When American explorers crossed the Texas Panhandle, they dubbed it part of the ""Great American Desert."" A ""sea of grass,"" the llano appeared empty, flat, and barely habitable. Contemporary developments - cell phone towers, oil rigs, and wind turbines - have only added to this stereotype. Yet in this lyrical ecomemoir, Shelley Armitage charts a unique rediscovery of the largely unknown land, a journey at once deeply personal and far-reaching in its exploration of the connections between memory, spirit, and place. Armitage begins her narrative with the intention to walk the llano from her family farm thirty meandering miles along the Middle Alamosa Creek to the Canadian River. Along the way, she seeks the connection between her father and one of the area's first settlers, Ysabel Gurule, who built his dugout on the banks of the Canadian. Armitage, who grew up nearby in the small town of Vega, finds this act of walking inseparable from the act of listening and writing. ""What does the land say to us?"" she asks as she witnesses human alterations to the landscape - perhaps most catastrophic the continued drainage of the land's most precious resource, the Ogallala Aquifer. Yet the llano's wonders persist: dynamic mesas and canyons, vast flora and fauna, diverse wildlife, rich histories. Armitage recovers the voices of ancient, Native, and Hispano peoples, their stories interwoven with her own: her father's legacy, her mother's decline, a brother's love. The llano holds not only the beauty of ecological surprises but a renewed realization of kinship in a world ever changing. Reminiscent of the work of Terry Tempest Williams and John McPhee, Walking the Llano is both a celebration of an oft-overlooked region and a soaring testimony to the power of the landscape to draw us into greater understanding of ourselves and others by experiencing a deeper connection with the places we inhabit.

Tembeli is a beautiful island in Muzanga located somewhere in the heart of the Niger Delta, an island so lavishly blessed by nature with natural and material resources. The people lived in perfect harmony until Oilgate, a multinational Oil company struck its first oil well in Tembeli. Ever since then, things have never been the same in Tembeli.For long, the people found it themselves in a period of no peace. Faced with intimidation and marginalization by the military government of Muzanga, who felt that their crude oil revenue base was being threatened by Tembeli's outcry for environmental violations by Oilgate, the people vowed to defend their kingdom with the last drop of their blood. This is a story that was never told and will touch even a heart as cold as steel.

The book is designed to provide a review on the methods and current status of conservation of the tropical plant species. It will also provide the information on the richness of the tropical plant diversity, the need to conserve, and the potential utilization of the genetic resources. Future perspectives of conservation of tropical species will be discussed. Besides being useful to researchers and graduate students in the field, we hope to create a reference for a much wider audience who are interested in conservation of tropical plant diversity.

"Over 50 years in the life of a 'commons ecologist'; the quest for unappropriated government land ("Commons"). What was the "FLPMA"? Was it the greatest bloodless land reform in the 20th century? Does it possess 21st century environmental ideas that may save Earth's biodiversity?"--T.p.

""Notes from a Dying Planet" is a concerned, passionate, and informed survey of the environmental problems facing our planet, with gems of succinct essays interspersed with the reality of daily news. Written from the perspective of a very well informed citizen with a solid scientific background, it conveys in clear language the many challenges we face, convinces us of the folly of continuing on our present course, and suggests useful steps that each of us as individuals can take toward making our planet a sustainable habitat for all species." - Jeffrey A. McNeely, Chief Scientist, IUCN-The World Conservation Union, Gland, Switzerland

Internationally respected neuroscientist Paul Brown asks why we are doing so little about overpopulation, global warming and the current mass extinction. He describes how these three threats could end civilization as we know it, and possibly finish off our entire species, by the end of this century. Brown examines the biological and cultural evolution of our species, and how they influence our behavior. He describes some of the proposed solutions to problems like the energy crisis, explains why they're too narrow in scope, and proposes broader approaches. He also takes us week by week through crucial events unfolding around the globe. Written for a lay audience, "Notes from a Dying Planet" provides all the background needed for each topic.

"Paul Brown has written a book that is at once unique, scary, and exciting. It is unique because of the format, scary because the author tries to be honest with the reader, and exciting because if we all become as committed as Brown is we will reverse the environmental trends that are undermining our future." - Lester Brown, Founder and President, Earth Policy Institute, and author of "Plan B 2.0: Rescuing a Planet under Stress and a Civilization in Trouble."