A long, overly detailed book that tries to make an interesting point but is bogged down in too many details and asides. The main point of the book, to save you the time of reading it, is that wood is the most important material to ever exist. There would be no Stone Age, Bronze Age or Iron Age without the utility of wood. I wouldn’t recommend this book as it is too detailed to make it enjoyable.

I appreciate the publisher allowing me to read this book. This is a fascinating read on the history of wood. Highly recommend.

I'm a sucker for a single-item "history of" books. The best books of this nature, I've found, are those that are telling a *story* of the history versus those that are simply a history. Books like Salt (Mark Kulansky) or Longitude (Dava Sobel) are terrific examples of the narrative nonfiction that will pull the reader in to the world of the subject, riding along like a time traveler following a single strand of history.

There were instances where I felt that same tug from The Age of Wood, but unfortunately, I found them to be rare. The book is still quite interesting, chasing down the use of wood over the centuries and to the current day, assuming you're interested in a rather dry overall tone.

Those with an acute interest in wood, or people just looking to learn something on the subject will likely be more willing to get through an almost textbook-like reading than the casual reader, and it's worth it, in my opinion. It's relatively short, which brought to my mind the question of whether the storytelling was not enough to push it to a longer page count and more relaxed narrative, or whether the publisher or author decided about 300 pages was all they were willing to venture into the subject. Either way, the book suffers for it.

There are numerous discussions of things built with wood versus metal, and a somewhat questionable (to me) passage about Amazonian deforestation, and into the modern time period, quite a bit of page count given over to metal - not what I was here for.

Overall, it isn't terrible, but it isn't great, for a book about a resource indispensable to humans ancient and modern, which I'd think is a fascinating topic.

Three out of five stars.

Thanks to Scribner and NetGalley for the review copy.

The strongest part of this book was the beginning. I really enjoyed the fist couple chapters and was happy that Ennos really did start at the beginning of time when discussing the uses of wood. For some reason, I was expecting this book to focus just on the history of wood, but there was quite a bit of science mixed in, which I liked.

The book slowly went downhill for me though. I think metals were focused on too much. I get that wood is used when melting metals down, but I didn’t need a lengthy discussion of everything that metal was then used for. And this discussion happens several times as Ennos moves through time and more metals are discovered.

The deforestation discussion was also really disappointing. The way that it’s written makes it seem like Ennos believes that deforestation is a myth. Which it is not. But really the only thing that Ennos discusses in relation to deforestation is soil erosion, but that is only one of many effects from deforestation.

While this book isn’t very long, just over 300 pages, I think most people will struggle to finish it. It’s not an exciting read, which I think is expected, but I think this really is written for a niche market.

I’m a sucker for books marketed as “the complete history of (some noun that is completely overlooked in history but probably very important)”, as are many. Mark Kurlansky has made a career out of it with Salt, Milk!, and Cod. I was excited for but ultimately disappointed with Timothy Winegard’s The Mosquito. But I loved Judith Flanders’ history of alphabetical order, A Place for Everything (I even interviewed her about it), and I am looking forward to reading Flanders’ 2017 history of Christmas as well. What I didn’t expect was to be completely enthralled with a new addition to the microhistory genre, Roland Ennos’ The Age of Wood.
Ennos argues that through all of human history: the “stone age”, “bronze age”, and “iron age”, our most useful material was always wood. It even has a large effect on society today, despite industrialization pushing it more towards the periphery. Thus, most of human history could be called “The Age of Wood”. He tells a story in the introduction about Britain’s need for trees tall enough and wide enough to serve as masts for their ships. In Britain’s American colonies, Ennos writes:
White pine trees above twenty-four inches in trunk diameter were marked with three strokes of a hatchet in the shape of an upward-pointing arrow and were deemed to be crown property. Unfortunately, this policy soon proved to be wildly unpopular and totally unenforceable. Colonists continued to fell the huge trees and cut them into boards twenty-three inches wide or less, to dispose of the evidence. Indeed wide floorboards became highly fashionable, as a mark of an independent spirit.
As a matter of fact, the unenforceable British laws about pine trees precipitated the Pine Tree Riot, which began when “sawmill owners from Weare, New Hampshire, refused to pay a fine for sawing up large white pines”. Ennos asserts that the Pine Tree Riot “became a major inspiration for the much more famous Boston Tea Party in December 1773.” A little-known riot over wood regulations was a significant step on the road to American independence.

