“The Year Without Summer: 1816” by William K Klingaman and Nicholas P. Klingaman was a very interesting book for readers that want to see the effects of weather on people that led to historical changes.  In April 1815, a massive volcanic eruption occurred on Mount Tambora in Indonesia with ash going 18 miles into the atmosphere.  The explosion was heard 250 miles  at sea.  The next day Napolean returned to Paris after being sent to Elba.  Thus the book starts a two year journey  that interweaves the effect of the resultant dust clouds that lowered the World’s temperature and  its effect on the people.   In the northern hemisphere, 1816 became as the year without a summer.

Most of the World did not know about the eruption at the time so the mysterious changes that occurred resulted in many concocted reasons for the low temperatures.  There were excessive rains, floods, frost and early snowfall across Europe and the Unuiterd States.  Food shortages, religious revivals, and westward migration of people occurred in the United States.  In Europe, there were famine, food riots, typhus epidemics and many stable communities  were transformed into wandering climate refugees.  It also had an impact on the arts.  All of the changes occurred before any of the rapid communications that started decades later.