This was an entertaining and informative read. I found myself sharing what I learned from this book with those around me. I recommend it to fans of good and highly readable non-fiction.

A fun, quick read piece of narrative nonfiction that brings to life the race to recover the first T. rex.

If you love narrative nonfiction about the Bone Wars, this is a fun next step chronicling events that happened afterward and the quest to bring home a T. rex to the Natural History Museum in New York.

The book is, by extension, a history of the early days of the museum as well, in addition to the accounts of how it got its now famous T. rex.

This is a history book rather than a science book, focused more on the collection of specimens, the battle to get to them first, and museum and expedition financing. There’s some explanation of the paleontology involved as well, but the primary focus is on human interest and interaction with the bones rather than the bones themselves.

This reads well for nonfiction, fast paced and intriguing, and correctly structured for narrative format. Though the personalities involved in the race for Rex aren’t exactly likable for the most part, they’re certainly interesting.

In truth this little work brings to light the story of a fascinating individual (told almost in an old west breezy "tall tale" type of style) and his historic contribution to a whole new realm of scientific exploration, however, quite of bit of patience is asked of the reader as they sift and chip through tangents of background subjects and background chaff that leaves the question if the author truly wanted to tell the story of Barnum Brown and the discovery of the infamous Tyrannosaurus rex or create something else entirely? If anything this book set me off on a journey to learn more.

*Many thanks to W.W. Norton & Company and NetGalley for early access to this title in exchange for an honest review.

Before the Tyrannosaurus rex stomped onto screens, its fossilized remains were one of the most prized finds of the early 20th century. Early fossil hunters became bitter rivals in the race to discover more bones, and each new remnant changed our understanding of Earth’s history. Randall keenly captures the characters and cultural shift that brought the T. rex roaring onto the world’s stage with this enlightening read.

Visiting the American Museum of Natural History, you might not think that dramatic human history influenced one of the most iconic artifacts in American museums, the T. Rex fossil. Randall explores the cast of characters that span from prehistoric North America to the present-day that shaped our understanding of dinosaurs and human evolution as a result. For readers who enjoy museum studies and other books about the controversy of human evolution such as "Summer for the Gods" by Edward J. Larson

This book was an absolutely fascinating read and I would highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in paleontology or the history of museums.

As someone who has gone to the American Museum of Natural History countless times, it was a fascinating read about the early days of its history, and its dinosaur collection. The troubling history of museums - especially those in America - are generally not well known to those outside of the field (and quite frankly to a lot of those within it as well) - so it's especially vital that books like these shed at least a little light on some of the roots of museums' past. What curators and researchers decide to put in museums do not exist within a cultural vacuum, and The Monster's Bones does a fairly good job at showing that this past was not just sunshine and daisies.

Overall, it was a really great read and thank you so much to Netgalley and the publisher for the e-ARC.

I enjoyed this! I've always been a big Jurassic Park fan, so this was an excellent non-fic read. While the story does drift back and forth chronologically at the beginning, which confused me at times, the narrative had a nice flow. The research was spot on, peppered with conversational observations that at times made me laugh out loud. It's very well-placed and very unpretentious for a book about such a scientific topic. Randall did an excellent job of humanizing all of the cast, making them more than a biography blurb and really explaining how they got into the positions and circumstances that led to the first T. Rex skeleton.

I listened to the audiobook, too, and the voice was very nice. I especially liked the subtle changes when quoting different people.

A fascinating educational read, but there were times I cringed when the author was describing the blatant racist ideology of the beginnings of the American Museum of Natural History. Still a fascinating read about the “Wild West “ mentality associated with early dinosaur digs and how that mentality has moved to online bidding for dinosaur bones.

As a child I was always a fan of dinosaurs and loved to see dinosaur bones and full skeletons at places such as the Field Museum. I currently live near Pittsburgh's Carnegie Museum, which along with the Field Museum and the American Museum, for which the book focuses on, feature heavily in this story. I also read this book while in the land of dinosaurs in Utah so I was excited to learn this story. The book does a great job of providing history and science along with a compelling underdog type story that I was not aware of. While the Field Museum may have the best and most complete T rex now, this book chronicles the first museum to have a T rex and the story of how it was found and brought there. The stories of early fossil digs and dinosaur discoveries were very interesting to someone who is really only aware of the state of these artifacts in museums in present day. The author also makes the historical characters feel real, which is always a hallmark of good non-fiction. This isn't a difficult non-fiction book to read either, making it a great summer read that will also teach you along the reading journey.

