There's a slight change in the format of this book. The first book was told in first-person as Arthur and Will's journal. This book switches to a third-person perspective. As I've said, Arthur and Will go on their own separate adventures, but their paths do eventually cross.
I've said that the Dinotopia books really evoke a lot of those 19th century adventure novels. This influence is very strong in this book. The entrance to the World Beneath is located underwater, and we do get some scenes evocative of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. We also got some great appearances by various prehistoric sea creatures such as dunkleosteus, leopleurodon and the creatures of the Burgess Shale. Once we get to the World Beneath it all feels a bit evocative of Journey to the Center of the Earth, with just a pinch of Indiana Jones.
From this expedition we learn that Dinotopia was once divided into many different empires. One of these, Poseidos, was actually quite technologically advanced. However, their hubris and love of machines proved to be their undoing. Eventually the island of Poseidos sank into the sea, and served as the inspiration for the legend of Atlantis. The thinking is that Poseidon sunk Atlantis, and Poseidos sounds like Poseidon, so Poseidos inspired Atlantis.
Unfortunately, this leads us to my biggest issue with this big. There is a pretty obvious anti-technology and anti-science message running throughout this book. Arthur has been tinkering and building machines throughout the book, but they almost always end in disaster. Naturally, this requires him to be saved by friendly dinosaurs. Similarly, one of the big downfalls of Poseidos was how they tried to replace their dinosaurs with machines. The message seems to be "you can have dinosaurs, or you can have robots, but you can't have both." This is particularly odd because the Dinotopians weren't shown to be Luddites before this. Moreover, Arthur was always treated with respect and admiration for being a man of science.
Arthur get a love interest in the form of Oriana Nascava. On the one hand, I'm glad to see that Arthur is moving on from his wife's death and finding new love. On the other hand, Oriana contributes to the anti-technology message. She constantly poo-poos his idea about reviving Poseidon technology, because who needs robots when you have dinosaurs. To be fair, other than these moments of pontificating, she wasn't too bad. Meanwhile, Will is doing well with his own love interest Sylvia.
I guess my problem with the anti-technology message is that way it presents a black and white view of things. Well, that and how it ignores the ways that technology has improved our lives. All the lives saved thanks to advances in medicine, the revolutions in agriculture that have fed millions, and countless other great things are thanks to technology. Moreover, wouldn't the dinosaurs like for their workloads to be lightened a bit? The implication seems to be that the robots would inevitably replace the dinosaurs. It would have been better if the message was less "technology is evil" and more "technology can be used for good or evil, so learn to use it wisely." The book didn't even need to have a message. A Land Apart From Time didn't have a message, the plot was mostly just there to explore the worldbuilding, and it was perfect just the way it was.
Also, Lee Crab was hired to help-out with the expedition. Really, Arthur, just what were you expecting to happen when you hired Lee Crab? I know it seemed like a good idea at the time, but still.
Still, if you ignore the clunky message, The World Beneath is a pretty fun adventure book. Hey, it's a James Gurney book, so you are guaranteed to get tons of gorgeous illustrations to go along with the text. I probably should have mentioned this before, but the dinosaurs survived in the World Beneath thanks to sunstones. Sunstones, as their name suggest, are capable to generating light, but they can also be used to power machines. If you squint very, very hard you might be able to see evidence that the sunstones are what gave the dinosaurs their sentience. So, if the World Beneath is where the Dinotopian dinosaurs came from, then where did the Ice Age mammals come from? For that matter, there's also several animals, particularly sea animals, from before the dinosaurs. And how does plate tectonics play into this and...you know what, I'm not going to question it. I love Dinotopia and its menagerie of creatures too much to serious question the logic of it all.
Similarly, the books take place in the 1860s, but Arthur knows the names of various dinosaur that hadn't been discovered yet. For example, tyrannosaurus wasn't discovered until 1902. Then again, given that's it's already odd that the dinosaurs are referred to by their scientific names, it's a bit of a moot point.
I did enjoy how this book expanded upon the history and mythology of Dinotopia. I'm especially intrigued by the legendary King Ogthar; he was said to have been half-human and half-dinosaur, and brought peace and stability to Dinotopia. We get hints that there was a time when Dinotopia wasn't so idyllic and utopian. I also loved how the inhabitants of the Rainy Basin weren't shown in a bad light just because of their lifestyle. In fact, a group of tyrannosaurs even helps to save the day.
And here’s a fun fact, The World Beneath played a role in the history of paleoart. It was one of the first, if not the first, depictions of giganotosaurus in pop culture. In fact, James Gurney consulted with Rodolfo Coria, the paleontologist who named giganotosaurus and argentinosaurus. In fact, Gurney made the first portrait of giganotosaurus. Gurney asked Coria about what he should do for colors. Coria quipped “Color? That’s your problem.” The moral of the story is, don’t stress about your paleoart. You’re in good company.
Well, I don't think there's much more to add. The Worth Beneath is certainly a flawed book, but I still had a good time overall. And hey, we got plenty of great artwork to look at. I think I'll be keeping up this Dinotopia kick. I will see you guys next time.
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