It’s not hard to think of wood as being so significant in the 1600s and 1700s, however. It is much more difficult to see its properties as being important today, save for making paper and building the occasional fire for fun. Ennos argues, however, that there are many contemporary uses for wood because of its unique properties. When stone buildings took over the architecture of Europe and Central Asia, wood was still used in China and Japan because of its structural properties. The Forbidden City in Beijing is built of wood, though it could easily have been made of stone. They also build all the joints at right-angles to each other instead of triangulated beams like Western architecture. Why?
Recent research by Chinese engineers shows that the flexible design of the buildings and the shock-absorbing dougong joints protect them from damage. As an earthquake hits, and the ground moves around, the pillars sway, while the inertia of the heavy roof keeps it still and the energy is absorbed within the dougong joints. Tests on models have shown that these buildings can withstand shocks that reach over 10 on the Richter scale, more powerful than any earthquake yet recorded. It’s no surprise then that the Forbidden City has stood for six hundred years.
It is details like these that separate Ennos’ The Age of Wood from other hypothetical versions of this history. While scientific specificities fly over my head sometimes, the general gist of the information leaves the impression that there is a lot of expertise in this work that is put to great use. Every age of human history is impacted by wood, yet Ennos is not afraid to put to death any myths that have arisen concerning its history. As a bonus, it’s a manageable 336 pages. If a broad view of history interests you, yet you are also enthralled with how specific properties of one natural material have dramatic effects on that history, The Age of Wood is where you want to abide, if even for a short time.
I received a review copy of The Age of Wood courtesy of Scribner and NetGalley, but my opinions are my own.

Mr. Ennos, I Read This Book On A Kindle. ;) This was a fascinating and at times novel look at how wood - not stone or metals - has allowed and even encouraged human biological and civilizational evolution. Written by a British academic-engineer, this book looks to the bioengineering of woods of various forms and how the material's strengths and versatilities have allowed so much human progress, from eras before homo sapien sapien appeared through the future of the species. While the text does have a couple of weaknesses - he assumes that the book will be read on paper and there is a distinct lack of bibliography, at least in this advanced review copy I read - overall the book really is an amazing look at an oft-overlooked feature of human history. Very much recommended.

The Age of Wood was reviewed and featured as a "ray of hope" on a recent episode of the Beacon podcast: https://mainebeacon.com/in-debate-trumps-proudest-accomplishment-is-thanks-to-sen-collins/

Maybe I overestimated my interest in wood? No, I don’t think so. I mean, obviously I’m not as passionate about the subject as the author, I love very few things as much as he loves wood, but nevertheless I was completely committed to learning all about it. Plus I like object histories or whatever you call it when history is framed and told from a specific perspective involving a specific thing. Usually those are some of my favorite historical nonfiction reads. This one, though, didn’t quite work for me. Disappointing, really, especially since I’m the first person reviewing this book, ideally this ought to have been a more encouraging review. I mean, objectively, this was very, very informative. I learned a lot about wood. Significance of wood throughout history often gets underestimated, after all for as practical as it has been throughout the centuries, there’s never been a wood age the way there’s been a stone age, bronze age, iron age, etc. Metals in general are huge in age classifications. Wood got kinda shafted by history, if you think about, though first weapons, fires, abodes, etc. were all built with wood. Books were printed with it. All major major things, crucial to developing of civilization as we know it. So the author decided to set the thing to rights and make an Age of Wood, the book. Admirable, for sure. But also in forest lingo, dense, very dense, and in plain lingo…pretty textbooky. Tons of information and the author’s passion and erudition for the subject very transparent and drives the book diligently, but it doesn’t really engage as a narrative. Great facts on deforestation, different types of trees, clever historical observations, even a fascinating original theory on the Rapa Nui people, whose fate has long been blamed on unsound tree harvesting practices. All the good things. But as a reading experience the book was something of an effort to get through, which it absolutely shouldn’t have been given the great concept and the relatively short page count. It certainly tried my mental vigor and academic discipline. I’m glad to have learned new things, as always. Just wish it was a more enjoyable experience. I don’t mean to discourage readership of this book, just maybe prepare the readers going in. This was a major publisher book that read more like a university press one. So now that you know, proceed at will, arboreal delights await. Thanks Netgalley.