Steve Brusatte & Thomas Halliday: The Paleo-Adventurers

Has our obsession with dinosaurs overshadowed other discoveries about our planet’s history? Palaeontologist Steve Brusatte lays out a fascinating alternative history in The Rise and Reign of the Mammals. Thomas Halliday is a Scottish paleontologist and evolutionary biologist whose book, Otherlands, looks back into Earth’s distant past to explore the extraordinary features of our seemingly permanent ecosystem. This is science writing at its finest, chaired by Professor of Geography Jo Sharp.

Book Festival News

Communities Programme participants celebrate success of 2024 Communities Programme participants celebrate success of 2024
Friday 13 December

Enjoying this event? You can help us produce more like it.

Donate

Share

Watch more

Vivian Gornick: A Map of American Feminism Vivian Gornick: A Map of American Feminism In an age of instant opinions and the daily social media rush from one outrage to another, it’s refreshing to read the words of an 85 year old writer who insists on taking her time. In fact, Taking a Long Look, Vivian Gornick’s latest essay collection, is… Reverend Jesse Jackson (2015 Event) Reverend Jesse Jackson (2015 Event) One of the best-respected and most formidable civil rights activists of the 20th century, the Reverend Jesse Jackson worked for Martin Luther King in the 1960s. During his later political career, he specialised in high-profile international diplomacy… Mara Menzies: A Story of Identity Mara Menzies: A Story of Identity Perhaps because it is such a natural human impulse, storytelling has sometimes been overlooked as an art form. Yet we are content to take it for granted as a building block for films, plays and the written word. Mara Menzies is a performance storyteller… Minouche Shafik: Recipe for a Better Society Minouche Shafik: Recipe for a Better Society We live in a world of discontent: four out of every five people in China, Europe, India, and the United States feel that the system is not working for them. This is a time of polarized politics, culture wars, conflicts over inequality and race, tensions… Chris Brookmyre talks to Brian Taylor at the Edinburgh International Book Festival Chris Brookmyre talks to Brian Taylor at the Edinburgh International Book Festival Sixteen years on from the death of young Niamh on a holiday in Portugal, the glamorous Temple clan hold a fateful family reunion in Fallen Angel, Chris Brookmyre’s new standalone thriller. For Amanda, a neighbouring nanny, fascination gives way to… Andy Burnham & Steve Rotheram: Another Way – Politics Post-Westminster Andy Burnham & Steve Rotheram: Another Way – Politics Post-Westminster 25 years since the Devolution Act, two English city Mayors come together to offer rare insight into politics from outside the Westminster bubble. In Head North, the Mayors of Greater Manchester and the Liverpool City Region, Andy Burnham and Steve… Wanjiru Koinange & Donna Obaseki-Ogunnaike: Outriders Africa – Sub-Saharan Swiping Wanjiru Koinange & Donna Obaseki-Ogunnaike: Outriders Africa – Sub-Saharan Swiping As part of the Book Festival's Outriders programme exploring the shifting landscapes of contemporary Africa, we turn to The Gambia and Senegal, where, like everywhere else, a maelstrom of taps and swipes has seen modern dating change beyond recognition… Outriders: Harry Giles & Katherena Vermette (2017 Event) Outriders: Harry Giles & Katherena Vermette (2017 Event) As part of our Outriders project to explore the Americas, poet Harry Giles travelled across Canada with Metis writer Katherena Vermette. Starting in Montreal amid the buzzy Quebecois writing scene, the two writers travelled to Winnipeg, where Lord Selkirk&… Peter Ross: The Stories and Glories of Graveyards Peter Ross: The Stories and Glories of Graveyards How is it possible that a book about graveyards can be so full of life? The colourful characters who populate Peter Ross’s non-fiction book, A Tomb with a View, include a bisexual Italian Bohemian hedonist named Marchesa Luisa Casati, who is buried in… Garth Greenwell: Intimate Truths Garth Greenwell: Intimate Truths The annual Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Awards delights in taking bundles of limbs and badly chosen adjectives, removing them from their context and mocking them for their unsexiness. But there is real power in its opposite: by capturing the truth…