4 stars

Randall’s book argues that the discovery of the T. rex by Barnum Brown in 1900, and later display in the American Museum of National History under the direction of Henry Osborn, was the pivotal event that both secured the place of dinosaurs in pop culture and convinced the general public of the importance of dinosaur studies in our scientific understanding of the world. It does this by setting up the context of paleontology at the turn of the 20th century, relaying a biography of Barnum Brown as an excavator, and presenting a highlight reel of the T. rex’s cultural and media afterlives following its first museum display.

This is an excellent nonfiction book for laymen, providing relevant information about paleontological practice and dinosaur ontology only as necessary to understand the narrative of the T. rex’s discovery and importance to the burgeoning field of vertebrate paleontology. It reads like a cross between a biography and an adventure novel, peppered with interesting trivia about famous personages or fossils without feeling the need to show off all the research the author may have undertaken at the expense of a good story. At times the prose veers a little too flowery; there is one rather fantastical early passage describing the charismatic effect of Barnum Brown’s blue eyes that does not appear to be drawing from any historical texts. However, the overall effect is one of fun, informative readability.

What the book does especially well is to convince the reader of the importance of the T. rex to the layman’s perspective of dinosaurs and how they shape our perception of ourselves in the history of the world. Because previous huge fossil skeletons had largely been herbivorous, Randall convincingly argues, the discovery of the T. rex portrayed a rich and complex prehistoric ecosystem that had not previously been grasped by the public imagination. Furthermore, the fact that such a domineering monster had gone extinct, allowing for the rise of mammals and the human being, put human mortality into sharp relief.

I commend the book for not shying away from the ugly eugenicist history and agenda of Osborn, the American Museum of Natural History, and other early figures of vertebrate paleontology; however, it seems a glaring oversight that Barnum Brown’s views on eugenics and human racial ‘science’ is never mentioned. If there is no textual evidence of Brown’s opinions on that subject, it would be relevant to say that, rather than merely never addressing it while waxing poetic about Osborn’s white supremacist opinions.

An engaging, readable history of the paleontology surrounding the discovery of the celebrity Tyrannosaurus rex, this book reads as pop history that nonetheless gives the reader a new and illuminating perspective on a dinosaur that has become a household name, not only in its import to the science of life on earth but in the outsized impact it has had on our culture and understanding of ourselves.

The Monster’s Bones: The Discovery of T. Rex and How It Shook Our World by David K. Randall describes what it was really like to work as a paleontologist in the early days of extracting dinosaur bones from the earth. The author takes us on the many digs of Barnum Brown, the man who eventually discovered the bones of T. Rex. The isolation, logistical challenges, and just plain hard physical labor are made evident.

Unfortunately, the author goes off on so many tangents with too many that are unrelated to the topic of the book, that it can be frustrating by the time he circles back around to the original topic. The racism, eugenics, and professional rivalries during this time are also discussed and Randall makes his case that the discovery of T. Rex forced people to confront ideas about the birth of humanity.

This is a book for dedicated armchair paleontologists who don’t mind meandering off-course into historical and cultural detours before arriving at the destination.

The Monster's Bones
by David K. Randall
Pub Date: June 7, 2022
W.w. Norton
Thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the ARC of this book.
A gripping narrative of a fearless paleontologist, the founding of America’s most-loved museums, and the race to find the largest dinosaurs on record.
Reads like a novel. I liked it.
3 stars

A narrative history that uses accessible prose and humour to enliven a dusty topic (literally and figuratively). The Gilded Age 'Bone Wars' are a fascinating look at a young republic trying to establish its bona fides as a center of culture and natural history. The central 'characters' Henry Fairfield Osborn and Barnum Brown are fascinating in their vision and eccentricities. I thoroughly enjoyed the discussion of museum formation and debates in the curatorial community. My 40-year-old scholarly self and my 7-year-old, dinosaur crazed self read this account side by side, still fascinated by the enduring wonder and and mystery of T. Rex.