Found by my buddy Angel. Just beautiful.
The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore from Moonbot Studios on Vimeo.
The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore from Moonbot Studios on Vimeo.
Showing posts with label books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label books. Show all posts
Friday, February 03, 2012
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Housecleaning and Book Selling
In the process of moving my books into their new "homes," I found that there were some books that I'd read once and realized I'd never read again, or books I'd bought and not gotten so far as the front matter. I could take them to the used bookstore and get MORE books, but that would sort of defeat the purpose of freeing up book shelf space. So...the following books are available for sale at low, low prices (which would include shipping within the U.S. or Canada, even if I take a loss):
Mass Market Paperback or Smaller: $5
Trade Paperback: $7:
Hardcover: $10
The following titles are yours if you're willing to send a check (email me for a mailing address).
Science Fiction
Moving Mars, by Greg Bear (Mass Market Paperback)
Mercury, by Ben Bova (Mass Market Paperback)
Hunters of Dune, by Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson (Hardcover)
The Dosadi Experiment, by Frank Herbert (Mass Market Paperback)
The Godmakers, by Frank Herbert (Mass Market Paperback)
Destination: Void, by Frank Herbert (Mass Market Paperback)
The Jesus Incident, by Frank Herbert and Bill Ransom (Mass Market Paperback)
Singularity Sky, by Charles Stross (Mass Market Paperback)
Other Fiction
The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Trade Paperback)
The Literary Ace Strikes Again, by Charles M. Schulz (Mass Market Paperback/Small Hardcover)
Nonfiction
The High Road, by Ben Bova (Trade Paperback--Discounted to $7 due to the obscene amount of scribbling I did in the margins, arguing with the author)
The Survival Imperative, by William E. Burrows (Hardcover)
Mission to Mars, by Michael Collins (Hardcover)
Breach of Trust, by Toma A. Coburn (Hardcover)
Why We Whisper, by Sen. Jim DeMint and J. David Woodard, Ph.D. (Hardcover)
Astrobusiness, by Edward Ridley Finch, Jr., and Amanda Lee Moore (Trade Paperback)
The Drama of Atheist Humanism, by Henri De Lubac (Trade Paperback)
Comet, by Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan (Hardcover)
My Grandfather's Son, by Clarence Thomas
How to Think Like Einstein, by Scott Thorpe
History of the Peloponnesian War, by Thucydides
Travel (All Trade Paperback)
Europe for Dummies
All 3 for Trade Paperback Price:
Eyewitness Travel Guide: French Phrase Book
Eyewitness Travel Guide: German Phrase Book
Eyewitness Travel Guide: Italian Phrase Book
Fodor's Europe
Fodor's Ireland 2005
Fodor's Italy 2000
Fodor's Switzerland 2000
Frommer's Ireland 2005
Rick Steves' Europe Through the Back Door 2008
Rough Guides First-Time Europe
Thomas Cook Europe By Rail
In the process of moving my books into their new "homes," I found that there were some books that I'd read once and realized I'd never read again, or books I'd bought and not gotten so far as the front matter. I could take them to the used bookstore and get MORE books, but that would sort of defeat the purpose of freeing up book shelf space. So...the following books are available for sale at low, low prices (which would include shipping within the U.S. or Canada, even if I take a loss):
Mass Market Paperback or Smaller: $5
Trade Paperback: $7:
Hardcover: $10
The following titles are yours if you're willing to send a check (email me for a mailing address).
