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Wavewatcher's Companion (2000)

by Gavin Pretor-Pinney(Favorite Author)

3.73 of 5 Votes: 1

ISBN

1408809761 (ISBN13: 9781408809761)

languge

English

genre

Nonfiction

review 1: There are the making of a lovely little book in here, with a little stern editing. The problem is that Pretor-Pinney seems to think that waves of the wet variety aren't meaty enough a topic to fill a whole book, so he expands his scope to include waves of all kinds. On the one hand this does draw in some interesting material from the worlds of optics, acoustics, etc. On the other hand it all gets a bit desperate when he devotes a whole chapter to the invention of the Mexican Wave at sports events, and tries to convince us that the spread of global phenomena like avian flu or the financial crisis can usefully be considered as forms of "information waves".But when he sticks to describing waves in water there's plenty to enjoy, although I found the somewhat forced jokey tone ... morea little grating at times. As if he didn't trust you to be captivated by the science alone, he has to throw in a feeble joke at the end of the paragraph. It would also have been nice to have a little more reference to waves in the arts and literature, as I seem to remember he did in his excellent Cloudspotter's Guide.
review 2: Fascinating book. It gets a little slow in parts, but overall just brimful of interesting data. I liked the conversational writing style, and self-deprecatory tone of the book. Starts and ends with the classic wave - ocean swells. In between it travels through all the other waves in the world, which ultimately is everything according to quantum physics. Found the emphasis on the information and energy transfer aspects of waves very useful. The snapping shrimp and the description of shock waves is probably my favorite part, but the explanation of tides and bores are right up there as well. Overall a very fun and informative book, which does that great thing of making you see the world around you in a different light and with a greater sense of understanding. less

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