throughout England, examining rocks and developing a geological map of England. In 1815 he published his map and the science of historical geology was born. But it was another fifteen years before Smith would get the recognition he deserved. This book tells the story of how he developed his map and what happened to it and to him after it was published. Note: Be forewarned that while some people like Winchester's writing style, others very strongly dislike it. You might want to look at this first in a library before buying it.
NEW LaROUSSE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE EARTH*
Bertin, Leon
c.1972, Crown Publishers
ISBN: 0-600-35464-4
The "LaRousse Encyclopedia" series are huge books that give detailed surveys of their chosen topics. This one is about geology and other aspects of earth science. Rather old and out of date now, unfortunately.
NORTHWEST EXPOSURES: A Geologic Story of the Northwest
David Alt & Donald Hyndman
c.1995, Mountain Press
ISBN: 0-87842-323-0
Another look at the geology of the Pacific Northwest, from the same people who wrote the Roadside Geology guides to Oregon and Northern California.
WHERE TERRANES COLLIDE*
Yorath, C. J.
c.1990, Orca Publishers
ISBN: 0920501-48-6
A look at the incredibly complex geology of British Columbia, where several exotic terranes (chunks of continental crust) have mixed and merged with the North American continent.
