Magnum Leap for Mammalian Evolutionary HistoryEVOLUTION OF TERTIARY MAMMALS OF NORTH AMERICA. VOLUME 2: SMALL MAMMALS, XENARTHRANS, AND MARINE MAMMALS. Edited by Christine M. Janis, Gregg F. Gunnell, and Mark D. Uhen. New York: Cambridge University Press. 2008. 795 pp., $300.00 (cloth).

摘要

In every science, a few books come along each decade that set the stage for future research to leverage a new beginning. Evolution of Tertiary Mammals. Volume 2: Small Mammals, Xenarthrans, and Marine Mammals, edited by Christine Janis, Gregg Gunnell,and Mark Uhen, is such a book. Following on the standard format of the first volume of this series, edited in 1998 by Janis, Kathleen Scott, and Louis Jacobs, on the terrestrial carnivores, ungulates, and ungulate-like mammals, Volume 2 now completes the series. These two volumes, along with the monumental work by K. D. Rose (2006), The Beginning of the Age of Mammals, provide a comprehensive and nearly complete key reference source for the Tertiary mammals of North America that is not available for any other continent.