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megatsunami's review against another edition
4.0
I told my mom I was reading a book on climate change and she said "Well, that must be depressing." On Goodreads, folks have criticized the book for being both too depressing and too optimistic! Of course it is scary to think about what's coming, and yet I thought Hertsgaard did a great job focusing on what people can do to both mitigate (lessen) and adapt to the effects of climate change. The book might be overly optimistic but honestly, I see that as a useful way to mobilize people rather than leaving us stuck in despair. I came away from the book feeling like there are some (at least partial) solutions, and with a sense of urgency about making them happen.
karieh13's review against another edition
4.0
This book took me quite a while to read. Not because of its length or complexity, but because of the subject matter. Climate change is one of the most important issues facing our planet, but because of the enormity of the consequences, it is also one of the scariest.
“In triggering climate change, humanity has unwittingly launched a planetary experiment. Because this experiment has never been run before, and because it involves extremely complicated systems, knowing exactly how it will turn out is impossible.”
All of the science and scientific predictions in “Hot” agree that the results will be far from good. There is no disagreement that climate change is here and that it means dire things for many parts of Earth, the only thing that remains to be seen is how dire.
Because of all of this, I had to read “Hot” in parts. I could only take bits at a time…and some bit were easier than others. I am lucky enough to live in an area where one of the people profiled as being a positive force regarding climate change is laying good groundwork for our region going forward. I could focus on those successes and the things that the author outlined that individuals could do as I read the parts about what would occur if nothing was done.
I liked that Hertsgaard puts his daughter and another child at the forefront of this book. Because climate change is a gradual occurrence, it easier for many people to take the “I’ll think about that tomorrow” approach. But when again and again, Hertsgaard reminds the reader that tomorrow is alive in the children of today, it makes it harder and harder to push the reality away. We save mementoes, heirlooms and money for our children’s future – it’s hard to disagree that we need to make sure that the world they will inhabit shouldn’t be saved for them as well.
I was very interested to read that, “Bangladesh has done more over the past twenty years to understand and adapt to climate change than any other country in the world except for Great Britain and the Netherlands.” Which is amazing to me as well as ironic because, “There is a terrible injustice at the heart of the climate problem: climate change punishes the world’s poor first and worst, even though they did almost nothing to bring it on.”
Though there are some very hard and necessary truths in “Hot”, Mark Hertsgaard does a good job in walking the reader close to the ledge, but then showing them there is a ladder there. He deftly shifts the focus between the science of what will probably happen in the next fifty years to the actions that are being taken around the world to minimize and deal with the impacts. He does not let the reader off the hook or pretend that everything will be fine – but leads them to the blueprints of how things can be better.
I applaud the author for taking this subject on, especially with the concerted and highly funded campaign of lying with which climate change deniers are assaulting the world. This is about us, but more importantly, it is about our children. Not the children of tomorrow, but the children we are raising and protecting and loving today. “We are responsible for laying the foundations that future generations will build on, somewhat like the mason’s who laid the foundation of the European cathedrals that took several centuries to complete. They knew they would not live to see the final product of their work, but they also knew they needed to do very solid, precise work because of all the weight that was going to be placed on top of their work.”
We, too, need to take this long world view. We need to understand that tackling climate change is not only our most important challenge as a people but also possibly our greatest triumph.
“In triggering climate change, humanity has unwittingly launched a planetary experiment. Because this experiment has never been run before, and because it involves extremely complicated systems, knowing exactly how it will turn out is impossible.”
All of the science and scientific predictions in “Hot” agree that the results will be far from good. There is no disagreement that climate change is here and that it means dire things for many parts of Earth, the only thing that remains to be seen is how dire.
Because of all of this, I had to read “Hot” in parts. I could only take bits at a time…and some bit were easier than others. I am lucky enough to live in an area where one of the people profiled as being a positive force regarding climate change is laying good groundwork for our region going forward. I could focus on those successes and the things that the author outlined that individuals could do as I read the parts about what would occur if nothing was done.
I liked that Hertsgaard puts his daughter and another child at the forefront of this book. Because climate change is a gradual occurrence, it easier for many people to take the “I’ll think about that tomorrow” approach. But when again and again, Hertsgaard reminds the reader that tomorrow is alive in the children of today, it makes it harder and harder to push the reality away. We save mementoes, heirlooms and money for our children’s future – it’s hard to disagree that we need to make sure that the world they will inhabit shouldn’t be saved for them as well.
I was very interested to read that, “Bangladesh has done more over the past twenty years to understand and adapt to climate change than any other country in the world except for Great Britain and the Netherlands.” Which is amazing to me as well as ironic because, “There is a terrible injustice at the heart of the climate problem: climate change punishes the world’s poor first and worst, even though they did almost nothing to bring it on.”
Though there are some very hard and necessary truths in “Hot”, Mark Hertsgaard does a good job in walking the reader close to the ledge, but then showing them there is a ladder there. He deftly shifts the focus between the science of what will probably happen in the next fifty years to the actions that are being taken around the world to minimize and deal with the impacts. He does not let the reader off the hook or pretend that everything will be fine – but leads them to the blueprints of how things can be better.
I applaud the author for taking this subject on, especially with the concerted and highly funded campaign of lying with which climate change deniers are assaulting the world. This is about us, but more importantly, it is about our children. Not the children of tomorrow, but the children we are raising and protecting and loving today. “We are responsible for laying the foundations that future generations will build on, somewhat like the mason’s who laid the foundation of the European cathedrals that took several centuries to complete. They knew they would not live to see the final product of their work, but they also knew they needed to do very solid, precise work because of all the weight that was going to be placed on top of their work.”
