Krakatoa, the day the world exploded by Simon Winchester.

Simon Winchester's chronicle of the destruction of the Indonesian island of Krakatoa in 1883 charts the birth of our modern world. He tells the story of the unrecognized genius who beat Darwin to the discovery of evolution; of Samuel Mose, his code and how rubber allowed the world to talk; of Alfred Wegener, the German explorer and father of geology. In detail he describes how one island and its inhabitants were blasted out of existence and how colonial society was turned upside down in a cataclysm whose echoes are still felt today. Read more