Judith Schalansky has turned her lifelong interest in maps, atlases, and geography into a quick-read book about fifty of the remotest (and often most useless) islands on Earth. Dancing just this side of tongue-in-cheek, the author describes islands whose descendants can trace directly back to the HMS Bounty mutineers, islands whose only purpose is for radio communications, islands so impossible to land on that they were discovered but not occupied until the late 20th century, and islands with deep and complex mysteries that have yet to be solved. Don’t let the text fool you however, as all of it is impeccably researched. The story is accompanied by beautiful, full-color maps of each island, and statistical data about each island such as the land area and population. For the armchair traveler in all of us, this one goes quickly but is an excellent read. Recommendation: A great non-fiction read.
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