Mass Extinctions and Their Aftermath, published in 1997, was intended as the first systematic review of all the mass extinctions that have occurred in the history of life. "Having been largely ignored throughout most of the history of palaeontological and geological research," the authors write, "the subject of mass extinction has emerged within the last couple of decades as one of the most lively and contentious issues in the whole of science." The reviewer for the Times Higher Education Supplement described the book as "the only comprehensive, 'single-author' treatment of the major features of the entire paleontological extinction record."