Poetry. "Murray Shugars may find his 'lost apotheosis of absence' somewhere on the road between Michigan and Mississippi, or perhaps he may never find it at all. It doesn't matter: the record he leaves of his search are these charming, crafty poems, smartly probing into the everyday details of provincial life and turning magically into private rituals before our eyes. here is a poet who casually invites Garcia Lorca to stay with him in Vicksburg, who is on good terms with Lilith, and occasionally plays cards with God. these are poems to be savored like good bourbon, like Bill Evans at the piano. they are 'hazel and amaranth, cypress and madwort.' They're the real deal." Norman Finkelstein"

Invasive species are everywhere, from forests and prairies to mountaintops and river mouths. Their rampant nature and sheer numbers appear to overtake fragile native species and forever change the ecosystems that they depend on. Concerns that invasive species represent significant threats to global biodiversity and ecological integrity permeate conversations from schoolrooms to board rooms, and concerned citizens grapple with how to rapidly and efficiently manage their populations. These worries have culminated in an ongoing “war on invasive species,” where the arsenal is stocked with bulldozers, chainsaws, and herbicides put to the task of their immediate eradication. In Hawaii, mangrove trees (Avicennia spp.) are sprayed with glyphosate and left to decompose on the sandy shorelines where they grow, and in Washington, helicopters apply the herbicide Imazapyr to smooth cordgrass (Spartina alterniflora) growing in estuaries. The “war on invasive species” is in full swing, but given the scope of such potentially dangerous and ecologically degrading eradication practices, it is necessary to question the very nature of the battle. Beyond the War on Invasive Species offers a much-needed alternative perspective on invasive species and the best practices for their management based on a holistic, permaculture-inspired framework. Utilizing the latest research and thinking on the changing nature of ecological systems, Beyond the War on Invasive Species closely examines the factors that are largely missing from the common conceptions of invasive species, including how the colliding effects of climate change, habitat destruction, and changes in land use and management contribute to their proliferation. There is more to the story of invasive species than is commonly conceived, and Beyond the War on Invasive Species offers ways of understanding their presence and ecosystem effects in order to make more ecologically responsible choices in land restoration and biodiversity conservation that address the root of the invasion phenomenon. The choices we make on a daily basis—the ways we procure food, shelter, water, medicine, and transportation—are the major drivers of contemporary changes in ecosystem structure and function; therefore, deep and long-lasting ecological restoration outcomes will come not just from eliminating invasive species, but through conscientious redesign of these production systems.

Its capabilities unrivaled and its global reach unmatched, America's military is the envy of the world. Yet, to those in the know, like retired Marine Major General Arnold Punaro, a former Staff Director of the Senate Armed Services Committee, there is compelling need for improvement in its support elements. From the glacial pace of acquisitions to the spiraling growth of the defense agencies to the fully-burdened costs of the All-Volunteer Force, the Department of Defense's non-warfighting elements are not getting enough bang for the buck. Every recent Secretary of Defense has pushed business-minded reforms as a high priority, citing the need to convert overhead to warfighting capacity.Despite substantial increases in defense spending over the last decades, the number of warfighters is still declining. The Ever-Shrinking Fighting Force lays out, in clear and compelling detail, the major factors that contribute to this adverse trend that has outlasted efforts to reverse it by strong Defense Secretaries and even Presidents.Drawing on his half-century of experience in national security, Gen. Punaro offers a no-nonsense look at the inefficiencies that have plagued the Pentagon's creeping bureaucracy for decades. With calls for defense reform emanating from both the executive and legislative branches, this timely book provides a road map for thoughtful and balanced improvements.

Drew A. Swanson has written an “environmental” history about a crop of great historical and economic significance: American tobacco. A preferred agricultural product for much of the South, the tobacco plant would ultimately degrade the land that nurtured it, but as the author provocatively argues, the choice of crop initially made perfect agrarian as well as financial sense for southern planters. Swanson, who brings to his narrative the experience of having grown up on a working Virginia tobacco farm, explores how one attempt at agricultural permanence went seriously awry. He weaves together social, agricultural, and cultural history of the Piedmont region and illustrates how ideas about race and landscape management became entangled under slavery and afterward. Challenging long-held perceptions, this innovative study examines not only the material relationships that connected crop, land, and people but also the justifications that encouraged tobacco farming in the region.

In these essays, one of the most influential Southern journalists of his generation sorts out a whole warehouse of Southern idiosyncrasy and iconography, including the Southern belle, Faulkner, James Dickey, Stonewall Jackson, Cormac McCarthy, guns, dogs, fathers, trees, George Wallace, Elvis, Doc Watson, the decline of poetry, and the return of chain gangs.

The award-winning author’s “gorgeously-crafted second collection of stories” explores moments of profound loss, discovery, and transition (Charlotte Observer). The stories in this volume explore the myriad ways people lose, find, and hold on to one another. When all else fails her characters—science, religion, family, self—the powerful act of storytelling keeps their broken lives together. Each story in this rewarding and multifaceted collection introduces people who yearn for better lives and find themselves entangled in the hopes and dreams that heal and bind us all. The title story—chosen by John Updike for The Best American Short Stories of the Century anthology—follows two generations of a family driven by the “patient and brutal need that people called hope.” In “The Jap Room,” winner of the 2008 Goodheart Prize, a woman tries to help her WWII veteran husband finally come home. “Rowing to Darien” introduces a famous English actress as she rows away from her husband’s rice plantation. In “Hush” a gravely ill man encounters himself in the darkness of Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave. These and other stories deftly broach universal themes of love, loss, and the redemptive power of storytelling. Foreword by the Flannery O’Connor Prize–winning author Mary Hood

5-Star, A Country Bull of Legend, never wanted to be conquered. Reading his life story inspires one to believe that all animals desire individual freedom. Growing up on a farm during the 1940's and 1950's allowed the author to nurture and experience this determined and stubborn full-blooded Jersey bull. Learn how the bull's escapades fascinated, amused, frightened, and left a legend of stories in the countryside of rural Louisiana.

Invasions of non-native plants into forests of the Southern United States continue to go unchecked and only partially un-monitored. These infestations increasingly erode forest productivity, hindering forest use and management activities, and degrading diversity and wildlife habitat. Often called non-native, exotic, non-indigenous, alien, or noxious weeds, they occur as trees, shrubs, vines, grasses, ferns, and forbs. This guide provides information on accurate identification of the 56 non-native plants and groups that are currently invading the forests of the 13 Southern States. In additin, it lists other non-native plants of growing concern. Illustrations. This is a print on demand edition of an important, hard-to-find publication.