Dogs: Their Fossil Relatives and Evolutionary History

This was a gift for my mother, an avid dog lover, who saw it in a local bookstore and begged for it for Christmas. I got it for her and she absolutely loves it. The pictures are detailed and beautiful, and the information is presented in both an informative and interesting way. As my mother put it, "A beautiful piece of scholarly work."

The medium sized book provides an excellent, well written, and entertaining summary of the evolutionary history of the canine family; described in the context of the changing geologic, climatic, and biologic conditions of the past 60 million years. The many excellent illustrations truly add a sense of life to both the many living and long extinct species. The book is fairly technical, but is written is such a way as not to scare off the non-scientific reader. I highly recommend it for both the technical and casual reader.

Dogs and their kin have an extensive fossil record, especially in North America. The authors have recently published three extensive technical monographs on fossil dogs, wolves, coyotes, foxes, etc. based on the unbelievably huge collections at the American Museum of Natural History and elsewhere. This book is essentially a popularization of the technical work, although this volume can be a bit technical in places. The authors cover the taxonomy of modern Canidae, the origin of carnivores, dogs, and numerous doglike mammals, anatomy, hunting and social activity (not only of modern dogs, but what can be interpreted from fossils), how the evolution of dogs is related to the last 40 million years of climate change, the migration of dogs from North American into the Old World, and a short chapter on domestic dogs. Included as appendices are listings of all 200 plus fossil and living Canidae species and an evolutionary tree base on the author's research. The artwork by Antön is wonderfully done with his sketches rivaling his almost photographic looking color paintings in quality. Antön previously has illustrated other books on vertebrate paleontology, including The Big Cats and their Fossil Relatives. Almost anyone who is interested in dogs and/or vertebrate paleontology should read this book. Natural History magazine has a short non-technical summary article by the authors in July-August '08 issue if you want a good preview. Dr. Wang has a wonderful website with links to much of his research and a pdf of the Natural History article.

This book is a great follow-up to The Big Cats and Their Fossil Relatives and like the forementioned it doesn't disappoint! Well researched, well written and accompanied by outstanding illustrations (Mauricio Anton really displays his talents as a reconstructive artist), this book is a treasure to anyone interested in carnivoran evolution. The list of pertinent reference books relating to mammalian evolution is an added bonus. I just wish it could go into more depth on many of the interesting species it reveals to us. A great introduction to canid evolution, you can't go wrong with this one!

This book encompasses everything that inspired me to pursue paleontological research...the meticulous manner in which the authors document the evolutionary history of dogs, and the unparalleled illustrations that bring those concepts and species to life. The paleontologists who wrote this book are authorities in their fields, and are much respected for the quality of their work. The price tag for the book is a huge understatement of its value. Be glad you are getting such a bargain for a priceless work, just short of picking the brains of the authors themselves!