Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

Simon Winchester , New York Times bestselling author of The Professor and the Madman , examines the legendary annihilation in 1883 of the volcano-island of Krakatoa, which was followed by an immense tsunami that killed nearly forty thousand people. The effects of the immense waves were felt as far away as France. Barometers in Bogotá and Washington, D.C., went haywire. Bodies were washed up in Zanzibar. The... (more)

The World Without Us

by Alan Weisman

A penetrating, page-turning tour of a post-human Earth In The World Without Us, Alan Weisman offers an utterly original approach to questions of humanity’s impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us.In this far-reaching narrative, Weisman explains how our massive infrastructure would collapse and finally vanish without human presence; which everyday items may become immortalized as... (more)

Moon Crash Trilogy: Book 2

The Dead and the Gone

by Susan Beth Pfeffer

Susan Beth Pfeffer’s Life as We Knew It enthralled and devastated readers with its brutal but hopeful look at an apocalyptic event--an asteroid hitting the moon, setting off a tailspin of horrific climate changes. Now this harrowing companion novel examines the same events as they unfold in New York City, revealed through the eyes of seventeen-year-old Puerto Rican Alex Morales. When Alex's parents disappear in... (more)

A Crack in the Edge of the World

America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906

by Simon Winchester

Unleashed by ancient geologic forces, a magnitude 8.25 earthquake rocked San Francisco in the early hours of April 18, 1906. Less than a minute later, the city lay in ruins. Bestselling author Simon Winchester brings his inimitable storytelling abilities to this extraordinary event, exploring the legendary earthquake and fires that spread horror across San Francisco and northern California in 1906 as well as its... (more)

Isaac's Storm : The Drowning of Galveston

Isaac's Storm : The Drowning of Galveston

by Isaac Monroe Cline, Erik Larson

September 8, 1900, began innocently in the seaside town of Galveston, Texas. Even Isaac Cline, resident meteorologist for the U.S. Weather Bureau failed to grasp the true meaning of the strange deep-sea swells and peculiar winds that greeted the city that morning. Mere hours later, Galveston found itself submerged in a monster hurricane that completely destroyed the town and killed over six thousand people in what... (more)

Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America

Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America

by John M. Barry

An American epic of science, politics, race, honor, high society, and the Mississippi River, Rising Tide tells the riveting and nearly forgotten story of the greatest natural disaster this country has ever known -- the Mississippi flood of 1927. The river inundated the homes of nearly one million people, helped elect Huey Long governor and made Herbert Hoover president, drove hundreds of thousands of blacks... (more)

Zeitoun (Voice of Witness)

by Dave Eggers

When Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, Abdulrahman Zeitoun, a prosperous Syrian-American and father of four, chose to stay through the storm to protect his house and contracting business. In the days after the storm, he traveled the flooded streets in a secondhand canoe, passing on supplies and helping those he could. A week later, on September 6, 2005, Zeitoun abruptly disappeared. Eggers’s riveting... (more)

Recovering Charles

by Jason F. Wright

Luke Millward is a man who does not know he is lost. His girlfriend loves him; his career is going well; and every night he falls asleep knowing that his life is good and meaningful. Only when the past reveals its twisted smile in a phone call and the disconnected voice asks him to come find his father in post-Katrina New Orleans is Luke compelled to find out what kind of man he truly is. Recovering Charles is for... (more)

The Children's Blizzard (P.S.)

by David Laskin

Thousands of impoverished Northern European immigrants were promised that the prairie offered "land, freedom, and hope." The disastrous blizzard of 1888 revealed that their free homestead was not a paradise but a hard, unforgiving place governed by natural forces they neither understood nor controlled, and America’s heartland would never be the same. This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into... (more)

Last Train to Paradise: Henry Flagler and the Spectacular Rise and Fall of the Railroad that Crossed an Ocean

Last Train to Paradise: Henry Flagler and the Spectacular Rise and Fall of the Railroad that Crossed an Ocean

by Les Standiford

Last Train to Paradise is acclaimed novelist Les Standiford’s fast-paced and gripping true account of the extraordinary construction and spectacular demise of the Key West Railroad—one of the greatest engineering feats ever undertaken, destroyed in one fell swoop by the Labor Day hurricane of 1935. Brilliant and driven entrepreneur Henry Flagler’s dream fulfilled, the Key West Railroad stood as a magnificent... (more)

