Tom Ough The Anti-Catastrophe LeagueThe pioneers and visionaries on a questto save the world336pp. Mudlark. £22. David Spears and Michael Geruso After the SpikeThe risks of global depopulation and the

A millennium ago, the land that is now the United States looked very different from how many might imagine it. Instead of a sparsely populated wilderness, across much of North America people inhabited

LETTER FROM LONDON AHMED: HAYLEY BENOIT; PHOTO ILLUSTRATION ...

Lizzie Wade Apocalypse How catastrophe transformed our world and can forge new futures 320pp. William Collins. £20. Luke Kemp Goliath’s Curse The history and future of societal collapse 592pp. Viking.

Amazing answers to your curious questions

I magine you’re in Nebraska, standing on North America’s Great Plains, where the broad Platte and Missouri rivers join on their way to the mighty Mississippi. It’s 1804, and in the blistering 36°C hea