| Marginellidae Cystiscidae of the World
by T. Cossignani
with over 2600 photos 2006, L'Informatore Piceno Ancona, Italy 408 pages, page size A4 (11.7 by 8 inches) includes over 300 full page color plates, and other color and b/w illustrations, sewn binding with printed, laminated board covers.
According to Dr. Cossignani this book had its beginnings in 1995 and it has taken 11 years to complete. One would expect that with this amount of time spent on compiling this book that it would be very complete, and indeed it is. The author says that there are more than 750 species are represented in this work. The text is somewhat minimal and it is in Italian and in English translation. Most of the text portion of the works are the systematics of the classification of these shells both in the past and in the present system proposed by the author. The quality of the color photographs is remarkably and almost without exception very good especially when you take into account the very small size of many of these shells. Most of the plates contain 9 or fewer images of the shells and are a good size to work with. Since this is an Atlas the shells are arranged according to the geographical region from which they occur. A complete list of the species from each area proceeds the plates. There are also a few plates of fossil species included in this book but mostly, what the author has given us is a thorough look at the shells that are found in these families of shells. It is easy to argue that the author has created or accepted too many shells as species that may in reality be forms or variations. This is an issue that will not be decided here or is unique to this work, but you must appreciate the clear and beautiful look that the author has given to us of these shells. One peeve (of mine) that I feel I should mention is that in order to find out who named any shell you must first check the index at the back of the book to find the genus to which the shell is assigned, then turn to the front of the book to find the appropriate genus under which the species are listed alphabetically and the names of the authors and dates of the description are given. Surely this information could have been added to the index and given along with the shell names that appear with the plates |
