Diamonds: The History of a Cold-Blooded Love Affair

 

"Although the universe is abundant in diamonds, and the Earth itself encloses great seas of diamond-bearing rock, the stones are hard to find in the quantities necassary to support the development of a mine. The plucking of diamonds out of rivers and associated riverside gravels by garimpieros and other miners supplies only a small percentage of the world's gem diamonds. Diamond rivers are merely secondary sources of the gems. The diamonds found in them have not originated in the rivers, but in primary sources deep within the Earth. They were transported to the surface by volcanic eruptions." 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this book, the author Matthew Hart goes into great detail on the struggles of finding diamonds today. He discusses the many major diamond pipes, and goes into much length about specific trips to those pipes, the people that went on the expedition, how successful they were, their challanges, and many other factors involved in the mining of diamonds. The author also explains in general how diamonds are found, what the mines and pipes are like, what the certain indicators that a diamond could be found are, and about much about the economic factor of diamonds. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Matthew Hart writes in the first person perspective, however he is very removed from most of the book besides telling one personal experience, and occasionaly giving his opinion. Hart writes as if he tagged along on every single expedition to mines and pipes, and trips to bargain prices that he writes about. Before writing  Diamond: The History of a Cold-Blooded Love Affair Matthew Hart was an experienced newspaper and magazine reporter, and had written a book titled Golden Giant about the gold rush. Matthew Hart has appeared on 60 Minutes, CNN, and the national geographic channel. He has written two IMAX movies, a pluthera of TV documentaries, and feature-length magazine and newspaper pieces on a variety of topics. The author has such a fascination with beautiful things from the Earth, such as Diamonds and Gold, two topics he did in depth research and exploration for- travelling all the way to Brazil to have 10 minutes with one of the most spectacular stones in existence at the time.