The past 20 years has seen a revolution in the understanding of the history of life on Earth. McNamara and Long round up the latest ideas on the very beginnings of microbial life over three billion years ago to the evolution of humans. Included are the first fish, the$ land-going vertebrates and plants, and the evolution of the dinosaurs and of birds. As professional palaeontologists at the Western Australian Museum in Perth, they are well placed to "cherry-pick" the best stories as soon as they appear in the academic press. Not many of these discoveries get into the public domain because the media tends to think that the$ public only wants dinosaur stories. McNamara and Long have had a personal involvement in some of the discoveries, notably ones involving fish, arthropods and dinosaurs. They fulfil their aim of sharing "the excitement and fascination that comes ... from making fossil discoveries" and write with an authority that is not always found in such books. When attractively written like this and suitably illustrated with simple but effective black-and-wh$ drawings, even quite complex palaeontological stories can be explained for the general reader. References are provided for the more dedicated enthusiast. In particular, McNamara and Long present a welcome antipodean slant to the history of life. Australia, along with India and the great southern continents of South America, Africa and Antarctica formed the Gondwanan supercontinent for many millions of years, and yet they contain some of the most geologically unexplored territory in the world. Their final thoughts mention the discovery of the oldest fossil ants and feathered dinosaurs--so rapid is the prese$ rate of palaeontological discovery that within a few years any new edition would be able to present a whole new collection of stories. For now, though, this edition represents a fine summation of the current state of the art. -- Douglas Palmer