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Wallace deftly moves over varied terrain - drawing from history, science, evolutionary theory, and art history - to present a lively account of fossil discoveries and an overview of what those discoveries have revealed about early mammals and their evolution. He includes memorable figures as Georges Cuvier, Richard Owen, Edward D. Cope, George Gaylord Simpson, and Stephen Jay Gould and learn of their heated disputes, from Cuvier's and Owen's fights with early evolutionists to present controversies over the Late Cretaceous mass extinction.

From reviews:

"Ties together in an interesting way many of the old chestnuts of vertebrate paleontological lore. . . . Wallace has skillfully woven his tale around the Zallinger art . . . his literary use of the Zallinger frescos succeeds in drawing us into deep time."--Malcolm C. McKenna, Trends In Ecology & Evolution

"Beasts of Eden is a wondrous journey through the vanished worlds of extinct mammals. Exciting, insightful, and accurate, it is everything that good science writing should be."--Tim Flannery, author of The Eternal Frontier

"A compelling scientific adventure story. . . . Peopled with colorful and larger-than-life characters, this account of the history of paleontology dramatically demonstrates how the interactions between crude but charismatic fossil seekers, ascetic intellectuals, temperamental artists, and many others have forever changed the ways in which we view life's prehistoric beginnings."--Ian Tattersall, author of The Monkey in the Mirror