Rating: 
Summary: Fascinating Account of the World's Most Famous Eruption
Review: A few volcanoes have had larger eruptions. One volcano -- also located in what is present-day Indonesia -- killed more people. But no volcano has gripped the public's imagination all over the world like Krakatoa.Simon Winchester explains that this was as much a matter of timing as it had to do with the deadly power of Krakatoa's eruption. When it exploded in 1883, the world had just been linked together by underwater cables over the previous two decades. News readers in the West were thus linked to events in the East with an immediacy they never had before. All around the world, scientists of the time were able to use this information when measuring and observing certain phenomenon in their own localities. As Winchester points out, this was significant, marking the first time that scientists had proof of the interconnectedness of the world, that the globe was not just a hodgepodge of separate regions. As some reviewers have already mentioned, perhaps the most remarkable part of the book is the chapter called "Close Encounters on the Wallace Line". Here Winchester shows how Alfred Russel Wallace's observation of distinct fauna on the Indonesian Archipelago, narrowly separated by the eponymous line that splits through the middle of the group of islands, in a way foretold the twentieth century discovery of continental plates and subduction -- the processes responsible for the volcano's terrible eruption. (Wallace himself seems to have had an intuition that geological processes were responsible for two such different groups of animals being clustered together.) After Winchester gives this context, he then moves on to the actual eruption of Krakatoa. Here he explains in such detail about the events (and who wrote them down) leading up to the final eruption that he becomes more recorder than storyteller, and the story surprisingly becomes more comprehensive than interesting. I hasten to add that this part of book is still very hard to put down, but the sheer bulk of detail about who saw what, and how reliable they are as a witness of the event, might have been edited down a bit when the subject matter is so compelling. Winchester is a good -- not a great -- writer, and he doesn't seem to have the ability to be both comprehensive and fascinating. Some people may actually enjoy Winchester's decision to carefully go over the time frame, the witnesses, their reliability, and other details, but I found this focus on minutiae to detract somewhat from the overall quality of the book.
Rating: 
Summary: Five Stellar Non-Fiction
Review: This book was as good as my three favorite works of non-fiction ever: Frank McCourt's "Angela's Ashes," Suzanne Short's "Wisdom Daddy Taught Me," and Clint Arthur's "9 Free Secrets of New Sensual Power." All four share a brilliant economy of words mixed with powerful expressiveness making for a great pleasure to read.
Rating:
Summary: Good Historical Account of the Global Village Event
Review: Simon Winchester has entered the disaster field with his newest pop history entry and has created a book, Krakatoa, that succeeds, in terms of entertainment, beyond his previous very well-done works. The astonishing fact about this book is that the most interesting aspect is the first couple hundred pages of history on both the colonization of the East Indies and the development of the study of the earth. That he can render the history of geology so fascinating should be no suprise to readers of his last book, The Map That Changed the World, but that he can almost suceed in rendering it more gripping than the account of the explosion itself is a wonder. Which is not to say the explosion of Krakatoa is not incredibly nail-biting because it most certainly is. The story flags a little in the politics of the last chapters recounting the aftermath of the explosion, but only a little, as the author seems on less sure ground. An exciting read.
Rating:
Summary: Spectacularly Interesting
Review: I'm not even through reading this book, and I must recommend it absolutely. Winchester writes like a dream, combining meticulous scholarship with wit and clarity. (The title of one chapter: "Close Encounters on the Wallace Line"). He carefully walks the non-technical reader through complex scientific theories such as plate tectonics. One grumble: the book is badly in need of better maps. Many of the important places mentioned in the text are not even shown on what maps are included. The maps themselves are hard to read. Get out a good atlas before you start reading, but start reading!
