New Releases by Michael Brown

"A well-written and carefully crafted account of Aguaruna magic and its practical applications [that] diverges from more traditional approaches by focusing not only on the symbolic realm of magic but also on the instrumental intent." --American Anthropologist

Between the mid-13th and mid-14th centuries, Scotland experienced a period of crisis, as she struggled to maintain her position as a distinct realm and community. This volume describes the wars of the period and examines their impact on the anglicized and gaelicized worlds of the British Isles.

How to give the media news releases they''ll want to use and interviews that will impress everybody, including your peers.

During the century and a half of their power the Black Douglases earned fame as Scotland''s champions in the front line of war against England. On their shields they bore the bloody heart of Robert Bruce, the symbol of their claim to be the physical protectors of the hero-king''s legacy. But others saw the power of these lords and earls of Douglas in a different light. To their critics the Douglases were a force for disorder in the kingdom, lawless, arrogant and violent, whose power rested on coercion and whose defiance of kings and guardians ultimately provoked James II into slaying the Douglas earl with his own hand. Michael Brown analyses the rise and fall of this family as the dominant magnates of the south, from the deeds of the Good Sir James Douglas in the service of Bruce to the violent destruction of the Douglas earls in the 1450s. Alongside this study of the accumulation and loss of power by one of the great noble houses, The Black Douglases includes a series of thematic examinations of the nature of aristocratic power. In particular these emphasise the link between warfare and political power in southern Scotland during the fourteenth century. For the Black Douglases, war was not just a patriotic duty but the means to power and fame in Scotland and across Europe.

Whether viewed as a lawgiver, tyrant or martyr, James I has cast a long shadow over the history of Scotland. Michael Brown''s biography, the first full-length study in over fifty years, concludes that despite its apparent glamour and power, James I''s `golden age'' had shallow roots: after a life of drastically swinging fortunes, he met his end in a violent coup, a victim of his own methods.

Since the publication of Carr and Brown''s biomedical equipment text more than ten years ago, it has become the industry standard. Now, this completely revised second edition promises to set the pace for modern biomedical equipment technology.

A Niagara Falls, N.Y., reporter uncovered the Love Canal toxic waste scandal in 1978, and now relates tales of thousands of chemical dumps that contaminate waters, soil and air in the United States.