Tunguska

‘In this wonderful and fascinating book, Andy Bruno unravels the mysteries and marvels of the awe-inspiring extraterrestrial event that rocked Siberia’s Tunguska region in 1908; an event we have been struggling to grasp for more than a century. Brimming with engaging prose and insightful analysis, Tunguska is at once a scientific detective story, an exploration of the cultural meanings of the cosmos and catastrophe, and a deep dive into the environmental and scientific history of the Soviet Union and beyond.’ Nicholas Breyfogle, Ohio State University

‘Professor Bruno explores the century-long quest to learn more about the vast, mysterious Tunguska fire in remote Siberia. As citizen-scientists and research teams pondered the cause of the blast, they stumbled toward an awareness of the vulnerabilities that accompany human habitation on earth. Whether it be an invasion from outer space, a catastrophic collision of earth with a meteor, the decimation of the planet from nuclear war, or the cascades of extinction accompanying a warming earth, Dr. Bruno uses the Tunguska explosion to meditate on how human societies have come to understand the mortality of not just the human species, but earth itself.’ Kate Brown, author of Manual for Survival

‘Impeccably researched and engagingly written, Tunguska is the story of a mystery-what was this event that shook people in their Siberian beds in 1908?-but also a history of how mysteries come to be. Combining environmental history and histories of science, Bruno gives us a rich portrait of an event and its afterlives.’ Bathsheba Demuth, Brown University