PAST IMPERFECT

Rupert Sheldrake. The Presence of the Past: Morphic Resonance and the Habits of Nature, 2nd edition. Icon Books, 2011.

My review of the first edition of this book in Magonia 32 (March 1989) was less than enthusiastic to say the least. In the second edition Sheldrake does seem to have made an effort to incorporate more recent scientific findings and ideas and to back-peddle on some of the political and metaphysical speculation, but I doubt that this will make his central thesis any more attractive to the scientific community.
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NORTHERN ECHOES: MY FIFTY YEARS IN A STRANGE WORLD

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It is hard for me to believe it, but this Spring and Summer marks 50 years of my interest in topics ufological, Fortean, Gouldian and paranormal. This interest was sparked by a television series called Court of Mystery which ran every other week from the 18th May to 13th July 1961. This featured a number of 'unsolved mysteries' including the Eilean Mor lighthouse, the Mary Celeste, Andrew Crosse the man who made insects, the loss of the Waratah, and finally 'The Flying Saucer'.
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TRACKING THE MEN IN BLACK

Jim Keith, Casebook on the Men in Black, Adventures Unlimited Press, 2011.

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Nick Redfern. The Real Men in Black. New Page Books, 2011.

The Jim Keith book is a new edition, with a foreword by Kenn Thomas, of a book first published in 1997. Jim Keith died in 1999. After a short summary of stories about mysterious men in dark clothing, dating from the 15th century, there is a discussion of the modern version of the tradition.

MAKING PEOPLE

Philip Ball. Unnatural: The Heretical Idea of Making People. Bodley Head, 2011.

A major theme of the modern alien abduction folklore is that of the mass produced 'hybrid' children, fermented in various sorts of equipment from test tubes to incubators via nutrient vats. Being raised thus, these children are assumed to be somehow wan and soulless. Though the alien abduction lore is nowhere mentioned in it, Philip Ball's excellent book shows how such fantasies develop.
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STRANGE NEW WORLDS

Ray Jayawardhana. Strange New Worlds – The Search for Alien Planets and Life Beyond Our Solar System. Princeton University Press, 2011 

There is little doubt the discovery of tell-tale signs of life elsewhere in the universe, let alone the receipt of an indisputably alien radio signal, would have massive implications for mankind – the first sign that life is not unique to Earth.
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TWO VIEWS ON THE THRICE-GREAT

Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince. The Forbidden Universe. Skyhorse Publishing, 2011.

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Gary Lachman. The Quest for Hermes Trismegistus Floris Books, 2011.

The Forbidden Universe is divided into two parts: the first shows how Hermetic doctrines, for example, heliocentricity, the notion of an infinite universe, the circulation of spirit moving in the blood, above all the notion that Man was a miraculous creation, divine, and capable in principle of working wonders, derived from an Ancient Egyptian theological school based in Heliopolis.
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INVESTIGATING THE IMPOSSIBLE

Ulrich Magin. Investigating the Impossible: Sea Serpents in the Air, Volcanoes that Aren't and Other Out of Place Mysteries. Anomalist Books, 2011

Ulrich Magin is a Fortean writer very much in the Magonia mould as his introduction to this collection of essays shows, where he contrasts the various approaches to reports of anomalous experiences. The skeptical one simply says that the witnesses are lying, or drunk, or crazy or just mistaken, or there is a 'rational' explanation and that is that, end of the matter.
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