An astonishing transformation over the last 20,000 years has seen our
planet changed from a frigid wasteland into the temperate world within
which our civilization has grown and thrived. This dynamic episode in
our planet's history, right at the close of the Ice Age, saw not only a
huge temperature hike but also the Earth's crust bouncing and bending in
response to the melting of the great ice sheets and the filling of the
ocean basins--dramatic geophysical events that triggered earthquakes,
spawned tsunamis, and provoked a series of eruptions from the world's
volcanoes. In Waking the Giant, Bill McGuire argues that now that
human activities are driving climate change as rapidly as anything seen
in post-glacial times, the sleeping giant beneath our feet is stirring
once again. When and if it finally wakes, we should all be afraid--very
afraid. Could we be leaving our children not only a far hotter world,
but a more geologically unstable one too?