The Galapagos Islands: A Natural History Guide, Sixth Edition (Odyssey Illustrated Guide)

Review by Steven J. Bissell for The Galapagos Islands: A Natural History Guide, Sixth Edition (Odyssey Illustrated Guide)
Rating:
I bought this book due to the somewhat glowing reviews. I usually don’t complain about that, but in this case I feel compelled to post a warning: if you are thinking of buying this book as a travel guide, don’t! It has very little information about how to travel in the Galapagos, in fact I don’t think the author really wants you to go to the Islands because he complains throughout the book about the impact of tourism.The book is poorly edited with numerous mistakes. For example, Constant attributes “survival of the fittest” to Charles Darwin in the very weak section on evolution. In fact that phrase belongs to Herbert Spencer writing about evolution. In another area the author states there are two species of snakes on the islands, then goes on to describe eight species. One pet peeve, he calls Gulls, “seagulls” throughout the book, a very common, but galling mistake. I believe that English is not the author’s first language and this shows throughout. In one area there is a reference to “black men” which doesn’t seem to relate to anything else in the paragraph. This should have been noticed by the editors.I think the sections on geology and history are probably very good, but the section on evolution is rife with mistakes. I won’t detail them here, but if you want to know about Darwin and the influence of the Galapagos on the development of the theory of evolution, go somewhere else; this book will seriously mislead you.The strong point of the book, the the only reason I gave it three instead of two stars, is the photographs. This are by the author and are outstanding, especially the underwater photos. The species lists seem very good and this book, if used with a good travel guide, would probably enhance a trip to the Galapagos.