Science Fiction
Moving Mars, by Greg Bear (Mass Market Paperback)
Mercury, by Ben Bova (Mass Market Paperback)
Hunters of Dune, by Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson (Hardcover)
The Dosadi Experiment, by Frank Herbert (Mass Market Paperback)
The Godmakers, by Frank Herbert (Mass Market Paperback)
Destination: Void, by Frank Herbert (Mass Market Paperback)
The Jesus Incident, by Frank Herbert and Bill Ransom (Mass Market Paperback)
Singularity Sky, by Charles Stross (Mass Market Paperback)
Other Fiction
The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Trade Paperback)
The Literary Ace Strikes Again, by Charles M. Schulz (Mass Market Paperback/Small Hardcover)
Nonfiction
The High Road, by Ben Bova (Trade Paperback--Discounted to $7 due to the obscene amount of scribbling I did in the margins, arguing with the author)
The Survival Imperative, by William E. Burrows (Hardcover)
Mission to Mars, by Michael Collins (Hardcover)
Breach of Trust, by Toma A. Coburn (Hardcover)
Why We Whisper, by Sen. Jim DeMint and J. David Woodard, Ph.D. (Hardcover)
Astrobusiness, by Edward Ridley Finch, Jr., and Amanda Lee Moore (Trade Paperback)
The Drama of Atheist Humanism, by Henri De Lubac (Trade Paperback)
Comet, by Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan (Hardcover)
My Grandfather's Son, by Clarence Thomas
How to Think Like Einstein, by Scott Thorpe
History of the Peloponnesian War, by Thucydides
Travel (All Trade Paperback)
Europe for Dummies
All 3 for Trade Paperback Price:
Eyewitness Travel Guide: French Phrase Book
Eyewitness Travel Guide: German Phrase Book
Eyewitness Travel Guide: Italian Phrase Book
Fodor's Europe
Fodor's Ireland 2005
Fodor's Italy 2000
Fodor's Switzerland 2000
Frommer's Ireland 2005
Rick Steves' Europe Through the Back Door 2008
Rough Guides First-Time Europe
Thomas Cook Europe By Rail
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
People of the Screen, People of the Book
I just finished reading an amazing article in The New Atlantis titled “People of the Screen.” Go ahead and read that first. I'll wait.
Okay, now, this article continues a battle that was being waged when I was in tech writing grad school (1999-2002): do computers and other electronic gadgets undermine or redefine what it means to be “literate?” I find myself in a unique position relative to the People of the Book and the People of the Screen, as I am a user of both.
The author discusses the cognitive differences between reading on a computer and reading a book. Book reading is obviously more linear. Books have a beginning, middle, and end, and they proceed in that order without a lot of noise or special effects. Computer reading is more like scanning or “reading” the TV. The text is there, but so are advertisements, music, animations, and hyperlinks, begging for your attention.
Cognitively, book reading is a very different activity from “surfing.” Book reading is quieter and requires a certain passivity as one allows another person—the author—to string words together in order to create a story and (if you have the imagination for it) images in your mind. The reader is the student, following a trail laid out by someone else, and can have the pleasures of “getting away from it all” or “escaping” to another world without a lot of effort. The reader might expand their personal intellectual or emotional horizons or learn something new by absorbing the ideas of another person.
The hypertext reader is operating within a created environment, as the book reader is, but has more control over the flow of events. Hyperlink A leads to Hyperlink B leads to Hyperlink C, and the original flow of text is disrupted by a reader-directed search for specific information. Video game players, too, operate within an environment created by someone else, and are expected to have much more control and autonomy than a book reader. Goals are established externally, more or less, and the player must reach those goals by trial and error. The fundamental difference (usually) between video gaming and hypertext fiction is that the visual environment is created for the player, much as movies imagine a book author’s “world” for the audience member.
My primary concerns about this shift from books to computers are their effects on basic and technical literacy, writing, and philosophy. Hypertext is, perhaps, the ultimate revenge of Jacques Derrida and the Deconstructionists, who have sought to question many or all of the assumptions put into writing (mostly by Western white males) by “deconstructing” every single term in a text (however you define it)*. I got one of two B’s in grad school partly because of my visceral distaste for this sort of thinking and my willingness to state so to the professor. Technical writers, especially, need to be very particular about the words they use to do their jobs, as technical results (or even lives) might be on the line if the wrong word or word order is used. So to subject a technical writer to the notion that the true meanings of words are problematic—and indeed, can be willfully or playfully messed with—is not a welcome one.
