Shawn William Miller, Brigham Young University, Utah
Shawn W. Miller is the author of Fruitless Trees: Portuguese Conservation and Brazil's Colonial Timber (2000), and has published on Latin America's environmental history in the Hispanic American Historical Review, Forest & Conservation History, and Colonial Latin American Historical Review.

Introduction: props and scenery
1. An old world before it was 'new'
2. Nature's conquests
3. The colonial balance sheet
4. Tropical determinism
5. Human determination
6. Asphyxiated habitats
7. Developing environmentalism
Epilogue: Cuba's latest revolution.

"Sailing over the last six centuries in just over two hundred pages, Shawn Miller presents readers with a magnificent panorama of the turbulent environmental history of Latin America. Specialists, students, and general readers will all find Miller's pages intellectually intriguing and often entertaining. A delightful book and an important story."