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Book Summary and Reviews of The Weather of the Future by Heidi Cullen

The Weather of the Future by Heidi Cullen

The Weather of the Future

Heat Waves, Extreme Storms, and Other Scenes from a Climate-Changed Planet

by Heidi Cullen

  • Published:
  • Aug 2010, 352 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

In The Weather of the Future, Dr. Heidi Cullen, one of our foremost climatologists and environmental journalists, offers detailed predictions of what our world will look like if we do nothing to curb CO2 emissions. Combining interviews with climate scientists from around the world with state-of-the-art climate model projections, this essential volume spells out the inherent risks that global warming poses for everyone - not just those who live on the coasts. Making a strong case for how we must connect our weather today with climate change tomorrow, Cullen offers a new way of envisioning climate change, one in which climate change isn't happening just at the poles in some distant future, but is happening right now in our own backyards.

With careful and meticulous research as a backbone, Cullen explores climate change scenarios for seven locations around the world, taking the reader to places as diverse as New York City, Bangladesh, and Australia. Taken together, these scenarios collectively spell out the full spectrum of risks that exist for mankind in a climate-changed future, illustrating how, if left unabated, this phenomenon will transform every corner of the world by mid-century. Featuring a data rich appendix of the type of weather we could expect to experience in cities around the U.S. by 2050, The Weather of the Future will make climate change local, showing how no part of the country or the world will be safe from its reach. Equal parts The World Without Us and Collapse, this provocative and convincing guide is a shocking exploration of our world, one that will bring the realities of climate change home.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"This engrossing study predicts global warming scenarios for seven hot spots around the world--and evaluates the responses of communities, governments, and international organizations." - Publishers Weekly

"Vivid and compelling, this book shows what life will be like in a warming world. Essential reading for anyone who’s planning to inhabit the planet for the next few decades." - Elizabeth Kolbert, author of Field Notes from a Catastrophe

"In this important and timely book, Heidi Cullen breaks ground...simplifying the connection between weather and climate and bringing the true impact of the problem, literally, right to your front door." -Laurie David, Academy Award winning producer of An Inconvenient Truth

This information about The Weather of the Future was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

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More Information

Dr. Heidi Cullen is a senior research scientist with Climate Central, a nonprofit, nonpartisan network of scientists and journalists reporting on climate and climate change. Climate Central currently provides climate news and information for outlets such as The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Time.com, and The Weather Channel, as well as local television news outlets. In addition, she is also part of Climate Central's forecasting efforts, in which scientists from Princeton and Stanford have partnered with Google.org to use Google visualisation technology to map the future and help the public better understand the impacts of climate change.

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