[* Sidebar Explanation: For example, a documentation writer might say that a technical document is a success if anyone picking up the document could follow the instructions and come up with the same results as anyone else (e.g. a recipe). A Deconstructionist, thinking him or herself inherently cleverer than the empirically “simple” tech writer, would ask, “Whom do you mean by anyone? What are your educational, economic, geographic, age-ist, racial, sexual, or political assumptions about that ‘anyone’? See? Your simple document isn’t written for ‘just anyone,’ is it?” And so the postdoc Deconstructionist gallops off merrily to write another monograph, happy with the chaos and extra paperwork they’ve caused for the tech writer. Meanwhile, the tech writer is left with the chore of adding a carefully worded disclaimer to the document to answer the Deconstructionist’s questions, and then hoping like hell that the reader, however defined and explained, can still do the basic task, which is to follow the damned directions.]
Now to keep myself honest and cut the Deconstructionists a little slack, I do write in hypertext, especially on this blog, wherein I link to various places on the Internet to make or amplify my points on this or that subject. It is also obviously true that I qualify as both regularly and digitally literate. However, I was just plain literate first, and that experience shapes my approach to blog writing, which is to say, I write as a linear text writer. My hyperlinks are more like footnotes, not deliberate links meant to “complicate” or “decontextualize” my words. If anything, my links reinforce my meaning.
Anyhow, there’s a philosophical dimension to Deconstructionism that is often overlooked because it seems so distant from real-world concerns. But notice my earlier distaste. What was it that I found so distasteful? Simple: nihilism. I don’t like the notion that “we don’t truly know what words mean.” If words can mean anything (“It depends on what your definition of ‘is’ is,” sayeth Clinton the Sage), then they might as well mean nothing. I believe that words can have somewhat consistent meanings across time—for instance, I’ve read translations of 2,500-year-old Greek and Latin authors and managed to enjoy the experience without a great deal of turmoil. If you don’t believe that words can have shared meanings across cultures or across time, then the Wizards of Smart who write dictionaries and textbooks and “set the intellectual tone” of the language will be the ones who decide what words mean based on pure politics.
So how does this relate to hypertext? Two words: Google Bombing. As Wikipedia (a bastion of hypertext if ever there was one) puts it,
So to take my revenge on the 21st century, I think I’ll turn off the computer and spend the rest of the night reading a book. Sounds like a fabulous way to spend a quiet evening.
I just finished reading an amazing article in The New Atlantis titled “People of the Screen.” Go ahead and read that first. I'll wait.
Okay, now, this article continues a battle that was being waged when I was in tech writing grad school (1999-2002): do computers and other electronic gadgets undermine or redefine what it means to be “literate?” I find myself in a unique position relative to the People of the Book and the People of the Screen, as I am a user of both.
The author discusses the cognitive differences between reading on a computer and reading a book. Book reading is obviously more linear. Books have a beginning, middle, and end, and they proceed in that order without a lot of noise or special effects. Computer reading is more like scanning or “reading” the TV. The text is there, but so are advertisements, music, animations, and hyperlinks, begging for your attention.
Cognitively, book reading is a very different activity from “surfing.” Book reading is quieter and requires a certain passivity as one allows another person—the author—to string words together in order to create a story and (if you have the imagination for it) images in your mind. The reader is the student, following a trail laid out by someone else, and can have the pleasures of “getting away from it all” or “escaping” to another world without a lot of effort. The reader might expand their personal intellectual or emotional horizons or learn something new by absorbing the ideas of another person.
The hypertext reader is operating within a created environment, as the book reader is, but has more control over the flow of events. Hyperlink A leads to Hyperlink B leads to Hyperlink C, and the original flow of text is disrupted by a reader-directed search for specific information. Video game players, too, operate within an environment created by someone else, and are expected to have much more control and autonomy than a book reader. Goals are established externally, more or less, and the player must reach those goals by trial and error. The fundamental difference (usually) between video gaming and hypertext fiction is that the visual environment is created for the player, much as movies imagine a book author’s “world” for the audience member.
