Guns Germs and Steel

This comparative history asks why societies on some continents developed dense farming, writing, and metal weapons and then expanded, while others did not. Diamond argues from geography: the distribution of domesticable plants and animals, the east-west axis of Eurasia, and the germs that came with herds. Case studies include the Polynesian islands, the Spanish meeting with the Inca, and the spread of crops. Race and individual genius are set aside as causes. The book is a large-scale environmental argument about inequality among peoples, not a military history of guns alone.

Bound in metallic silver paper cover and spine blocked with a black and green design by Christian Montenegro. Metallic silver textured slipcase.