'Glorious . . . anecdote and information accumulate with marvellous abundance and a passionate sense of the fascination of jewels . . . a wonderfully generous gift' - John de Falbe, Spectator In this scintillating audiobook, journalist Victoria Finlay embarks on her own globe-circling search for the real stories behind some of the gems we prize most. Throughout history, precious stones have inspired passions and poetry, quests and curses, sacred writings and unsacred actions. Blending adventure travel, geology, exciting new ...
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'Glorious . . . anecdote and information accumulate with marvellous abundance and a passionate sense of the fascination of jewels . . . a wonderfully generous gift' - John de Falbe, Spectator In this scintillating audiobook, journalist Victoria Finlay embarks on her own globe-circling search for the real stories behind some of the gems we prize most. Throughout history, precious stones have inspired passions and poetry, quests and curses, sacred writings and unsacred actions. Blending adventure travel, geology, exciting new research, and her own irresistible charm, Finlay has fashioned a treasure hunt for some of the most valuable, glamorous, and mysterious substances on earth. With the same intense curiosity and narrative flair she displayed in her widely-praised book Colour: Travels Through the Paintbox, Finlay journeys from the underground opal churches of outback Australia to the once pearl-rich rivers of Scotland; from the peridot mines on an Apache reservation in Arizona to the remote ruby mines in the mountains of northern Burma. She risks confronting scorpions to crawl through Cleopatra's long-deserted emerald mines, tries her hand at gem cutting in the dusty Sri Lankan city where Marco Polo bartered for sapphires, and investigates a rumour that fifty years ago most of the world's amber was mined by prisoners in a Soviet gulag. Jewels is a unique and often exhilarating voyage through history, across cultures, deep into the earth's mantle, and up to the glittering heights of fame, power, and wealth. From the fabled curse of the Hope Diamond, to the disturbing truths about how pearls are cultured, to the peasants who were once executed for carrying amber to the centuries-old quest by magicians and scientists to make a perfect diamond, Jewels tells dazzling stories with a wonderment and brilliance truly worthy of its subjects. 'A fascinating and exhaustive travelogue . . . a prism through which the spectrum of history, geography and the sciences is refracted' - Anna Swan, Times Literary Supplement
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Very good. Connecting readers with great books since 1972! Used books may not include companion materials, and may have some shelf wear or limited writing. We ship orders daily and Customer Service is our top priority!
This book contains a lot of information that I did not know. This book was a slower read as the information did not flow as easily as that in Finlay's book, Color.
I won't likely read any more work of hers.
Matthew
Nov 26, 2007
Entertaining and informative
Few writers can make nonfiction as entertaining as Victoria Finlay. This book has one chapter on each of ten of the most famous and valuable gemstones throughout history: from amber and pearl to ruby and diamond. (In trying to pick a a way to order the chapters, Finlay chose to order them by hardness). Each chapter contains a potpourri of entertaining information on the formation of the gems, their place in history, and how they are brought from their source to the people who use them. Finlay's stories are entertaining and her facts well-researched and clearly presented. One of the most entertaining non-fiction books I have ever read.
