Perhaps the most up-to-date and comprehensive treatment of dinosaur evolution currently available, The Mistaken Extinction discusses both the origin of birds and the supposed extinction of the dinosaurs in detail, offering a very accessible discussion of modern taxonomy and cladistics en route. Writing in The New York Times Book Review, John Noble Wilford comments, "If their richly illustrated book is perhaps too comprehensive for cover-to-cover reading, it is well organized to be used for years as a reference work on all kinds of dinosaur and bird lore."