'The best books, reviewed with insight and charm, but without compromise.'
- author Jackie French

Friday, 1 August 2025

Review: Wind Atlas: Everything You Need To Know About The Wind

As a kid, the wind unnerved me. Wild, unpredictable, displacing. As an adult, the wind is still my least favourite weather phenomena but along the way to learning to sail and gaining a better understanding of meteorology, my appreciation of ‘wind’ is now more discriminating.

Wind Atlas, the third in the amazing weather series by Thames & Hudson, consolidates that appreciation and then some. 

Like its predecessors, Wave Atlas and Cloud Atlas, this guide into the world’s fascinating zones of pressure and air movements is both refreshingly informative while simultaneously easy to assimilate.

Youngsters, regardless of their scientific predilections, will gain much from the definitions, rating scales and fantastic accompanying artwork. Because we all relate to wind in some way. We all experience is wrath and wonder. We all feel its presence even if we are unable to physically clap eyes on it.

To ensure instant audience appeal, the creators begin our tempestuous journey with wind, with a quote from Mary Poppins leaving us in no doubt as to the magic and mischief wind can elicit. We move swiftly through various historical homages to the vagaries of the world’s air currents before swooping headfirst into the global forces and zones through which wind travels and plays.

The relationship between these is then measured and quantified and dutifully explained each resplendent on its own beautiful double page spread which allows full appreciation of each ‘wind state’.

Zanella’s stirring illustrations reflect Zambello’s sometimes abstract but always majestic chronicle of history or event that connects the reader to the grade and strength of the wind type in question. The result is a visual and intellectual feast of enlightenment that many children will be able to recognise from their subconscious collections of countless weather forecasts. Now they can muse more deeply about the capricious breezes that blow through the washing and tussle their fringes.

Having lived through several ‘wind driven’ events myself, I find books like Wind Atlas establish logic and understanding in a truly unique and alluring way. These atlases are the opposite of dull and dusty nonfiction coffee table books. They are expeditions into the wonderful weather experiences that we encounter daily and are truly, simply, everything you need to know about the them.

Learn more about the companion editions of Cloud Atlas and Wave Atlas.

Title:  Wind Atlas: Everything You Need To Know About The Wind
Author:  Sarah Zambello
Illustrator:  Susy Zanella
Publisher:  Thames & Hudson, $34.99
Publication Date:  29 July 2025
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781760764517
For ages:  7+
Type:  Non-fiction Picture Book