| Mollusks of Korea
by
Min Duk-Hi
published 2004, Min Molluscan
Research Institute, Seoul, Korea, hard cover in blue
cloth binding in printed slipcase, 566 pages and
introduction, page size is 7.25 by 10.25 inches, 214 full color plates
of mollusks photographs and drawings.in Korean
This is a fabulous
book and of all of the books that have appeared in print recently I
will go out on a limb and say that it compares very closely with "Marine Mollusks in Japan"
in quality and in content. The single problem, and it is a big one
is that I can find in this work is that it is that the text
going to be impossible to read for most people who would be interested
in having this book. It is written only in Korean. There is an English
translation "in the works" that will be available probably in the early
part of 2007 that will be sold separately for a modest sum. Once the
translation appears it will without a doubt give this book the exposure
that it deserves. Until then we will find it useful as a source for
identification for the shells from this rather special part of the
globe that is at the confluence of the warmer regions to the south and
the colder regions to the north. The book is indexed in Latin
and in Korean so that users unable to read Korean should have no
difficulty locating anything in the text. The names for the shells on
the plates are also bilingual and so are the names in the text
descriptions of the shells. Min does a great job in covering the fauna
and unlike many books he illustrates and gives information on all of
the known classes of the marine shells
and covers the landshells
and the freshwater shells
found in Korea too.In all 1672 species
are covered and illustrated in this work. The book is printed in the
familiar format with the shell plates occupying the right hand page and
the information about them on the facing page.The book has been very
difficult to obtain outside of Korea and I think that this is the first
time that it will be widely available. There is actually an earlier
edition of this work from 2002 but this edition is larger and
considerably expanded and corrected from that edition. It is a book
where no expense has been spared in its production and it is a book
that I am sure you will want to own. The author has a shell
Museum in Seoul, Korea and it appears that he has been working with and
studying the phylum Mollusca for many years. If I am interpreting
things correctly he has put this book together with three colleagues,
Lee Jun-Sang, Koh Dong-Bum, and Je Jong-Geel and a lot of credit must
be given to them for the remarkable job that they did in producing this
book. |
