The reader is taken from the known and familiar past in the first chapter, peeling back the layers to the "terra incognita" of the deep past with its completely extinct life forms. Our human ancestry is traced back through different periods, focussing on different fossil environments, revealing how and when the site was discovered. Covering sites and discoveries from Europe, North America, the Middle and Far East and Australasia, the text is broken down into small digestible topics with box features. Timelines are included for every chapter and sub-topic, illustrating the age of our planet, as well as diagrams of the different stages of evolution.