In Seach of Sea Dragons - Matthew Myerscough ****

It's common advice to would-be authors of narrative non-fiction to open with something dramatic - Matthew Myerscough certainly does this with the story of his being trapped under an avalanche on Snowdon (while his girlfriend, also carried away remains on top of the snow unhurt). It certainly is dramatic, but seemed entirely disconnected from the reason I got the book, which was to read about fossil collecting. 

Luckily, though, in the second chapter we get into a more conventional 'how I got interested in fossils as a boy'. Having recently reviewed Patrick Moore's autobiography and noting that astronomy was one of the few sciences where amateurs can still make a contribution, it came to mind that palaeontology is another - Myerscough is a civil engineer by trade, but just as amateur astronomers can find new details in the skies, so amateur fossil hunters have been searching for these relics for centuries. When I give talks in junior schools, the two topics that guarantee a good response are space and dinosaurs - it's a happy coincidence they correspond to the potential for amateur input.

After spending many a happy holiday hunting fossils with his father, there was a near 20 year gap leading up to Myerscough's avalanche incident. We then get a number of chapters each based on a (mostly) Welsh location where Myerscough had gone hunting. Sometimes it's really just about the experience of being on the beach in all conditions, sometimes highlighting finds small and large. Each location has a map, but unfortunately the background colouring is so dark they are almost impossible to read.

In some ways fossil hunting has similarities with two much derided hobbies: metal detecting and train spotting. A lot of the time very little of interest happens, and outside the big finds, it can be hard for the non-enthusiast to share the excitement of discovering a fossilised bit of bone: there is a danger when writing about such activities that a lot of what goes on can feel very samey. Myerscough provides three sets of good colour plates, many of which feel a little 'okay, if you say so', but just occasionally something really jumps out at the reader. It's not an easy subject to keep the non-enthusiast engaged with, but on the whole Myerscough manages it.

I'm not a great reader of nature books, so not an ideal audience for the general 'joy of being out in nature' memoir. Don't get me wrong - I love being out in nature myself, but I just don't find it a particularly engaging read: I need some science or history to get my teeth into. Luckily Myerscough does give us a fair amount of detail around the various periods that have left fossils around Wales, and while I admit to skipping over a few pages where it all got a bit too 'hello clouds' or 'here was another interesting rock', I found it an enjoyable read.

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Review by Brian Clegg - See all Brian's online articles or subscribe to a weekly email free here