Handbooks

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28553, 5 April 1958, Page 3

Handbooks

Foyles Handbooks are a very well-known, most reasonablypriced series of books designed to give instruction on a wide range of subjects. Four new titles illustrate the diversity of subjects in a series which now includes 130 books The new titles are: “Irises For Your Garden,” “Rifle Shooting,” “Alsatians,” and “Canoeing.” Instruction in each book is illustrated by picture and diagram., The plates in the ( book on irises are particularly good. Phoenix House has published two books by George F. Mason which will entertain and delight young persons interested tn natural history: In “Animal Tools,” Mr Mason describes the anatomical features which members of the animal kingdom put to highly specialised uses. Thfe reader is instructed about such things as the spider’s spinning machinery, a fly’s gyroscope, and the elaborate tool kit a bee carries. Ih “Animal Homes,” Mr Mason gives a fascinating account of the places where animals live. Mr Mason writes and draws with the author* ity and skill expected of a hatur-alist-artist on the staff of the American Museum of Natural History, New Ydrk. ♦ “Full Throttle” in the Foulis Handy Series is the handbook size edition of the racing experiences of Sir Henry (“Tim”) Birkin, the famous racing motorist. “The Sex Factor in Marriage” is a new, reset edition of a book first published in 1930 and found acceptable to several generations. Two!, just-published New Zealand handbooks are “Speak Easy,” by James Milbum, published by Hugh Price, and “How to Write and Sell Short Stories,” by George Joseph, published by Whitcombe and Tombs. Mr Milbum’s is a clearly-written handbook about public speaking and is specially designed for New Zealand conditions. The title of Mr Josephs book explains the writer’s theme "Looking At The Stars” is a new volume in - the Excursions Series published by Phoenix House. Dr. Michael Ovenden tells the story of astronomy and he gives an excellent summarised story of our knowledge of the universe. He puts the latest astronomical knowledge into his picture, and a chapter on the radio telescope explains the potentialities this new scientific instrument possesses for enlarging knowledge. A larger book, but a handbook all the same, deals with genetics —a branch of biological study that is attracting more and more alien-' tion. In “Genetics Made Easv.” published by Faber and Faber. Philip Goldstein, an American biologist. takes his reader step by step through the hereditary’ factors known to geneticists. A complicated subject is explained lucidly, and the reader’s understanding 4s helped by a profusion of diagrammatic illustrations.