"This is the first book to cover the identification, biology and relationships of all true shrikes, bush-shrikes, helmet-shrikes, wood-shrikes, the closely related flycatcher-shrikes, philentomas, batises and wattle-eyes. This group comprises 114 species in 21 genera within the families Laniidae and Malaconotidae." "All species are portrayed in 41 colour plates, consisting of over 480 illustrations and depicting differences in sex, age, geographical variation, and flight pattern. Facing the plates are identification captions and colour distribution maps for at-a-glance reference. The introduction explains the history of relationships within the group and highlights the issues of conservation and species identification. It offers birdwatchers, conservationists and ornithologists a challenge to evaluate species from the perspective of behavioural communication, stressing acoustic and visual signals in an attempt to better understand what species represent. For each genus, acoustic and visual signals are summarised and used to map similarities."--Jacket.