Bones, Rocks and Stars: The science of when things happened, by Chris Turney

IF YOU like detective stories, you’ll love this book. With a passion that radiates from every page, geologist Chris Turney, who did the radiocarbon dating on the “hobbit” human fossil recently discovered in Indonesia, reveals how scientific dating techniques have helped solve the biggest mysteries of all time. What really happened to the dinosaurs? How old is the universe? Why did giant kangaroos die out? When did early Homo sapiens sweep aside the Neanderthals in the Middle East? What caused the ice ages? Turney explains how trees, amino acids, carbon, luminescence, volcanic ash, stars and even pollen can all…