Megalith: Studies in Stone (Wooden Books)

Tapping into our continued fascination with Neolithic stone structures, Megalith is a compilation of several smaller books on the topic, including the books Stone Circles, Stonehenge, and others. Compiled in this way, you not only have a wonderful collection aggregated in one beautiful, hardcover (and giftable!) volume, but you have a lovely sequence of writings that hints at the scope of what we know about Megaliths so far. The first book or chapter walks readers through several important megalithic sites, mostly in the United Kingdom, and exposes amazing insight on geometries and planning. Then there are specific chapters on the important sites of Carnac, Stonehenge, Avebury, and others. Each chapter becomes almost an extended essay, although the beauty of this book really lies in the lovely reproductions of drawings of these sites, many of them from drawings made hundreds of years ago, and many of sites that no longer exist. These drawings are romantic and evocative, truly capturing the mystery one feels when encountering these stones for the first time. Many readers will also be intrigued by the reproductions of the rock art found carved into these stones; it is another inscrutable clue to the ingenuity of peoples who built these monuments so long ago.