Book review A young climate activist from Uganda, Hilda Nakabuye, told political leaders at a recent UN Climate Conference: “You’ve been negotiating for the last 25 years, even before I was born. I am the voice of the dying children, displaced women, and people suffering at the hands of a climate crisis created by rich countries.” It is a stark reminder of the long-term failure by states, institutions, companies, and individuals to arrest the climate change–led degradation of planet Earth both for present and future generations. In this award-winning book, author Eugene Linden seeks to explain how this failure has come about by chronicling, decade by decade, the personalities and events that have contributed to placing the planet on the edge of potentially catastrophic climate tipping points.