I've had an interest in the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-1812 since I first learned about them in Tennessee history class in 7th grade. The earthquakes formed Reelfoot Lake, the only natural lake in Tennessee. This book is a nice introduction to the earthquakes, earthquake preparedness, and New Madrid's local history. The book also covers the earthquake scare of the fall of 1990, when the media hyped a prediction that the New Madrid fault would experience a major earthquake in December of that year. There were some in Knoxville who expected that the predicted quake would affect our area. They were buying earthquake insurance and stocking up on disaster supplies. Even though the quake didn't happen as predicted, it did raise the level of preparedness for such a disaster. The book is basically a literature review. It isn't a definitive account of the earthquakes, but it will point readers in that direction. It will take a little extra effort to locate the sources Bagnall cites in her bibliography since it is organized alphabetically by title rather than by author. ( )