Rating:
Summary: Winchester Relates This Tragic Event with Masterly Vividness
Review: By late summer of this year, 120 years will have passed since the greatest natural disaster to occur on this planet since mankind began recording history some 30,000 years ago. It was exactly 10:02 a.m. on Monday, August 27, 1883 when the small volcanic island of Krakatoa in the Sunda Strait between Java and Sumatra blew itself out of existence with an explosion that was heard thousands of miles away and that resulted in the deaths of over 36,000 people. That eruption is believed to be the loudest sound ever heard by human ears. As Simon Winchester points out in this latest of his detailed historical-scientific investigative books, the vast majority of those 36,417 victims were killed not by the explosion itself, but by the enormous tsunami it created. This moving mountain of seawater wiped out whole towns; devastated the social and economic life of a region measured in thousands of miles; and was recorded on tide gauges as far away as France. Winchester specializes in detailed accounts that shine light into odd or forgotten corners of history. His two most recent successful efforts in that genre were THE MAP THAT CHANGED THE WORLD and THE PROFESSOR AND THE MADMAN. Now he has crafted a vividly written book of 400-plus pages about an event that was over in a matter of hours. KRAKATOA is certainly full of digressions that have only tangential relevance to its main subject --- but those digressions are so well researched, beautifully written and just plain interesting that they become assets rather than liabilities. The reader does not really object to the fact that the eruption doesn't begin until past the halfway point in Winchester's text. The preliminaries that lead Winchester up to August 27th involve, among other things, giving proper credit to people like Alfred Russel Wallace --- whose theories of evolution paralleled those of Charles Darwin --- and Alfred Lothar Wegener, whose prescient views on continental drift, once ridiculed, were scientifically confirmed only in the 1960s. We get lengthy side-essays on subjects such as the science of plate tectonics; the spread of information technology spurred by the laying of the Atlantic Cable; the flora and fauna of the southwest Pacific; the history of colonial exploitation in that area by the British and Dutch; and the growth of international trade that placed Krakatoa directly on one of the busiest sea lanes in the world on that August morning. His thesis, backed by impressive geological evidence, is that Krakatoa had certainly erupted many times in the distant past --- before recorded history began --- and that it will inevitably do so again sometime in the unforeseeable future. The small volcanic island had given plenty of warning. There had been a serious eruption the previous May and the warning signs of the big bang of late August were obvious. Yet, as so often happens in both natural and manmade catastrophes, no one put the pieces of the puzzle together in time. The eruption actually began on Sunday the 26th, but no one was prepared for the incredible disaster of the next morning. The captain of a passing British ship, awestruck, wrote in his log: "A fearful explosion...I am writing this blind in pitch darkness...The eardrums of over half my crew have been shattered. My last thoughts are with my dear wife. I am convinced that the day of judgment has come." The island of Krakatoa --- six miles long and two miles wide --- was largely destroyed. Only tiny fragments of it remain today, along with an island, locally known as "The Child of Krakatoa," which has risen from the seabed where the volcano's crater once stood. Winchester tells this story with masterly vividness. His research is thorough and he has the ability to translate things like the records of the pressure gauge at the gas works in Batavia (present-day Dakarta), 90 miles away, into telling historical evidence. He does seem, however, to be on somewhat shakier ground in contending that the catastrophe contributed to a rise in Islamic Fundamentalist fervor that has survived, grew and fed the political turmoil that grips independent Indonesia to this day. That may be stretching things rather further than is logical. For American readers, KRAKATOA will serve as a vocabulary builder, with its references to genever (an alcoholic drink), godowns (warehouses), pye-dogs (??), solfataras (volcanic fissures) and other such technical terms. But readers will also learn about "subduction zones" and the prime role they play in the continuing slow-motion subterranean dance going on beneath the feet of all of us as continental plates rub up against each other, causing volcanic matter to gush up or be dragged down to await further Krakatoas. It seems that, if mankind somehow escapes blowing itself up, nature may do the job for us down the road in a few million years. --- Reviewed by Robert Finn
Rating:
Summary: Krakatoa: The History
Review: Krakatoa by Simon Winchester is a very informative, enlightening, and researched work. Rather than just being a recounting of the day Krakatoa exploded (which the title seems to imply), the damage it caused, etc., the book does much more. It recounts the historical significance of Indonesia (and the Dutch rule there), the importance of the Sunda Strait (where Krakatoa is located), the underlying reasons for massive volcanic explosions (plate tectonics and continental drift), and the social and religious aftermath due to Krakatoa.
