Hothouse Earth: an Inhabitant's Guide

It s a paradox but this was one of the most chilling books I ve read this year. It s the definitive guide to where we re heading ... ANTHONY HOROWITZ

The Earth is already in a dangerous phase of heating. Many scientists admit privately to actually being "scared" by recent weather extremes. But the public doesn t like pessimism, so we environment journalists hint at future optimism. This book provides a more steely-eyed view on how we can cope with a hothouse world. - ROGER HARRABIN, former BBC Environment Analyst

This accessible and authoritative book is a must-read for anyone who still thinks it could be OK to carry on as we are for a little bit longer, or that climate chaos might not affect them or their kids too badly. MIKE BERNERS-LEE is a professor at Lancaster University, founder of Small World Consultancy and author of There is No Planet B: A Handbook for the Make or Break Years

If you read just one book about the menace of climate breakdown, make it this one. - TIM RADFORD, Climate News Network

We inhabit a planet in peril. Our once temperate world is locked on course to become a hothouse entirely of our own making.

Hothouse Earth: An Inhabitant s Guide provides a post-COP26 perspective on the climate emergency, acknowledging that it is now practically impossible to keep this side of the 1.5°C dangerous climate change guardrail. The upshot is that we can no longer dodge the arrival of disastrous, all-pervasive, climate breakdown that will come as a hammer blow to global society and economy.

Bill McGuire, Professor of Geophysical and Climate Hazards, explains the science behind the climate crisis and for the first time presents a blunt but authentic picture of the sort of world our children will grow old in, and our grandchildren grow up in; a world that we catch only glimpses of in today s blistering heatwaves, calamitous wildfires and ruinous floods and droughts. Bleak though it is, the picture is one we must all face up to, if only to spur genuine action - even at this late stage - to stop a harrowing future becoming a truly cataclysmic one.