The Magicians of the Gods By Graham Hancock

This is long awaited sequel to the best-selling 'Fingerprints of the Gods' that was published way back in the mid-1990s. One remembers attending a lecture presentation at Adventures Unlimited in the mid-1990s and being genuinely shocked by the multitude of images of the thousands of mysterious archaeological sites that litter our planet for which mainstream academia had no explanation , no knowledge of the civilizations who built them, no understanding of the technology required for such mammoth feats of engineering, feats that we could not hope to duplicate today or couldn't duplicate until the advent of modern machinery/technology. (For example cause I know you want one; the 800 ton trilithons at Baalbeck as a starter for $1).

Here Hancock broaches many sacred cows, one of them an unpopular cow probably because it would frighten people; catastrophism, and the reality of periodic catastrophism. Yes, disturbing isn't it. This book is full [XBR] of 'disturbing' and in that is its appeal for the dining table of the mind. For those who do, a YouTube search will bring up a fabulous discussion with Joe Rogan and Randall Carlson on this cow. In fact Hancock after a time on the sidelines is back and all over the place in lecture and interview with the release of this book. One other detail one must share is the geological fact of sudden climate changes on earth, in our past when there were no cars and smoke stacks, our climate went through sudden and rapid heating and cooling many times in the ancient past, often thousands of years apart, just like we are doing now.

Hancock's book gives one many of those moments when you stare off into the distance your mind a whirl of possibilities and potentialities which makes for slow reading . There have been many pauses for thought and this book is impelling one to learn more about geology so one can recognise the results of the sudden and destructive mile high tsunamis that occurred from the instantaneous ice melt when one is standing right in front of it instead of just wondering about the pretty colours and shapes of the geologic strata. (Too bad one is not a mole, then one could also burrow into the earth and check out the giant kauris laying on their sides, forests laying this way, and at another stage in time forests laying another.)