Anthrax and smallpox get all the public's attention when it comes to biological weapons, but many biologists have warned that the greater threat is against agriculture. Attacks on livestock and crops could have much more profound impacts on a society than could many anti-personnel agents. In this slim volume, Simon Whitby sets out to demonstrate this thesis.

The book has the expected components: a brief outline of plant
pathology, a review of the effects of disease on crop yield and its effects across the world. It also uses declassified US documents to assemble a history of US anticrop warfare research and a large chapter on the planning of a possible attack on China's rice crop.

The overall view is historical and the chapters on the history of the US program are the most interesting and illuminate many interesting points. However, Whitby is a policy wonk and he keeps on charging off the track into thickets of policy that are are not relevant to his thesis. There is a large section on how Vannevar Bush manoeuvered himself into a dominant position in the wartime scientific research establishment. Whether Vannevar Bush or Kate Bush was in charge of scientific research at the time is irrelevant. The person having the greatest effect on vulnerability to anti-crop biological warfare was already in Washington and doesn't get mentioned in the book at all. Other excursions into the policy debate are more interesting, such as
Cuba's efforts to get two thrips included in the list of anticrop agents which highlights the challenges and the highly political nature of the topic. It is a highly political topic, but I do not see policy issues as relevant to an analysis of the nature and effects of anti-crop warfare.

As a policy wonk Whitby does not appear at all comfortable with the science. He spends many pages in lengthy quotes to define terms that he could have covered in a few lines and comes up with strained repetitive writing. Later in the book he pleads shortage of space. He also makes a number of technical errors (Phytophthora was taken out of the fungi half a decade ago; witches' broom isn't caused by a fungus.) Scientific
names are often inaccurate or outdated and the partially translated table of insect pests that Nazi Germany investigated is largely useless. However, there is a good discussion of major crops and their pathogens.

Does he prove his point? Not entirely. Apart from the policy debates, the book centers on declassified, and also very old, research from the United States. The documents show that anti-crop warfare was taken seriously and that target crops had been identified and the technical, logistic, and tactical problems were addressed and that ways to cause great damage were considered. Things have changed. Some of the agents not used in the 1950's may be useful now because of advances in technologies such as microencapsulation and culture methods. New agents have appeared, we have a much greater understanding of the relationship between crops and their pathogens and we have better defenses. The landscape of 2003 is very different from that of 1953, 1963, and even 1993.

More importantly, the book does not look at changes in agriculture and in crop plants in the past 50 years. The person not mentioned by Whitby who may have greatly increased crop plant vulnerability, but who also did so much good for US agriculture was Vice-President Henry Wallace. Wallace was a plant breeder. He greatly increased the yield and improved the agronomic performance of corn (maize) by selective breeding. He did this by bringing corn under control. He established a group of highly inbred lines that could be crossed and recrossed and selected and screened for the sort of performance farmers wanted. The consequence of this was that he also narrowed the genetic variability available to the plant breeder. All the plants in any field of cereals are genetically almost identical, they share the same strengths and the same weaknesses. A pathogen that attacks any one plant of a variety will attack them all. The ability to introduce weaknesses into plants is demonstrated by the accidental introduction of susceptibility to Southern leaf blight by corn breeders in the 1980's. Brief case studies of major crop failures caused by disease would have been helpful.

This book is not without merit. It brings to light a great deal of interesting information and heads largely in the right direction. I have to think that it could have been greatly improved if Whitby had spent a bit less time in the archives, and had left his office at the University of Bradford to spend a few hours talking to farmers in the Vale of York.

This is an excellent historical review of anticrop BW efforts. The author starts with Iraq and UNSCOM, then quickly moves into describing the history of modern anticrop warfare from pre-WWII to the end of the US's BW program.

It covers the early efforts by France and Germany, then US and British efforts. Also described are US weapon systems, and target analysis.

This is a must have book in regards to studing anticrop BW, and understanding its history.

The sweater designs looked plain as if they were taken from each designer's bargain bin. There wasn't much that inspired me to knit one of the patterns right away. Also there were only a handful of patterns for the beginner -- the rest were forintermediate and expert knitters.

The majority of the patterns in this book require to you be an "expert" or "experienced" knitter. As a beginner/intermediate, that left me with very little to choose from. I was also disappointed in the lack of true wearability of most of these patterns. That aside, I like classic, time tested, designs that are updated to look contemporary, and did not find these appealing. Each designer seemed to be trying to out do the other, and some are way over the top. If you're an expert knitter who's looking for gimmicky sweaters to "WOW" your friends- this book would come in handy; everyone else will likely be disappointed.