I enjoyed the treatment of each of these issues, but at times some of the information seemed to be a stretch in relation to the subject at hand. The first half of the book, the build-up to the massive explosion if you will, was slower and not as engaging as the second half which was absolutely a joy to read and learn. Winchester does a great job of convincing the reader that Krakatoa was truly the first major event that the world of global communication (due to the telegraph and transatlantic communication lines) came to know. Winchester also does a good job explaining why the Krakatoa legacy has endured. Interestingly, much of it has to do with the unique name itself. Krakatoa is a very good read. From an intellectual standpoint, the book is great, everything that you want to know about Krakatoa you'll find here. From the standpoint of enjoyable reading, the first half and some of Winchester's digressions are difficult to get through, but the second half is a great read. I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in the subject, or just history itself, but beware if you're looking for a book solely focused on the explosion/destruction of Krakatoa on August 27, 1883.
Rating: 
Summary: Skip it
Review: I was looking forward to reading "The map that changed the world" by the same author after this book. However, reading "Krakatoa" has made me quite wary of any such adventure. This book is as tepid as Krakatoa was explosive. This is one of the very few instances when I have actually calculated the remaining pages of a book while reading; just to know how much longer I had to sit through it (.... "Finish thy book" is the first of my personal commandments). And mind you, I enjoy reading about the allied scientific aspects of any subject matter including geology (the discussions on petroleum geology in "Hubbert's Peak" being a case in point). The author seems to have started off with the noble aspiration of seamlessly interweaving the history, geography, social context, geopolitics, technological deveopments of the age and other issues keeping Krakatoa as the central theme. However, he ends up serving an unappetising stew with even the meaty part about the dramatic explosion somehow leaving you uninspired. There are tidbits of interesting factual information but this is not enough to classify as saving grace for any book; especially one with such a compelling central subject, rich in possibilities.
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Summary: Relevant after December 2004 earthquake and tsunami
Review: Although Krakatoa was published in 2003, it has assumed new relevance since the December 26, 2004 earthquake and tsunami. This book is at its most engaging when it outlines the development of our understanding of the Earth's geologic processes (Chapter 3) and describes how the Krakatoa eruption affected people worldwide (Chapter 8). It is at its least successful in demonstrating cause and effect between the August 27, 1883 eruption and the 1888 Islamic rebellion in the Dutch East Indies.
Rating:
Summary: Thorough and informative
Review: If you are interested in geology, vulcanology,colonial history, oceanography, ornithology, current politics and fascinating archane information this book can be a worthwhile reading experience. Of course the explosion of Krakatoa in 1883 is a well known historical event, but Simon Winchester lets this story unfold with a treasure chest of valuable information so that the reader can better understand the events leading up to the cataclysm and the aftermath. If you read his footnotes you will become fascinated in the connections made through history between people, languages,innovation, scientific theories, etc. This book is a worthwhile read.
Rating:
Summary: This book is wonderful
Review: This book is wonderful. A natural curiosity and patience with the reading will help. The reader should not try to "speed read" as with a thriller in order to enjoy the storytelling and education. This book is not for everyone, some of my friends have called this book "boring", but if you have a natural curiosity and appreciation for both sciences and history you will enjoy this book-- with patience you will savor this book rather than be bored. Who would have thought the explosion could be heard 3000 miles away? Simon Winchester has an eye for detail, and by inserting his real-life experiences and descriptions into the storyline he adds a certain poignancy and whimsy-like how his field work in Iceland helped prove (in an admittedly extremely small part) plate tectonic theory while discussing eating worm and lice-ridden bear meat, or his description in visiting the island of Krakatoa recently. (I have to admit his description of his boat captain and crew swigging Bintangs caught me off guard and I wonder if it was an exaggeration-I lived there for several years and I never saw Indonesians drinking, and Bintang is very expensive for the locals). One huge problem, especially for someone who wrote a book on maps: there are many many references to cities that are not shown on maps, and he uses "old city" names for cities that even if you get out a recent map you cannot understand where he is talking about. This is a HUGE problem and I hope if this book is republished several decent maps are included. This can be allayed a little by using a guide to Indonesia, but referring to another book should not be needed and is frankly disappointing. This is especially frustrating when a city cannot be found with a current map because Mr. Winchester uses the old city name rather than the current name. Several decent maps with city names (and the old/new version in parenthesis) would make this a five star book. Other than this problem, which is frustrating, the book is fantastic and quite applicable to today. Some of the comments about the Muslim reaction to the disaster and their guidance from Saudi Arabia are eerily familiar to today's world.
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