What do readers think of The Heat Will Kill You First by Jeff Goodell? Write your own review.

Stephen King, move over. This book is far more frightening than anything you could write. It's not only a dire warning for the future, but also for today. I read this book during a newsworthy, week-long heat wave, which just emphasized even more the horror of what we are already facing and will be facing in the not-so-distant future.

The heat waves we are experiencing now are not just typical summer weather. They are caused by human beings and the choices we make and have made for the past 200 years. We are doing this to ourselves.

Prodigiously researched and masterfully written by Jeff Goodell, this book explains in basic and often gruesome terms what it means when our planet gets hotter…and hotter…and hotter. While much of the text is scientific, it is always presented in ways everyone can understand. The power of this book is not only in the scientific facts and figures and interviews and opinions of climate experts, but also the personal stories of people who have been tragically affected by intense heat for which they were not prepared.

We're not talking about uncomfortable heat. We're talking about heat that can kill you—and already is killing people every year from Phoenix to Paris and many, many places in between. In 2019, nearly a half-million people died of extreme heat, which is more than all other natural disasters combined. We're talking about heat that melts the asphalt on highways and bends the steel of railroad tracks.

To research this book, author Jeff Goodell traveled around the world, including the Arctic and Antarctica, as well as the hottest cities in Europe and the United States. He also interviewed climate scientists and experts, asking hard questions and gamely deciphering even the most complex answers.

Some of the topics covered in this book include:
• Find out why most life on Earth, including humans, must live in a Goldilocks Zone of temperature and why that Goldilocks Zone is being threatened now.

• We know exactly why the Earth is warming up: the burning of fossil fuels that releases CO2 into the atmosphere. Even if all fossil fuel production globally was stopped this minute, it wouldn't lead to cooler temperatures. All it would do is stop the temps from rising more. Find out some innovative (perhaps crazy??) ideas that might just help.

• Learn how heat-driven chaos exploits the poor and minorities more than anyone else. After all, if you have money, you can turn up the air conditioner; if you're poor, you probably don't even have an air conditioner.

• Find out why climate change is more strongly seen in heat waves than any other weather event. How hot can it get? Could Phoenix, which has seen temperatures as high as 122 degrees, hit 135 degrees or 140 degrees? What are the limits? And how many people will die when those high temperatures become a reality?

• Learn why the largest single global change that threatens food security is high temperatures. In addition, find out the occupations that are most at risk for heat exposure, including construction and farming, and what happens to the human body that toils under these conditions. Note this: In the United States, there are no federal regulations related to heat exposure for workers—inside or outside.

• Find out what is happening in Antarctica and the Arctic and the warnings we should heed from the melting ice. It's not only rising sea levels, but also a new risk for diseases that can spread worldwide.

While this book is fascinating and so very important, it can also feel a bit overwhelming simply because it is so terrifying. After all, extreme heat kills. It's a force for extinction of all life on Earth. Even so, the book should be required reading for everyone, especially our political leaders at the state and federal levels who make the decisions and laws that can help.

And P.S.: Take a minute or two to ponder the deeper and most important meaning of the title of this book.