The Secret Life of Plants

Paul Barber

Vampires, Burial, and Death: Folklore and Reality

In this engrossing book, Paul Barber surveys centuries of folklore about vampires and offers the first scientific explanation for the origins of the vampire legends. From the tale of a sixteenth-century shoemaker from Breslau whose ghost terrorized everyone in the city, to the testimony of a doctor who presided over the exhumation and dissection of a graveyard full of Serbian vampires, his book is fascinating reading. "This study's comprehensiveness and the author's bone-dry wit make this compelling reading, not just for folklorists, but for anyone interested in a time when the dead wouldn't stay dead."--Booklist "Barber's inquiry into vampires, fact and fiction, is a gem in the literature of debunking... [and] a convincing exercise in mental archaeology."--Roy Porter, Nature "A splendid book about the undead, illuminated by the findings of morbid anatomy.... The main value of this most interesting book is to remind us how far we have come in our ability to explain the world and how this has released us from at least some terrors."--Anthony Daniels, Spectator "This book is fascinating reading for physicians and anthropologists as well as anyone interested in folklore."--R. ...

Lawrence R. Spencer

Alien Interview

Copies of two letters, Top Secret military transcripts and notes from the late Matilda O'Donnell MacElroy, an Army Air Force nurse at the Roswell Army Air Field 509th Bomb Group in 1947. In her letters she asserts that the transcripts are an exact recording of a series of interviews she conducted with an extraterrestrial being as part of her official duty as a flight nurse in the U.S. Army Air Force. During July and August she interviewed a saucer pilot who crashed near Roswell, New Mexico on July 8th, 1947. The being she interviewed identified itself as an officer, pilot and engineer with an Invasion Force from a civilization she refers to as "The Domain". Their space craft use the planet Venus and the asteroid belt as space ports in our solar system. The Milky Way galaxy is a tiny area within the territorial possessions of "The Domain". The interview transcripts were kept secret - under threat of death - by Nurse MacElroy for 60 years, and released a few months before her passing at the age of 83.

Eve Adamson, Joan Budilovsky

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Meditation, 2nd Edition

-- New, updated content on modern areas in meditation including world religious tie-ins, music and modern chants. -- Beats coverage of the competition. In today's hectic times, it's more important than ever to learn to slow down, relax and be calm. Whether part of religious habit or just part of a daily routine, meditation can help slow the today's frenzied pace and improve feelings of good health, peace and control. In The Complete Idiot's Guide "RM" to Meditation, Second Edition, the authors explain how easy it is to enjoy the benefits of meditation including: simple stress-reduction techniques that make learning to meditate easier; incorporating meditation into day-to-day situations; common misconceptions about meditating; and special techniques from Zen to guided imagery to mindfulness meditation.