The Pocket Cloud Book

A comprehensive pocket guide to cloudspotting, from the author of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize winner, The Invention of Clouds.

Clouds have been the object of fascination throughout history, their fleeting magnificence and endless variability providing food for thought for scientists and daydreamers alike.

Clouds may have many individual shapes, but there are a few basic forms. In this definitive guide to the clouds and the skies, Richard Hamblyn introduces you to all the different cloud species. The Pocket Cloud Book will enable you to identify individual clouds, skies and phenomena. You will also be able to track their likely changes over time and predict the implications they have for the weather you may experience.

This portable edition includes the twelve new cloud types only recently officially recognized by the World Meteorological Organization. Many of these previously only had informal names, but their new Latin classification brings them into the fold of officially adopted global meteorological terms. It also includes a new foreword from the Met Office's Chief Meteorologist and an updated section on climate change and the role that clouds might play in shaping future conditions on Earth.

Illustrated with stunning images from around the globe, this edition is the perfect size to take with you on walks and have it handy in the garden so that you can enjoy sky-gazing every day. This is the only guide to cloud classification that you will ever need.