My primary concerns about this shift from books to computers are their effects on basic and technical literacy, writing, and philosophy. Hypertext is, perhaps, the ultimate revenge of Jacques Derrida and the Deconstructionists, who have sought to question many or all of the assumptions put into writing (mostly by Western white males) by “deconstructing” every single term in a text (however you define it)*. I got one of two B’s in grad school partly because of my visceral distaste for this sort of thinking and my willingness to state so to the professor. Technical writers, especially, need to be very particular about the words they use to do their jobs, as technical results (or even lives) might be on the line if the wrong word or word order is used. So to subject a technical writer to the notion that the true meanings of words are problematic—and indeed, can be willfully or playfully messed with—is not a welcome one.
[* Sidebar Explanation: For example, a documentation writer might say that a technical document is a success if anyone picking up the document could follow the instructions and come up with the same results as anyone else (e.g. a recipe). A Deconstructionist, thinking him or herself inherently cleverer than the empirically “simple” tech writer, would ask, “Whom do you mean by anyone? What are your educational, economic, geographic, age-ist, racial, sexual, or political assumptions about that ‘anyone’? See? Your simple document isn’t written for ‘just anyone,’ is it?” And so the postdoc Deconstructionist gallops off merrily to write another monograph, happy with the chaos and extra paperwork they’ve caused for the tech writer. Meanwhile, the tech writer is left with the chore of adding a carefully worded disclaimer to the document to answer the Deconstructionist’s questions, and then hoping like hell that the reader, however defined and explained, can still do the basic task, which is to follow the damned directions.]
Now to keep myself honest and cut the Deconstructionists a little slack, I do write in hypertext, especially on this blog, wherein I link to various places on the Internet to make or amplify my points on this or that subject. It is also obviously true that I qualify as both regularly and digitally literate. However, I was just plain literate first, and that experience shapes my approach to blog writing, which is to say, I write as a linear text writer. My hyperlinks are more like footnotes, not deliberate links meant to “complicate” or “decontextualize” my words. If anything, my links reinforce my meaning.
Anyhow, there’s a philosophical dimension to Deconstructionism that is often overlooked because it seems so distant from real-world concerns. But notice my earlier distaste. What was it that I found so distasteful? Simple: nihilism. I don’t like the notion that “we don’t truly know what words mean.” If words can mean anything (“It depends on what your definition of ‘is’ is,” sayeth Clinton the Sage), then they might as well mean nothing. I believe that words can have somewhat consistent meanings across time—for instance, I’ve read translations of 2,500-year-old Greek and Latin authors and managed to enjoy the experience without a great deal of turmoil. If you don’t believe that words can have shared meanings across cultures or across time, then the Wizards of Smart who write dictionaries and textbooks and “set the intellectual tone” of the language will be the ones who decide what words mean based on pure politics.
So how does this relate to hypertext? Two words: Google Bombing. As Wikipedia (a bastion of hypertext if ever there was one) puts it,
A Google bomb (or "link bomb") is Internet slang for a certain kind of attempt to raise the ranking of a given page in results from a Google search, often with humorous or political intentions.Overload the Internet with your own alternative meanings, and people start to believe it. It’s the 21st century version of “The Big Lie,” which Wikipedia puts thusly:
The Big Lie (German: Großen Lüge) is a propaganda technique. It was defined by Adolf Hitler in his 1925 autobiography Mein Kampf as a lie so "colossal" that no one would believe that someone "could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously".Lastly, there’s my earlier concern about trying to educate children about math or science using hypertext or video games. Can it be done? I remain to be convinced. Just as video game playing requires a different cognitive attitude from passive reading, so playing around the internet has a different approach than doing long division, algebra, trigonometry, calculus, and other forms of math.
So to take my revenge on the 21st century, I think I’ll turn off the computer and spend the rest of the night reading a book. Sounds like a fabulous way to spend a quiet evening.
Sunday, December 07, 2008
The 2008 Reading List, Revisited
Awhile back, I set myself the task of reading some books that had been on my "to do" pile for several years. Bolded items below indicate that the book was read. Bolded items with an asterisk (*) indicate that I didn't finish the book.
