Rand McNally Atlas of World Geography

If you want an atlas that would allow you to quickly and efficiently learn country names and capitals and their geographic location, then this book isn't the one to buy. I wanted and expected clear, concise, thorough political maps, and this just doesn't have it. For example, the political map of Europe is presented on two pages, and for some reason highways between major cities is included, which makes the map resemble something akin to bloodshot eyes, but yet the political map of Africa is presented without a single highway included, which makes it much easier to read yet begs the question why include highways for the former and not the latter? For me, a good way to judge an atlas is how it presents the West Indies, and this is a jumbled mess that totally omits some countries and labels some with print so small that a magnifying glass is needed. Even the presentation of the US is seriously lacking, with some states chopped up and placed in different regions.I suspect this atlas was assembled and printed before it was distributed for comments. They should have done much better.

The only reason for 4 stars is that it is difficult to read/see what is printed in the center of the book where it is bound. As a paper back, it is difficult to open up the book flat enough to see the printed matter in the center of the two-page spread.

Nicely formatted 176 page world atlas covering basic educational aspects of Physical and Human Geography during the first 50 pages or so. The additional 126 pages depict each continent's land use, political, climate, population, physical maps, indexes and details about that continent's unique attributes.This atlas works for middle schoolers through college age students. It is NOT Goode's World Atlas that I used in college physical and economic geography courses decades ago, but it is a 6th Edition with a 2019 copyright. It is very current in a rapidly changing world of political geography and country name changes. As a lifelong learner and former international airline pilot, I carried a similar edition in my flight bag while traveling the world.This book is paperback with a nice glossy cover and the pages are colorful and well produced. Due to the approx 8.5 x 11 inch format, you will lose a little detail on some maps as you get near page centers due to the binding process. Minor issue for me.Nice addition to my desk reference library to better understand today's world events in distant locales. For the price, this is a well written atlas.

We had versions of this and the historical atlases (US and World) from the 1990's and the books simply fell apart from use. Just love the series. I prefer the original binding to the glued binding - the one with old fashioned staples - because the binding broke on the World history atlas, but the maps are great. Lots of detail and perspective of surrounding areas and comparative sizes. It is great for those times when something comes up in a movie or on the news (Chernobyl, for instance) and someone says, "How far IS Chernobyl from Minsk and Kiev?" Out comes this paper atlas and viola! an answer - and more.

this atlas would be a LOT better if the countries / regions didn't have a seam in the middle of them. very hard to see those areas.

Needed to update some of our Atlas/Geography resources for our homeschool. This edition is a good resource for a reasonable price. Recommended.

Great pictures, good information and the size is perfect for sticking in my 3 ring binder.

We really like all the extra tidbits but wish the maps were a little more clear. Too many of them are spread across two pages and it's hard to read what's in the middle. All in all though, a good resource.