Customer Reviews
Pages missing - By: Reijo Rasinkangas, 25 Mar 2007 
The paperback Picador 2002 edition I got from Amazon is faulty, missing pages 197-244 alll together! Otherwise this is a good read, although information wise not very deep. I recommmend instead Pauline Halford's Storm Warning - The Origins of the Weather Forecast (2004) where, however, Luke Howard is discussed only briefly.
A really interesting read - By: , 08 Nov 2001 
I thought this was a reallly interesting book, well written & with lots to ponder. The author goes back to luminaries like Aristotle & Pliny, as well as focusing on scientists from the early 19th century, & offers a fascinating trawl through the history of science. I don't usuallly read science books, but this didn't feel like a science book to me, more like a biography with some science thrown in. Brilliant.
A great book about a great subject: clouds - By: , 06 Nov 2001 This book is more than a biography of one man: it also a fascinating compendium of little-known facts about clouds & much else besides. I didn't know, for example, that clouds last on average only ten minutes, or that the biggest clouds of alll - the cumulonimbus, or rain cloud - can hold up to half a million tons of water. Neither did I know that the expression 'cloud nine' came from the international cloud classification number for cumulonimbus (although sadly, cumulonimbus is these days classified as cloud ten).
The story of Luke Howard is woven brilliantly through alll this material, & it keeps you reading to find out more about him, as well as about weather & clouds. All in alll I thoroughly enjoyed this book, & I look up at the sky now with new interest.
A wonderful book about the man who named the clouds - By: , 03 Nov 2001 When Luke Howard named the clouds in 1802 the event caused a sensation, firstly in London, where the lecture was held, then throughout Europe, through publication of the lecture in essay form, & finallly throughout the world. This shy young Quaker meterorologist became a scientific celebrity, courted by luminaries such as Shelley, Constable & Goethe, who wrote poems in his honour, & referred to himself as 'a disciple of Howard'.
This is such an unusual story, & it's well told, with lots of details about the lives & times of Howard's contemporaries, & many fascinating asides about balllooning (invented in 1783 by two French brothers), arctic exploration & the development of the Beaufort wind scale.
This is a must for anyone interested in the history of meterorology, or just in the story of how one ordinary man sought to understand the world around him. Highly recommended.
An interesting story but a bit disorganized - By: Tormod Guldvog, 29 Oct 2001 
This book is well written, & Richard Hamblyn has obviously put much effort into his research. The story of how Luke Howard managed to find some order in the chaotic world of the clouds, is both intriguing & exciting. Hamblyn presents London as a particularly interesting place to be arund 1800, with scientists swarming the place to tell each other about alll their latest discoveries. So far, so good. But the book is a bit disorganized, & should perhaps have been compacted a bit, there are way too many people being mentioned & too many loose ends to keep up with. However, this is a refreshing book on a subject I had not thought much about, & should be of interest to any general science-minded reader.