Fiction
To the Stars Robert A. Heinlein
The Historian Elizabeth Kostova
Mother of Storms John Barnes
The Shield of Time Poul Anderson
The Decameron Giovanni Boccaccio*
Faust Johann Wolfgang Goethe
Inferno Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
Fleet of Worlds Larry Niven and Edward M. Lerner
The Crook Factory Dan Simmons
Maus: A Survivor's Tale Art Spiegelman
History
The Guns of August Barbara Tuchman
The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny Victor Davis Hanson
The Heritage of World Civilizations Albert M. Craig
Reflections on a Ravaged Century Robert Conquest
100 Decisive Battles: From Ancient Times to the Present Paul K. Davis*
The Crusades: Iron Men and Saints Harold Lamb
The Great Frontier Walter Prescott Webb
American Diplomacy: A History Robert H. Ferrell
The American Way of War: A History of United States Military Strategy and Policy Russell F. Weigley
The Influence of Sea Power on World History Alfred Thayer Mahan
Science, Technology, & Space
Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming Bjorn Lomborg
The Anthropic Cosmological Principle John D. Barrow*
The Bottomless Well: The Twilight of Fuel, the Virtue of Waste, and Why We Will Never Run Out of Energy Peter W. Huber
Arcology: The City in the Image of Man Paolo Soleri
Project Orion: The True Story of the Atomic Spaceship George Dyson
The Space Elevator: A Revolutionary Earth-to-Space Transportation System Bradley C. Edwards
Angle of Attack: Harrison Storms and the Race to the Moon Mike Gray
Toward Distant Suns T. A. Heppenheimer
Colonies in Space T. A. Heppenheimer
Terraforming: Engineering Planetary Environments Martyn J. Fogg
Philosophy & Politics
The Two Cultures C. P. Snow
The Conscience of a Conservative Barry Goldwater
Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method Kenneth Burke
Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds Martin Fridson*
Space and the American Imagination Howard McCurdy
Trans-Mambo Chicken and the Trans-Human Condition: Science Slightly Over the Edge Ed Regis
The Culture Cult: Designer Tribalism & Other Essays Roger Sandall
Ideas Have Consequences Richard M. Weaver
The Culture We Deserve: A Critique of Disenlightenment Jacques Barzun
A Republic, Not an Empire Patrick Buchanan
Business
Strategic Planning for Public Relations Ronald D. Smith
Servant Leadership: A Journey into the Nature of Legitimate Power and Greatness Robert K. Greenleaf
Generations at Work: Managing the Clash of Veterans, Boomers, Xers, and Nexters in Your Workplace Ron Zemke
Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do And Why They Do It James Q. Wilson
Economic Principles Applied to Space Industry Decisions Paul Zarchan
The Handbook of Strategic Public Relations and Integrated Communications Clarke L. Caywood
Market Education: The Unknown History Andrew Coulson
Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands: How to Do Business in Sixty Countries Terri Morrison
Creating Public Value Mark Harrison Moore
Biography
Isambard Kingdom Brunel L.T.C. Rolt
Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War Robert Coram
My Grandfather's Son Clarence Thomas
Korolev: How One Man Masterminded the Soviet Drive to Beat America to the Moon James Harford
Tramp Royale Robert A. Heinlein
Grumbles from the Grave Robert A. Heinlein
Okay, not a great percentage: 12 of 53 listed actually read. However, in my defense, I did read several other books that weren't on the list, which were "targets of opportunity" (i.e. impulse buys, often purchased when a particular book that WAS on the list couldn't be found on the day I was browsing the shelves at Barnes & Noble). These include:
- A History of Knowledge, Charles Van Doren
- Paris 1919, Margaret Macmillan
- Old Man's War, John Scalzi
- Manliness Harvey, C. Mansfield
- The Rough Guide: First-Time Europe
- Frommer's Europe
- A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway
- The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway
- Fodor's Ireland
- Frommer's Ireland
- Rick Steeves' Europe Through the Back Door, Rick Steeves
- Europe 101, Rick Steeves
- Societal Impact of Spaceflight
- Founding Brothers, Joseph Ellis
- Beyond Reason: Using Emotions As You Negotiate, Roger Fisher and Daniel Shapiro
- If Life is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits?, Erma Bombeck
- Oath of Fealty, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
- Mercury, Ben Bova
- Creating Character Emotions, Ann Hood
- Stages to Saturn, Roger Bilstein
- The Devil in the White City, Erik Larson
- Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking, William James
- The First World War, John Keegan
So: 35 books read for the year, about three per month. Not bad, but I'm going to have to ration myself this coming nine months, if I want to have the bandwidth to work on my French and German. Maybe I could compromise and try to read some of the books on my list in another language--Goethe in German, perhaps? Heinlein in French? That could be interesting. Anyhow, it's weird how books I want to read keep remaining on "the list," while tactical decisions get picked up and absorbed in a short time. That's why I occasionally cut back on "the list." After all, if the book was that important, I probably would've read it by now, yes? Maybe.
