What We Are Reading Today: Remnants of Ancient Life

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Updated 29 October 2023
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What We Are Reading Today: Remnants of Ancient Life

Author: Dale E. Greenwalt

We used to think of fossils as being composed of nothing but rock and minerals, all molecular traces of life having vanished long ago. We were wrong.

“Remnants of Ancient Life” reveals how the new science of ancient biomolecules—pigments, proteins, and DNA that once functioned in living organisms tens of millions of years ago—is opening a new window onto the evolution of life on Earth.

Paleobiologists are now uncovering these ancient remnants in the fossil record with increasing frequency, shedding vital new light on long-extinct creatures and the lost world they inhabited. 

 


What We Are Reading Today: Island at the Edge of the World

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Updated 30 January 2026
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What We Are Reading Today: Island at the Edge of the World

  • Pitts has gone deeper than any other writer in cutting through the miasma of misperceptions that shrouds the island, even if his work sometimes bogs down in numbing detail

Author: Mike Pitts

In his ‘Island at the Edge of the World,’ British archeologist Mike Pitts delves into the misconceptions and legends surrounding a complex ancient culture.
The book is a work of historical revisionism that re-examines the history of Rapa Nui, or Easter Island, using new archeological evidence, a fresh reading of 18th-century European accounts, and the long-overlooked work of early 20th-century anthropologist Katherine Routledge
Pitts’ investigation offers authoritative new insights into what really happened on the island.
Pitts has gone deeper than any other writer in cutting through the miasma of misperceptions that shrouds the island, even if his work sometimes bogs down in numbing detail.
Many questions still remain, but this is the most compelling and comprehensive account yet published of the extraordinary story of Easter Island.