This is the English language edition of the Les Grands Sols Du Monde (2007), translated by V. A. K. Sharma. There are four chapters on general topics, and one each on 10 globally important soil types. The main emphasis is on soil genesis and properties. The third chapter expounds the book's central paradigm that most significant pedological features can be explained by descending weathering fronts. In-situ transformations are deemed to account for formation, properties and distribution of the mineral components in most soils, and there is little need to invoke translocation. The emphasis on weathering is appropriate and helpful for old red tropical soils (Chapter 5), and continues a long tradition in French tropical pedology. The predominance given to progressive weathering fronts in the formation of temperate brown soils with high clay subsoils (Chapter 8) is a welcome counter to the overemphasis on clay translocation in Anglophone pedology. The discounting of substantial vertical translocation of iron and aluminium in podzols (Chapter 11) is less convincing.

This book is useful to Anglophone readers because the strong French emphasis introduces unfamiliar studies and fresh concepts. It is a highly personal, almost valedictory, exposition. It organizes a great deal of material in a logical way and the text is generally succinct and clear. It is somewhat didactic, with strong opinions, many exclamation marks and firm dismissals of alternative models. Nonetheless, it is very readable and interesting, and I recommend it to Anglophone soil scientists.