Well, Mr Wright, I'll admit it, you had me... you collected superb
agricultural data, and winningly merried it with 3rd party prose;
your chapters were bursting with life and crime, wit and hyperbole,
meaning and pettyness... but in the end, you're just a wing-nut
!
It's a good thing it's not a long book, because the conclusion
(ripe with useless, motherly sentiments we've all heard before) is
so benign you'll (hopefully) forget there even was one in minutes,
leaving you with a lasting rememberance of the finer points before
it. Right until about half-way through the final chapter, the
author pretty much nails every civilisations' tragic flaw, from
their emergence to their build-up, to the final coup-de grace. It's
a succinct, exhaustively researched (though lacking in primary
sources), often entertaining history book, covering everyone's
favourites: the Mayans, the Inca, the Romans, Mesopotamia, Egypt,
America, Canada...
Despite the ending, it's still a worthwhile read, but I wouldn't
pay full price for it...