There is considerable overlap between Gregory Smits's When the Earth Roars: Lessons from the History of Earthquakes in Japan and Tetsuo Takashima's Megaquake: How Japan and the World Should Respond. Both identify vulnerabilities based on past disasters, and both include proposals to mitigate future disasters. Smits provides a more thorough look at past disasters, while Takashima uses his skills as a novelist to imagine future ones.
When the Earth Roars is a rich survey of over ten seismic disasters in Japan supported by an impressive range of research. Smits outlines three main arguments. First, and most importantly, Smits argues that earthquake disasters are chaotic. Nevertheless, while each event is a unique combination of unpredictable geophysical forces and complex social conditions, as a whole, they also reveal patterns of vulnerability that can inform future disaster preparedness efforts. The second argument traces the history of science and technology surrounding earthquakes in...
