The Dinosaur Artist

Starred review from July 2, 2018
New Yorker staff writer Williams uses the story of fossil enthusiast Eric Prokopi to illuminate the murky world of modern fossil hunting in this fascinating account. The story begins with Eric’s discovery, around age five, of a fossilized shark tooth off the coast of Florida, which sparked a lifelong fascination with prehistoric life. Eric’s passion led him to take a cataloguing position with the Florida Museum of Natural History, and later to teach himself how to prepare fossils for exhibition. Williams carries this tale through Eric’s starting a business to sell his acquisitions, to his prosecution in 2012 by the federal government for smuggling into the U.S. and auctioning off Tarbosaurus bones deemed the rightful property of Mongolia, where they were found. Williams provides just the right amount of context, from the long-standing tensions between paleontologists and commercial fossil dealers, to Mongolia’s hardscrabble history since the days of Genghis Khan. To this foundation of solid research, she adds a vivid storytelling style. The combination results in a triumphant book that will appeal to a wide audience.

August 1, 2018

Accomplished New Yorker writer Williams brings her journalistic hand to the intriguing world of for-profit fossil trade, highlighting the people who find, prepare, and auction fabulous works of prehistory, including large dinosaurs and Ice Age mammals. The narrative focuses on the life of Eric Prokopi, a fossil prodigy who has a natural gift at finding and reconstituting prehistoric creatures. Prokopi's gift led him to selling his work at high-stakes and high-profit fossil auctions. His procurement of a Mongolian Tyrannosaurus bataar became the grounds for an international dispute over the legal ownership of natural history resources. Williams skillfully navigates this unique nexus of various fields, including paleontology, law, and international politics, leading readers through a wild topography of deep prehistory and modern black markets. Various issues are raised, including disputes between private fossil collectors and academic paleontologists; the market value of a dinosaur skeleton vs. its scientific value; and the proper enforcement of antiquities' laws. VERDICT Prokopi's case is a fascinating example of the pull of prehistoric fossils and the power of law. Nature enthusiasts, scientists, and politics buffs will sink their teeth into this intriguing account.--Jeffrey Meyer, Mt. Pleasant P.L., IA

Copyright 2018 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 1, 2018
An intriguing story of dinosaur smuggling.New Yorker staff writer and National Magazine Award winner Williams debuts with an account of a 38-year-old American fossil hunter who, in 2012, sold the reassembled bones of a 24-foot-long T. bataar from Mongolia at auction in New York. The illicit $1 million sale--the skeleton was returned to Mongolia--marked the downfall of Eric Prokopi, a fossil enthusiast who had peddled specimens to museums and collectors for years. In this densely detailed, wide-ranging narrative, the author uses the taciturn and constantly cash-short Prokopi's adventures in bone-hunting as a window on the world of fossil collecting. Dinosaurs roamed the Earth for 165 million years, but it was only recently, in 1994, that the first natural history auction occurred, creating heightened interest among wealthy buyers and providing cover for the sale of illegal fossils and forgeries. Williams delves into all aspects of the fossil business, from explorations in the Gobi Desert to Tucson's innumerable trade shows to natural history "field clubs" to the frequent conflicts between scientists and commercial dealers. She describes a colorful array of paleontologists, tradesmen, and hobbyists, including pipe insulator Frank Garcia, who unearthed the richest Pleistocene fossil bed in North America, and the celebrated Indiana Jones-like explorer-zoologist Roy Chapman Andrews, who became a 1920s hero after discovering dinosaur eggs. The flow of her story of science and crime is sometimes interrupted--rather than enhanced--by lengthy descriptions of people and events. Passages about Prokopi's dribbling wine down his shirt at an auction preview and his wife's penchant for house-flipping convey little beyond the need for editing. At other times, the author's deep reporting yields memorable passages on desert car caravans and the assembly of dinosaur skeletons. She brings to life an unlikely mix of museum officials and bone salesmen as well as the single-minded pursuit of "income and adventure" that drove her smuggler-protagonist to Mongolia in the service of paleontology and profit.Good fun for fossil freaks.

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August 1, 2018
Williams tells the unbelievably complex story of how United States of America v. One Tyrannosaurus Bataar Skeleton, an unprecedented decision, affected museums, science, law, and collecting. At the heart of the case is Eric Prokopi, a driven, humble paleontology enthusiast whose life's passion is finding, prepping, and selling fossils. To monetize the travel, equipment, and storage required of a commercial fossil hunter, Eric and his wife flip properties and juggle debt, seeking buried treasure that can land them in the black. Soon, Eric is negotiating with the shady Tuvshin for T. bataar, Mongolia's T. rex cousin. Along the road to Eric's sentence as a dinosaur smuggler, Williams detours into decades of scientific expeditions and Mongolia's complicated political history. Although the dinosaur is undoubtedly in the details, as it were, the biographies of minor characters occasionally distract from the larger narrative. Especially fascinating, however, are the intertwined roles of paleontologists, collectors, and commercial hunters?all who covet fossils and feel a claim to natural history. In the spirit of The Feather Thief (2018), Williams' illuminating chronicle questions who has a right to nature.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)