Some sporty styles, some classics -- all at varying skill levels, so anyone can find something in this book to knit. Most of the sweaters are from more recent (last 10 years) magazine issues, so you may have at least a few of these already. Others I haven't seen before, even though they look fairly current. If a yarn is no longer available, the author offers a substitute. As usual, the knitting instructions are clearly laid out, so knitting these sweaters should not be troublesome. For simpler designs, Malcolm has published a very easy, very vogue edition which also has a nice variety, mainly for a beginning or early intermediate knitter. But again, beginners or intermediates can find a lot for them in this volume as well.

White Wolf has a mediocre track record with the non-european, and is particularly dismal when it comes to India, China, Japan, Korea.

But it is not damning by faint praise to say that the author of this book, and another superb book, "Dragons of the East," has single-handedly reversed this situation and given us a marvelous, fascinating, playable look into the far east.

This book is great. It has an intricate description of Do, it has really fun, playable factions with fascinating orientations solidly within the chinese philosophical framework-- not that you have to know chinese philosophy or history to get them.

Why only three stars? I have a couple problems with the book. For one, like so many White Wolf books, it includes a great deal of in-character fiction. In fact, a tremendous amount. If you want to read fiction, that's one thing, but this is a game book, and I'm tired of White Wolf doing things this way just because they have a bunch wannabe-fiction-writers, but lack the guts and coordination to say anything definitive. This book's fiction is actually good, but darnit, it's not why I spent money for it! Every word of fiction is a waste of space, as far as I'm concerned. As far as this goes, I've half a mind to reccomend Dragons of the East *instead* of this book, because it has a lot less of this sort of thing.

Secondly, I'm protesting the decision to lump all kinds of distinct movements into one group. There's the obvious problem of putting the Wu Lung in the Brotherhood-- patently absurd, but probably dictated by a committe. Then there's the fact that we're slinging Bonn, Jains, Hinayana, Zen, Moism, Legalism, Taoism, Confucianism, Shinto, all into one group and then insisting, as the book does, that the Akashayana Sangha isn't just a motley of unrelated groups. Yes, Zen and Han Fei Tzu had heavy Taoist backgrounds. Yes, some of the other groups were synthesized together in popular movements, in later periods. But, come on. There's material for at least four major traditions here. Worse than the Dreamspeakers, this is. So why assert that they're all of one thought?

Also, as the prior reviewer pointed out, what's up with the incessant barrage of terminology? It's cute, I mean, but it's a major obstacle to understanding.

But honestly, the book is great. Don't play an Akashic without it!

The first of the revised Tradition Books for Mage: The Ascension, this book is simply overflowing with intriguing information on the Akashic Brotherhood. The Akashayana were somewhat shortchanged in the core revised rulebook for Mage: They are stereotyped as nothing more than bald-headed monks or super-ninjas. That falls far short of the truth.

This Tradition Book includes detailed descriptions of the sects within the Akashayana, including the Li-Hai (rebels who find the stereotype of robed monks to be laughable) and even the Roda d'Oro, a non-Asian branch of the Brotherhood. An excellent set of expanded rules for Do is included. Further, the views and goals of the Akashics are explored: Those who see only self-torturing ascetics are failing to understand the point. The goal of the truly enlightened is not to punish the body, but rather to cease to be distracted by it.

Best of all, most of this information is given in the format of a beautifully written story which fills the book from cover to cover. The prose is breathtaking, and seeing Akashic students and masters as they confront a crisis definitely gives greater insight into the Brotherhood. Further, within the story, a dark secret is revealed: A war begun a hundred lifetimes ago, and which rages even today; a war that could destroy the Traditions.

Unfortunately, this book is not always formatted in an easily understandable manner. The dialogue includes many specialized words used by the Brotherhood, but often the meaning of these words does not appear until halfway through the book. This maintains a sense of mystery in the story, but can also be extremely frustrating. Further, the book often refers to Dragons of the East; if you haven't read that sourcebook, you will probably be frustrated by the frequent appearances of "For more information, see 'Dragons of the East'."

All in all, however, an excellent book. Its strengths easily compensate for its shortcomings. This book might have earned five stars, but I give it four stars because of the confusing layout. Bottom line: If you play Mage and you intend to have even a single Akashic Brotherhood character, this book is a must-have.

