Praying mantis is one of the famous Chinese Martial Arts families.  It was said to be created by Master Wang Lang at the turn of the Ming Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty.  Master Wang developed this boxing technique by combining the twelve fundamental actions, (i.e. touch, stick, contact, lean, grab, forward, spring, attack, sickle, twist, pluck and block which were realized through observing how mantis fight for food) with another seventeen schools of northern famous martial arts and lastly monkey footwork. As a result of the adaptation or mixing with other school of thought, different sub-families of praying mantis were developed. The most famous sub-families include Seven Star, Plum-Blossom, Throwing Hand, Six combination, Taichi, and Guangban, etc.  The spreading of praying mantis was originally concentrated in Shandong province.  In 20th century, the Seven Star and Taichi mantis were brought to Hong Kong by Masters Luo Guangyu & Zhao Zhuxi. 
This book presents 53 Seven Star Mantis routines and 9 Taichi Mantis routines.  Besides, it also provide 6 free-hand combating routines.  Actions are named with a unified system to aid learning.