Vital Signs: A Complete Guide to the Crop Circle Mystery and Why It is Not a Hoax [Paperback]

Andy Thomas (Author), Mike Leigh (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 16, 2002

Crop circles, those beautiful and complex patterns that are visible from the air in fields around the world, have long fascinated the public, media, and scientific community. Vital Signs is a comprehensive guide for newcomers to these puzzling patterns and an essential history for those who are already intrigued. Illustrated with hundreds of full-color and black-and-white photos, this chronological and photographic history is an accessible discussion of the various crop circle theories, physical and statistical evidence, and the surprising effects these formations have had on observers and researchers.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...these beautiful and joyous creations not only transcend our ordinary understanding of the material world, but confront our sense of the spiritual, too. To learn about the formations is remarkable enough, but to see and enter and savor them is truly awesome…poised as we are on the brink of ever more mind-blowing formations and hidden messages, it is a blessing that we have a guide as inspired as Andy Thomas."
—from the Foreword by Mike Leigh

"One of the best books on crop circles to emerge in years...Highly recommended."
—UFO Magazine

About the Author

Andy Thomas was born and bred in the south-east of England at Lewes, East Sussex, an area where he still lives today with his wife and son. A founder and member of the Southern Circular Research team (SCR), which carries out much active cerealogical work and has been holding regular public meetings since 1991, Andy is now editor of the popular website www.swirlednews.com, renowned for its outspoken and insightful reporting. He previously produced SC, the globally read bimonthly crop circle journal.

Andy has made numerous international radio and TV appearances, including television spots on The Learning Channel, The History Channel, and NBC's Today Show. He has been featured in many programs in his home country, the UK, as well as in overseas productions in places as diverse as Italy, Denmark, Japan, and Germany, and has appeared in various crop circle documentary videos.

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: Frog Books; Revised edition (December 16, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1583940693
• ISBN-13: 978-1583940693
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 0.3 x 10.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #889,958 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A definitive history of the crop circles, May 1, 2003

By 

Michael Miley (Sonoma, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Vital Signs: A Complete Guide to the Crop Circle Mystery and Why It is Not a Hoax (Paperback)

When Andy Thomas' Vital Signs first came out in its UK edition in 1998, it was quickly seen as one of the best historical surveys of the post-1978 crop circle phenomenon. As a longtime editor of the journal of the Southern Circular Research group (now known as Swirled News at www.swirlednews.com), as well as a top-notch researcher himself, Thomas had been looking long and hard at the crop formations, from every angle, both inside and outside the glyphs. With great persistence, a feisty spirit, and often hilarious drama at such venues as the annual Glastonbury Symposium and the International UFO Congress, Thomas remains one of the fiercest defenders of the true crop circles, and a defender as well of the hard research that's been done on the phenomenon over the years. I'm happy to see that Vital Signs has come out in an updated version in the US, incorporating the glyphs from the intervening years, including the 2001 season. Readers unfamiliar with the first edition will want to buy this version, one of the best overviews of the phenomenon.

Vital Signs begins with a painstaking presentation of the ground-level data, including the unusual layering and swirls of the downed crop, while providing important details of the scientific work that's been done analyzing the effects on the stalks and soil, establishing the reality of the phenomenon beyond all the hoaxing. It then goes elaborately into what's seen from up above: the pictorial shapes and beautiful geometries, uncovering the mathematics encoded in the shapes. Along the way, we also learn of the strange balls of light (BOLs) seen hovering over the fields and of the effects of crop circle energies on electronic equipment and the biological systems of humans and animals. We're treated too to eyewitness accounts of crop circles forming, including the important recent case in Amsterdam when Nancy Talbott-a key scientific researcher and member of the BLT Research Team-along with Robbert van der Broeke, saw three powerful tubes of light descend into a bean field outside the van der Broeke home, only to discover a few minutes later that a structured crop circle had appeared in the field. It's stories like these that lead one to believe that crop circles are a key part of the worldwide UFO phenomenon.

One of the great strengths of Vital Signs is the year-by-year chronology it provides, as well as the beautiful photographic gallery that accompanies the text, including a central color section. It's a chronicle that not only describes the fascinating evolution of the crop formations over the years, but also the rabid atmosphere of controversy that has grown up around them: are they manmade, anomalous, or a mixture of both? How can you tell the real from the hoaxed and what's the percentage of each? Are the simple ones the true phenomenon, or are some of the more complex formations real as well? As Thomas juggles the assertions and denials on both sides of the fence-as well as the natural, supernatural, and ufological theories as to how they're made-what finally emerges is that, if any of them are not manmade (and much evidence supports the idea that many, perhaps most of them are not), then we have a genuine mystery that's growing in scope around the world. However, it's only ongoing, careful research that has the power to cut through the fog of disinformation. Vital Signs is a great introduction for those confronting the crop circles for the very first time, as well as a primary resource for long-time researchers still dazzled by the mysterious signs in the fields.

-Michael Miley is a contributing editor to UFO Magazine (US).

25 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb Photographs, Light on the Text, March 15, 2006

By 

Robert D. Steele (Oakton, VA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Vital Signs: A Complete Guide to the Crop Circle Mystery and Why It is Not a Hoax (Paperback)

EDIT of 30 Dec 09 to add pointer to all my reviews: Phi Beta Iota the Public Intelligence Blog now offers all of my reviews sorted into 98 categories including Intelligence Extraterrestial (13 books, all with links back to Amazon) and Consciousness and Social IQ (127 books) and Cosmos & Destiny (15 books).

This is one of two first-rate books on crop circles and their implications for mankind that I recommend. This one is the "coffee table" book, with an absolutely sensational collection of clear color photographs that provide what I believe may be the single best collection of distinct crop circles at distinct times and places on the planet.

This book is however light on the text and the thinking. It should be read in conjunction with Opening Minds: A Journey of Extraordinary Encounters, Crop Circles, and Resonance by Simeon Hein, Ph.D.

I am persuaded of three things by these books taken together and my various other readings:

1) The Earth is alive and everything on it is a web of life that has a global consciousness--the butterfly effect and the mind over matter effects are real.

2) There exist other forms of intelligence at least equal if not vastly superior to ours elsewhere, and I speculate from some of this reading that we are a "diversity enhancer" for a larger constellation of planets, and that we may also be failing a longer-term test to determine if we are ready for inter-planetary interaction.

3) There are, between books like this and the many very intelligent people that tend NOT to go into politics, clear possibilities for our rising to the challenge. We simply have not focused as a Collective Intelligence or World Brain, and we need to do so before we destroy our planet and our species.

Both books are almost mesmerizing.

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Crop Circle Encyclopedia, October 13, 2003

By 

Denni Clarke, author of "Crop Circle Wis... (Freedom, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Vital Signs: A Complete Guide to the Crop Circle Mystery and Why It is Not a Hoax (Paperback)

Vital Signs is the most comprehensive guide to the beautiful and enigmatic crop circles ever written. Andy writes in a very clear and easy to read style, putting together an enormous amount of information, combined with loads of wonderful photos, many of them in color.
This book is a "must read" for any crop circle enthusiast.