This book reviews the evolution of life (mostly single-celled) and the Earth system up until the early Cambrian. It discusses the origin of life, the Oxygen revolution, the development of eukaryotic cells, Snowball Earth and the Cambrian explosion. It also gives some details about the scientific work that has gone into piecing this story together.
ISBN 0-691-00978-3
find it in: Worldcat (for local availability) and Amazon.com