The British are coming! Fourteen-year-old Daniel wants to join the militia and fight against the redcoats. His father wants him to stay in Concord, Massachusetts, and help run the blacksmith shop. Daniel thinks the job is pointless, until he finds a secret stash of weapons in the shop's back room. Now, he must protect the weapons from the British, or the American Revolution could be over before it begins.

Secret Weapons of Jujutsu is the first jujutsu book in English that deals with the full array of small hand weapons used by the Japanese samurai and constabulary. This martial arts manual includes a history of the weapons and discussions of hibuki (concealed weapons), improvised weapons, and traditional battlefield weapons such as: kansashi (a long, pointed metal hairpin worn by men and women) kokai and kudzuka (small utility knives) shoku (fire ax) shakuhachi (a bamboo flute — a particular favorite of monks) yawara (short wooden rod) manriki-gusari (weighted chain) suntetsu (short iron bar) lessen (iron war fan). Secret Weapons of Jujutsu discusses the weapons and demonstrates their use, in a series of clear, easy to follow photographs. Also included are historical photographs, as well as reproductions of paintings and line drawings, of these weapons and their bearers.

Drawing on extensive interviews and previously secret CIA files, two sisters describe how they began their top-secret careers as espionage agents at the age of seven, the government programs that created them, and their work in a covert world of government intrigue.

Mostly tiny, infinitely delicate, and short-lived, insects and their relatives—arthropods—nonetheless outnumber all their fellow creatures on earth. How lowly arthropods achieved this unlikely preeminence is a story deftly and colorfully told in this follow-up to the award-winning For Love of Insects. Part handbook, part field guide, part photo album, Secret Weapons chronicles the diverse and often astonishing defensive strategies that have allowed insects, spiders, scorpions, and other many-legged creatures not just to survive, but to thrive. In 69 chapters, each brilliantly illustrated with photographs culled from Thomas Eisner’s legendary collection, we meet a largely North American cast of arthropods—as well as a few of their kin from Australia, Europe, and Asia—and observe at firsthand the nature and extent of the defenses that lie at the root of their evolutionary success. Here are the cockroaches and termites, the carpenter ants and honeybees, and all the miniature creatures in between, deploying their sprays and venom, froth and feces, camouflage and sticky coatings. And along with a marvelous bug’s-eye view of how these secret weapons actually work, here is a close-up look at the science behind them, from taxonomy to chemical formulas, as well as an appendix with instructions for studying chemical defenses at home. Whether dipped into here and there or read cover-to-cover, Secret Weapons will prove invaluable to hands-on researchers and amateur naturalists alike, and will captivate any reader for whom nature is a source of wonder.

Critical Acclaim for Secret Weapons of World War II "Breuer has produced yet another collection of rip-roaring tales. . . . A delightful addition to the niche that Breuer has so successfully carved out." -Publishers Weekly "It is Breuer's portrayal of the competition for technological superiority between the Allies and the Nazis that grabs the reader and shows the significance of each wartime discovery and invention." -State Journal-Register, Springfield, Illinois In the fast-paced, suspenseful Secret Weapons of World War II, noted military historian William Breuer chronicles the clandestine battle that occurred between the brilliant scientists and codebreakers of the Allies and the Axis powers. Re-creating the covert missions, hoaxes, spying, conspiracies, and electronic sleuthing, Breuer deftly uncovers the spectacular feats of the fascinating men and women who determined the outcome of the war-providing an unprecedented look at the least-known operations and plots conducted by both sides.

While previous writers have focused primarily on strategic, military, and intelligence factors, Walter Grunden underscores the dramatic scientific and technological disparities that left Japan vunerable and ultimately led to its defeat in World War II.

In the wake of the anthrax letters following the attacks on the World Trade Center, Americans have begun to grapple with two difficult truths: that there is no terrorist threat more horrifying -- and less understood -- than germ warfare, and that it would take very little to mount a devastating attack on American soil. In Germs, three veteran reporters draw on top sources inside and outside the U.S. government to lay bare Washington's secret strategies for combating this deadly threat. Featuring an inside look at how germ warfare has been waged throughout history and what form its future might take (and in whose hands), Germs reads like a gripping detective story told by fascinating key figures: American and Soviet medical specialists who once made germ weapons but now fight their spread, FBI agents who track Islamic radicals, the Iraqis who built Saddam Hussein's secret arsenal, spies who travel the world collecting lethal microbes, and scientists who see ominous developments on the horizon. With clear scientific explanations and harrowing insights, Germs is a masterfully written -- and timely -- work of investigative journalism.