Come Hell or High Water: Hurricane Katrina and the Color of Disaster

Come Hell or High Water: Hurricane Katrina and the Color of Disaster

by Michael Eric Dyson

What Hurricane Katrina reveals about the fault lines of race and poverty in America-and what lessons we must take from the flood-from best-selling "hip-hop intellectual" Michael Eric Dyson Does George W. Bush care about black people? Does the rest of America? When Hurricane Katrina tore through New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, hundreds of thousands were left behind to suffer the ravages of destruction,... (more)

My Big Nose & Other Natural Disasters

by Sydney Salter

It’s the end of junior year, and summer is about to begin. The Summer of Passion, to be exact, when Jory Michaels plans to explore all the possibilities of the future--and, with any luck, score a boyfriend in the process. But Jory has a problem. A big problem. A curvy, honking, bumpy, problem in the form of her Super Schnozz, the one thing standing between Jory and happiness. And now, with the Summer of Passion... (more)

Moon Crash Trilogy: Book 3

This World We Live In

by Susan Beth Pfeffer

It's been a year since a meteor collided with the moon, catastrophically altering the earth’s climate. For Miranda Evans life as she knew it no longer exists. Her friends and neighbors are dead, the landscape is frozen, and food is increasingly scarce. The struggle to survive intensifies when Miranda’s father and stepmother arrive with a baby and three strangers in tow. One of the newcomers is Alex Morales, and... (more)

At War with the Weather: Managing Large-Scale Risks in a New Era of Catastrophes

At War with the Weather: Managing Large-Scale Risks in a New Era of Catastrophes

by Howard C. Kunreuther

The United States and other nations are facing large-scale risks at an accelerating pace. In 2005, three major hurricanes—Katrina, Rita, and Wilma—made landfall along the U.S. Gulf Coast within an eight-week period. The damage caused by these storms led to insurance reimbursements and federal disaster relief of more than $180 billion—a record sum. Today we are more vulnerable to catastrophic losses because of the... (more)

GREAT DISASTERSJohn Canning

GREAT DISASTERS

by John Canning

JulieCatherine Marshall

Julie

by Catherine Marshall

1906

by James Dalessandro

EVERY DISASTER HAS A STORY, none more thrilling this one. Set during the great San Francisco earthquake and fire, this page-turning tale of political corruption, vendettas, romance, and rescue-and-murder, is based on recently uncovered facts that will forever change our understanding of what really happened. Told by Annalisa Passarella, a feisty young reporter, the novel paints a vivid picture of life in the... (more)

Global environmental change and human security

Global environmental change and human security

In recent years, scholars in international relations and other fields have begun to conceive of security more broadly, moving away from a state-centered concept of national security toward the idea of human security, which emphasizes the individual and human well-being. Viewing global environmental change through the lens of human security connects such problems as melting ice caps and carbon emissions to poverty,... (more)

Nation

by Terry Pratchett

The sea has taken everything. Mau is the only one left after a giant wave sweeps his island village away. But when much is taken, something is returned, and somewhere in the jungle Daphne—a girl from the other side of the globe—is the sole survivor of a ship destroyed by the same wave. Together the two confront the aftermath of catastrophe. Drawn by the smoke of Mau and Daphne's sheltering fire, other... (more)

Dark Water Rising

by Marian Hale

A poignant coming-of-age novel set during the Galveston Storm of 1900 I looked south toward the gulf, trying to keep an eye on the stalking sea. Wild waves rose up like a great hand and wrenched loose the Pagoda’s long staircase, sending planks tumbling through the air. With horror I watched the end of one twin building sway and dip into the surf. I yelled at Josiah, but my words disappeared on the wind. I... (more)

Shelfari Book Activity

Tags: natural disasters

The Day the World Exploded: August 27, 1883

by Simon Winchester

by Alan Weisman

by Susan Beth Pfeffer

America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906

by Simon Winchester

by Isaac Monroe Cline, Erik Larson

by John M. Barry

by Dave Eggers

by Jason F. Wright

by David Laskin

by Les Standiford

by Michael Eric Dyson

by Sydney Salter

by Susan Beth Pfeffer

by Howard C. Kunreuther

by John Canning

by Catherine Marshall

by James Dalessandro

by Terry Pratchett

by Marian Hale