This was fascinating, but depressing as hell. Weisman imagines a world without humans, and goes into how long it would take for our structures to fail, for nature to regenerate, and what would be left in geologic time to show we were ever here.
Some parts were heart-wrenching and made me long to visit some of the places he discussed- the ancient forest on the Polish/Belorussian border known as the Belaveskaya Pushcha sounded especially amazing. Well, it all sounded amazing, but that bit really took my mind. It's the last untouched bit of primeval forest in Europe.
The numbers and consequences started to boggle after a bit- the endless damage, which seems almost irreparable, unless you look at it in terms of geologic time, where we become mere blips. Towards the end I was crying.
A beautiful, thoughtful, but thoroughly and seriously sad book.
This image is from Weismans site, it is "Warsaw without us".
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