The year-long fact-finding mission of apostle David O. McKay and his traveling companion Hugh J. Cannon to places historian Leonard J. Arrington has called the "geographic and organizational periphery" of Mormondom was one of the most significant moments of the twentieth century for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. While the contemporary LDS church has grown to become a global presence, the early decades of the last century found missionaries struggling to gain converts abroad. Cannon's rich and vivid account of his and McKay's 61,646-mile around-the-world journey illustrates the roots of Mormonism's globalization. The account is without doubt one of the more significant texts in the historical cannon of global Mormon studies.

Reid L Neilson annotates Cannon's account, enriching the experience for scholarly and lay readers alike. Ancillary material, including the transcripts of Cannon's letters to the "Deseret News "detailing the journey, the complete text of Cannon's original journals (available for the first time ever), a collection of 60 photographs, maps, and illustrations culled from McKay's own collection, as well as comprehensive lists of names and places, will be available digitally.

Vedic Sanskrit literature contains a wealth of material concerning the mythology and religious practices of India between 1500 and 500 B.C.E. a crucial period in the formation of traditional Indian culture. Stephanie W. Jamison here addresses the conditions that have limited our understanding of Vedic myth and ritual, such as the profusion and obscurity of the texts and the tendency on the part of scholars to approach mythology and ritual independently. Tracing two key myths through a variety of texts, Jamison provides insight into the relationship between early Indic myth and ritual as well as offering a new methodology for their study.

After a brief survey of Vedic literature and religion, Jamison examines the recurrences of the myths "Indra fed the Yatis to the hyenas" and "Svarbhanu pierced the sun with darkness." Focusing on their verbal form and ritual setting, she essays a general interpretation of the myths and their ritual purpose. Her book sheds new light on some central figures in Vedic mythology and on the evolution of Vedic mythological narrative, and it points to parallels in other cultures as well. Indologists and other scholars and students of South Asian culture, Indo-Eurepeanists, folklorists, historians of religion, classicists, and comparatists will welcome this rich and suggestive introduction to the Vedic tradition."