SIEGERT, M. J. 2001. Ice Sheets and Late Quaternary Environmental Change. xv+231 pp. Chichester, New York, Weinheim, Brisbane, Singapore, Toronto: John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Price £19.99 (paperback). ISBN 0 471 98570 8.

Abstract

The study of former ice sheets is of growing importance with the realization that predicting global environmental change requires an understanding of the relationship between the cryosphere and climate as recorded in the geological record. Within this context, the last great ice sheets which covered much of North America and Europe have received a considerable amount of attention, both from the point of view of documenting ice-marginal and subglacial landforms, and in developing numerical models to ascertain their scale and dynamic behaviour. This book by Siegert of the Bristol Glaciology Centre is the first attempt to review our understanding of Late Quaternary ice sheets since the now classic work The Last Great Ice Sheets by Denton & Hughes, published in 1981. As such, the book represents an important contribution to the literature concerned with the relationship between ice sheets and environmental change. The aims of the book are threefold: (i) to explain how Late Quaternary ice sheets can be reconstructed; (ii) to present the dimensions and dynamics of these former ice sheets and show how these changed through the last ice age; and (iii) to indicate how Late …