Reviews: Antarctic Map Folio Series. Folio 7: Glaciers of the Antarctic; Folio 8: Climatology of the Surface Environment

The reviewer finds the volume’s brief text adequate and discusses its treatment of Antarctic surface temperatures, winds, blowing snow, and cloud cover. The choice of March, June, September, and December to represent the seasons is questioned because atmospheric lag makes April, July, October, and January more appropriate; the ocean-temperature maps are also weakened by sparse Antarctic data, and the use of Celsius in one plate but Fahrenheit in others is criticized. The reviewer considers the blowing-snow map inaccurate, particularly its figures for Halley Bay and the discrepancy between U.S. and non-U.S. stations, while acknowledging that meteorological coding makes reliable drift-snow data difficult to extract. Despite regretting the lack of fuller information about the source data and a bibliography, the reviewer concludes that—apart from the blowing-snow plate—the compilers handled a difficult task fairly well and produced a reasonably priced, convenient English-language reference.