Climate Change in Prehistory by William J Burroughs

This is an intriguing book of unexpected relevance to the 21st century. The main narrative is a climate history from the last ice age to the 10,000 years of relative tranquillity that has followed. Burroughs also shows how humans took advantage of this period of calm to build a vaulting dominance of the planet. He invites hard questions on how societies will cope with the return to climatic turbulence. But it’s hard to know what to make of his final thought – that the traits that helped us survive the ice ages could come in handy again.