I decided to list here some books about sand or related somehow with sand, beaches, deserts etc. For general issues and easy reading I would highly recommend the book of Michael Welland: Sand – The never ending story. Dr. Gary Greenberg has also some nice photos in his book: A grain of sand: nature’s secret wonder.
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O.H. Pilkey, W.J. Neal, J.T. Kelley, and A.G. Cooper The World’s Beaches. A Global Guide to the Science of the Shorelines 302 pages ISBN-13: 978-0520268722University of California Press; 1 edition (July 26, 2011)Book description at Amazon.com: “Take this book to the beach; it will open up a whole new world. Illustrated throughout with color photographs, maps, and graphics, it explores one of the planet’s most dynamic environments–from tourist beaches to Arctic beaches strewn with ice chunks to steaming hot tropical shores.[...]” |
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Jaques Ayer, Marco Bonifazi, Jacques Lapaire Le sable, secrets et beautés d’un monde minéral (book in French) 127 pages ISBN: 2940041105 [description in French, I did not buy the book yet since it was difficult to find it in libraries] |
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Josie Iselin Beach stones 144 pages ISBN-13: 978-0810955332“ From the sculpted limestone on a beach in Scotland that was formed 250 million years ago in a tropical sea, to a vein in a pebble from Maine showing that it was created 400 million years ago during the birth of a great mountain range, this book shows the incredible stories of such stones.” |
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Michael Welland Sand – The never – ending story 360 pages ISBN-13: 978-0520254374“ From individual grains to desert dunes, from the bottom of the sea to the landscapes of Mars, and from billions of years in the past to the future, this is the extraordinary story of one of nature’s humblest, most powerful, and most ubiquitous materials. Told by a geologist with a novelist’s sense of language and narrative, “Sand” examines the science – sand forensics, the physics of granular materials [...]” |
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Raymond Siever Sand 240 pages ISBN: 0-7167-5021-X In the first chapters the author explains various properties of sand such as the shape of its grains and its chemical-mineral composition. The sand’s origin is further unveiled by explanations about different processes (weathering, decay of igneous rocks etc). A special part is dedicated to sandstones, the author describing their formation over the years in deserts, on beaches or along rivers. |
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Gary Greenberg A grain of sand: nature’s secret wonder 112 pages ISBN-13: 978-0760331989″ To some, all sand looks alike – countless grains is a vast expanse of beach. But, if you look much closer, the view will never be the same! Employing the amazing photomicrography techniques he developed, Greenberg invites readers to discover the strange and wonderful world that each grain of sand contains: once magnified a hundred times it become a landscape of its own [...]” |
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Elizabeth Agate, Alan Brooks Sand Dunes: A Practical Handbook 109 pages ISBN-13: 978-0946752324 Book content: 1.A look at sand dunes |
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A.E. Adams, W.S. MacKenzie, C. Guilford Atlas of Sedimentary Rocks Under the Microscope 104 pages ISBN-13: 978-0470274767″ This color atlas serves as a lab handbook to assist students and researchers in the study of sedimentary rocks. Photographs of all the major components and sedimentary rocks in their section are included, and detailed appendixes describe important lab procedures, such as the making of sections and acetate peel.” |
