Otherlands: A Walk Through Ancient Times

Thomas Halliday

BY AUSTIN GLOCK

Thomas Halliday’s Otherlands takes readers through centuries of Earth's past, painting an amazing picture of what our planet used to look like. Halliday covers the epochs and periods all the way from the Pleistocene to the Ediacaran period. Every time period is associated with a chapter and a geographical location. In each, Halliday’s writing paints a beautiful picture of life as it used to be.

My personal favorite chapter was Contingency, which takes palace during the Triassic period. Halliday flexes his background in paleobotany through his descriptions of the flora of the time, but the true highlight was the focus on archosaurs. In the modern day, archosaur members are birds and crocodilians, but in the Triassic period, they were far more prevalent. One such archosaur is the Sharovipteryx, a small creature that had wings connected to its legs. That’s right, wings on its legs! Not only does it give the Sharovipteryx a stylish pair of pants but it allows it to glide from tree to tree. The Sharovipteryx isn’t the only strange creature from the Triassic, the Phytosaurs are of special note. It’s not because it’s a particularly weird creature, exactly the opposite really. If someone were to encounter a Phytosaurs today, it’d be very easy to confuse it for a crocodile. But keen-eyed crocodilian fans will see their nostrils are much further back on their snout and be able to tell the difference.

While we can’t go back in time, Otherlands gets us very close. Halliday’s writing made me feel like I was walking through the Triassic period with beautiful sights all around. For any interested in the field of paleontology, Otherlands scratches that itch very well.