We, too, need to take this long world view. We need to understand that tackling climate change is not only our most important challenge as a people but also possibly our greatest triumph.
mjfmjfmjf's review
4.0
Interesting quick read on global climate change and global warming. The conceit of the book is that of a letter to the author's newborn, who is several years old by the time the book is finished being written. The conceit got a little old, but never unbearable. This book has further convinced me that people in the United States have been fooled in the same manner as the issues around tobacco were minimized and in some cases by the same people. But in reality I think the climate change scientists made it easy. I think as long as we are talking a 2 degree average rise in temperature, people are incapable of measuring that on there own and at least in the United States are too stupid to think for themselves about what that means. If global climate change was only about the melting of glaciers and arctic ice and Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets and numbers of days over 90 degrees in a year and the date of ice breaking on rivers and the first day of birds returning and other pretty darn easy to measure facts ... well ... lying to yourself and others is an adaptation as well as many ... as was our moving to one of the more likely safe-ish places in the US from a climate change perspective.
The good news from this book is that there is still an awful lot of stuff that can be done to make the problem less bad for rich people like 99% of the people who live in the US.
The good news from this book is that there is still an awful lot of stuff that can be done to make the problem less bad for rich people like 99% of the people who live in the US.
introvertedbear's review
1.0
The tone of the book annoys me, and sometimes I feel like it's condescending. He talks a good bit about California but then leaves out other important places in the U.S. that will probably be affected more by climate change.
It's also really annoying how he talks so much about his daughter. I get it. He loves her. But I think if he really wanted to write a book for her, he should've just gotten one copy published for his daughter and be done with it.
The author does point out some great information that can be used to start discussions or inspire further research, but I don't like the way he presents it in this book.
It's also really annoying how he talks so much about his daughter. I get it. He loves her. But I think if he really wanted to write a book for her, he should've just gotten one copy published for his daughter and be done with it.
The author does point out some great information that can be used to start discussions or inspire further research, but I don't like the way he presents it in this book.
notladylike's review against another edition
5.0
So good! This was written about 10 years ago (10 years before I read it, I mean) so it was very interesting to note how we viewed the climate crisis then vs. now. And how we definitely have not done enough in our adaptation and mitigation efforts. A lot of research went into this book. Very accessible language, a lot of anecdotes and real world examples. The way he was writing it for his young daughter was very sweet, and I think it puts the shortened timeline we have into perspective.
msgtdameron's review against another edition
5.0
Many things that we need to do and, do today, are talked about. The problem is five years after publication we are still burning carbon at an alarming rate. 2 degrees C IS going to be blown past. The climate is running to hot too fast. I'm using less but most of America isn't getting the message. Our children WILL suffer. I hope that the resource wars that ARE coming won't destroy the human race. But the starvation and thirst that WILL come will kill billions, five to six at least, as we get down to a more livable size world. I hope my grand daughter is one of the survivors. Even the U.S. will lose multiple millions, at least 200 million, on the way to a more manageable population using resources size. The warning in this book have been ignored and we will have to pay a huge price. ask yourself do you think that you will be one of the three people in this country that will survive. Or that your kids are one of the three that will survive the resource crunch that is coming.
aerenrich's review against another edition
The scariest thing about reading this book is realizing that the big date, 2020, is only 7 years away.
satyridae's review
3.0
There's a LOT of meat here, a lot of very important information. It's presented in a fairly dense format and is not terribly well-written. From a journalistic standpoint, it's well-done, but it's too dense for a book, in my opinion.
This book also tips into the bathetic on more than one occasion as Hertsgaard talks about fatherhood and the fact that his own personal, perfect, adorable princess of a child will be dealing with climate change. And though he does admit that there are other children in the world, one gets the sense that he doesn't find them nearly as important as his own princess. And, sure, we all feel that way to some degree, but journalistic integrity demands we at least try to suppress it a little whilst reporting on a topic we are trying to present as universal.
I'm perhaps focusing on the negatives so I can avoid talking about the primary message of this book, which seems to be that we are screwed as a planet. Deeply, irremediably screwed. Unless we all wake up by noon tomorrow and change our ways- and somehow I'm doubting that the corporations who now own my country are going to be cooperating with that.
Hertsgaard offers some crumbs of hope, but they are merely crumbs. I can't imagine my grandchildren's world, but life seems to be heading back towards "nasty, brutish and short" in a big hurry.
So: 4 stars for content, 3 for writing and 1 for sentimentality. Averaged out.
This book also tips into the bathetic on more than one occasion as Hertsgaard talks about fatherhood and the fact that his own personal, perfect, adorable princess of a child will be dealing with climate change. And though he does admit that there are other children in the world, one gets the sense that he doesn't find them nearly as important as his own princess. And, sure, we all feel that way to some degree, but journalistic integrity demands we at least try to suppress it a little whilst reporting on a topic we are trying to present as universal.
I'm perhaps focusing on the negatives so I can avoid talking about the primary message of this book, which seems to be that we are screwed as a planet. Deeply, irremediably screwed. Unless we all wake up by noon tomorrow and change our ways- and somehow I'm doubting that the corporations who now own my country are going to be cooperating with that.
Hertsgaard offers some crumbs of hope, but they are merely crumbs. I can't imagine my grandchildren's world, but life seems to be heading back towards "nasty, brutish and short" in a big hurry.
So: 4 stars for content, 3 for writing and 1 for sentimentality. Averaged out.
will_sargent's review
4.0
Excellent, with a ton of first hand research and multiple trips to different countries -- Seattle, India, the Netherlands, China and even Bangladesh gets a look in.
I would have appreciated more technical details and numbers, as it can be hard to summarize data given in between anecdotes, but it's still solid journalism.
I would have appreciated more technical details and numbers, as it can be hard to summarize data given in between anecdotes, but it's still solid journalism.
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