You can’t dig a tunnel through the earth to Australia, but what if you could dig a tunnel through the history of the Earth from today to the Big Bang?

That’s the idea behind this beautifully illustrated exploration of the story of the planet for eight-year-olds and above. Travelling backwards in time, we stop off at various points along the way to take soundings. Since the idea is based on archaeology, our first stop is Pompeii; we then leap around geographically, via ancient China and early Egypt to the Ice Age in northern Europe, before heading off to the Age of the Dinosaurs and the emergence of life from the seas and before that to the formation of the earth.

There’s a picture timeline to fill in the gaps - the Victorians, the Greeks, and so on - and then you fold out the big pictures. The pictures are vivid and full of detail and the labels are unobtrusive but give lots of useful information. This is a wonderful celebration of the varied story of the Earth, and an absorbing and fascinating journey which will grace any school library. SL