This anthology of short fiction from Austria consists of stories and novel excerpts from 22 writers published in German between 1963 and 1995. In that regard I suppose it's a fair sampling of postwar Austrian literature, but what I had not expected was that this sampling would be so numbingly boring. As the majority authors represented were born during or soon after WWII, I shouldn't have been so surprised that the war and guilt are recurring themes, even in stories written in the '90s. While understand that the Austrian collaboration (Anschluss) with the Nazis is a scar in the national psyche, I suspect that those with more intimate knowledge of Austria may be able to tease a little more meaning out of the stories than I was able to.

Meaning and theme aside, too many of the stories are just flat out boring. I did more or less like Heimito von Doderer's "Beneath Black Stars", narrated by a Luftwaffe officer. I very much enjoyed Hans Carl Artmann's "Blind Chance and Roast Duck", which is a brief comic farce about three gentlemen who have gambled their money away. Peter Henisch's "Brutal Curiosity" appears to be a somewhat autobiographical account of his dying father's experience as a combat photographer in WWII which reads rather well. Gert Jonke's "The Bridge" comes close to being something quite interesting, and Peter Handke's two page sketches aren't bad. The remainder of the stories utterly failed to connect with me, mostly for stylistic reasons. In many cases the writing seemed incredibly stiff, while in others, experimentation runs amok.

I had hoped to emerge from this anthology with a sense of Austria beyond the standard Vienna, Mozart, classical view, with a gritty glimpse into the more real modern Austria. These stories more or less try to do that in a variety of ways, but ultimately fail. Rather than show what's going on now, the authors are more interested in deconstructing myths of the past.

Deftly edited by Martin Chalmers, Beneath Black Stars is an outstanding selection of original short stories by a number of talented, twentieth century Austrian writers. Many of these stories appear in English for the first time, and subtly express such concerns as alarm over the degree to which Austria collaborated with Nazi leaders during the German occupation, among other dark corners of Austrian culture that are not so often discussed in the land of Mozart, Vienna, and The Blue Danube. A most impressive and compelling literary anthology, Beneath Black Stars is a welcome and highly recommended contribution to Austrian Literature supplemental reading lists and reference collections.

The title of this book should be "Fuzzy Flowers". I have never been so disappointed in receiving a flower arranging book!

Most of the color photographs of arrangements are taken in some kind of 'fog'. If this is done for some kind of artistic reason, one or two would be okay but to show almost every arrangement as though in a cloud of dust or out of focus is just unecessary. The arrangements themselves seem to be quite good if one could only discern their placement and color of flowers.

From a technical point of view, the text is useful and covers all one would need to know as a flower arranger.

I would not recommend this book to my friends and will give this one to my Garden Club.

Malcolm Hiller's book is an excellent resource for floral design. The pictures are great! There are flower and foliage guides by season which are very helpful when selecting flowers for big events. Mr. Hiller's arrangements are also very different and inspiring.

This book has some novel and interesting ideas for breaking out of the classical design mold which might be boring to some people. However, contrary to the claim on the backcover that it contains "...easy-to-follow construction drawings even the most hesiteant amateur will be moved to build...", the designs really require the skills of a moderately experienced carpenter or cabinetmaker to follow. If you're already experienced in woodworking and reading design plans, then the diagrams may appear to be "elegantly simple". However, to a construction novice like myself, the designs will be daunting. The book is worth the price just to get some nice new design ideas, but don't expect it to be a beginner's guide to construction.

Once you plow through the diatribe condemming man for destroying the bird's environment, there are a lot of creative ideas here if you want to build birdhouses and nesting platforms. The book is illustrated with freehand drawings that can be hard to follow, but this is not meant to be a book of plans, more as an inspiration to the creative.

There is a brief chart showing the diameter of entrance hole for a few species, but it is not as complete as other sources. He does not get into any great detail about where to mount houses, proper interior sizes or spacing for the different species.

Most of his designs are for pole mounted houses and he gives some creative ideas for poles. Several ideas are for wall mounted houses. He does have a few designs for hanging houses. One of the more interesting houses is a pole mounted "earth sheltered" nesting platform.

If you want more technical information, I'd suggest Scott D. Campbell's "The Complete Book of Birdhouse Construction for Woodworkers" (available from Amazon.com.) Campbell's book is an excellent companion to Well's book and a basic technical reference for building birdshouses. You can modify the creative designs in Well's book to conform to the researched standards in Cambell's book.

