Despite being outdated, this is a "gem" of a book. Most of it takes the form of 2-page spreads about common rocks of the US, with a B&W photo on one side, and a brief description on the other.

At the end there's a nice page, "What to Do with the Rocks You Find," a few pages of further reading (titles ranging from 1950 to 1974), and an index.

Our earth science is meh, so we'd ask a more knowledgeable person to read it and insert notes regarding contemporary accuracy (yes, our understanding of rocks does evolve, as do some rocks; look up "secondary minerals," for example).

It's a fast, simple read, though, and such things have their place. I'd even call it classic.

(According to the back cover flap, the author, Barrie Klaits, "is co-author of four texbooks published by the University of Minnesota Press for MINNEMAST (Minnesota Math and Science Teaching Project)," so one presumes this was ship-shape-sharp at the time of publication.)

Klaits was born in 1944 according to the Mississippi Writers Page, and we did not find a death notice or obituary online.