This is an important and timely book – another gift to public understanding by Australian scientist and author Tim Flannery. Ten years ago he wrote The Weather Makers (2005), one of a handful of books which, together with Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth (2006), brought the climate crisis to a world audience. Now in Atmosphere of Hope, Flannery assesses what we have learned in the decade since 2005 about climate science and the policy options for action. On the eve of the Paris summit, it is refreshing to read such intelligent and lucid words about an issue that vested interests spend so much money trying to obfuscate. Australians especially need this book, for the Coalition government has manipulated a huge and disturbing gap between politics and reality.