The more information you have before you start, the better your results will be!

Captives in Time is about a girl named Anne and her brother Niklas who overcome many obstacles to be successful by building a clock.I thought this was a good book because two siblings overcame great obstacles in order to be successful.I also thought it was a good book because things happened right away and grabbed your attention immediately.This book would be good to someone who enjoys a book with a middle ages theme.

"CAPTIVES OF TIME," is a well written story by Malcolm Bosse for it will certainly make your attention captive right from the beginning where Anne Valens and her young brother Niklas Valens witness their parents murder. To the disobedience of her uncle Albrecht of building the clock, which he believed was the gift from God to the people. And as a result lead to the first female clock named Anne Valens. This story is full of emotions and events that will make you forget about sleeping until you are done reading the whole book.

This book has it's moments, such as "God's Judgement for White America" which speaks of divine revenge for the crimes against Black Americans, but too much of this reflects the period when Malcolm was parroting (his own admission) the cuckoo-patch teachings of Elijah Muhammad for the benefit of the ignorant. "The Black Man's History" is filled with utter madness about Blakc mad scientists creating White people, ad nauseum. Good only for historical purposes. Read the real, sensible stuff from when Malcolm had the sense to cut loose from Elijah's mess, such as "Malcolm X Speaks,' "By Any Means Necessary" etc.

I first started teaching myself about Malcolm X when I was only in 6th grade, but I was only really concerned with his life story and not his ideas. The books I had read up through high school never gave any extra insight either (and I owned 10 at the time). I first read this book in the fall of '95, finding it by accident when I was going through the books by Malcolm my freshman year at Montana State U. This book is terrific! I had always been an admirer of Malcolm, but without the insight and this book gave it. My favorite speech is "The Black Man's History", truly a masterpiece. There are some ideas that don't quite pan out, but these speeches came during the time he was still with the Nation of Islam and a follower of Elijah Muhammed. This book gives terrific insight into his ideas early on. It is well worth the money to buy this book!

I was rather excited when I picked up this book to see that someone had simplified the production of forms for Web Page development...

H O W E V E R....

Whoever the editor was and the author is ... they both DID NOT Care too well about the companion website... Adobe Press doesn't even own up to publishing the book as I had explored the Adobe website to find out the correct companion site.

I don't know if the book is worth it.. since I returned it since I got no response from Adobe and there is no way of contacting the author..

The first three chapters (100 pages) show you how to create HTML and PDF forms. The interaction between the browser and the server is explained. The section titled "Choosing Your Scripting Language" demonstrates Perl, C, JavaScript, Java, Visual Basic, VBScript, active server pages (ASP), and Applescript. The final two chapters (518 pages) contain the following eight examples: business card order, W4 employer form, 1040 Tax Form, Drivers License Order, Employee Benefits, Stock Photo Library, Resume Submission, and University Course Enrollment. The server scripts are written in Perl. The discussion of creating form fields in Acrobat Exchange bogs down the examples. However, the examples demonstrate important web programming techniques such as creating forms, creating server side scripts, maintaining state information (needed because of page transitions) in a PDF form using hidden fields, generating FDF files, and serializing information in a database.

This book shows you the way to build sails the old fashioned way, although some of the techniques shown are not really the way they were built in the "old days". It has lovely illustrations and and clear instructions on how to make sails with an eye on the craftsmanship of the past. The modern world of computer-designed and cut sails has no place here! If you are a novice and want this book to learn the art and craft of modern sailmaking, the book is not for you, as the construction details shown are needlessly complicated and redundant. Modern sails are actually easier to build than most of the techniques shown in this book, and most of today's sailmakers do not build sails using the book's methods. There are other books on how to make sails that are better and easier, but this is a great book for those who like the old ways of doing things. Nice photos and instructions on how to repair sails, and good basic advice for sailors who want to try their hand at a bit of palm-and-needle work. The author is holding onto the old way of designing and building sails, but has neglected alot of modern advances in the art of sailmaking.

The book seemed quite comprehensive on the subject of sailmaking. A good thing, but it took multiple readings to pick out what I did need vs. what I did not need when I started making my own sail. Having compared the techniques in the book to what I have seen in use among most so-called "production" sails, it was obvious to me this book was written for an audience who appreciates attention to details. It's a book for those serious about their sails, not for those who want to put together a quick and dirty sail that will last them only a couple of seasons, nor is it for those expecting nicely laid out patterns to follow.