We'll see what the new year brings. I have one book I promised to finish for reviewing purposes by the end of the year, and two I put on ye olde Christmas list. Get a new hobby? Perish the thought! How else can I maintain my self-imposed reputation as a geek?
I read, therefore I am.
Wednesday, December 03, 2008
Learning Styles: Visual, Audio, Kinesthetic...Hypertext?
It has come to my attention that literary/book reading is becoming less and less common. Blame it on whatever you want: TV, the internet, video games, cell phones, blogging, etc. One of my big concerns is the potential effect on STEM education. It seems to me that math, science, and the lot require slow, methodical, and linear thinking that can only be done through book reading. But perhaps I'm wrong.
Is it possible to teach linear processes like physics in a nonlinear fashion? We've seen the emergence of hypertext, nonlinear, and video game-based story telling--so can we get students to learn more serious subjects in the same environments? Some studies suggest that it might be possible (here, here, and here). My question would be, if we cannot adapt necessary learning to the environments kids know, can or should we force them to use plain old paper and blackboards to learn the stuff they'll need to keep up with nations that ARE still using them? What would be the result?
I must contemplate further. Inputs or additional sources/references welcome.
Thursday, January 03, 2008
The 2008 Reading List
I went over my Amazon wish list to "get serious" about my reading plan for 2008. My goal is to focus on some of those books that have stayed on that list for awhile. Consider this a premiere of coming attractions, though other reviews might pop up as my "book habit" strikes me.
Fiction
To the Stars Robert A. Heinlein
The Historian Elizabeth Kostova
Mother of Storms John Barnes
The Shield of Time Poul Anderson
The Decameron Giovanni Boccaccio
Faust Johann Wolfgang Goethe
Inferno Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
Fleet of Worlds Larry Niven and Edward M. Lerner
The Crook Factory Dan Simmons
Maus: A Survivor's Tale Art Spiegelman
History
The Guns of August Barbara Tuchman
The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny Victor Davis Hanson
The Heritage of World Civilizations Albert M. Craig
Reflections on a Ravaged Century Robert Conquest
100 Decisive Battles: From Ancient Times to the Present Paul K. Davis
The Crusades: Iron Men and Saints Harold Lamb
The Great Frontier Walter Prescott Webb
American Diplomacy: A History Robert H. Ferrell
The American Way of War: A History of United States Military Strategy and Policy Russell F. Weigley
The Influence of Sea Power on World History Alfred Thayer Mahan
Science, Technology, & Space
Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming Bjorn Lomborg
The Anthropic Cosmological Principle John D. Barrow
The Bottomless Well: The Twilight of Fuel, the Virtue of Waste, and Why We Will Never Run Out of Energy Peter W. Huber
Arcology: The City in the Image of Man Paolo Soleri
Project Orion: The True Story of the Atomic Spaceship George Dyson
The Space Elevator: A Revolutionary Earth-to-Space Transportation System Bradley C. Edwards
Angle of Attack: Harrison Storms and the Race to the Moon Mike Gray
Toward Distant Suns T. A. Heppenheimer
Colonies in Space T. A. Heppenheimer
Terraforming: Engineering Planetary Environments Martyn J. Fogg
Philosophy & Politics
The Two Cultures C. P. Snow
The Conscience of a Conservative Barry Goldwater
Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method Kenneth Burke
Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds Martin Fridson
Space and the American Imagination Howard McCurdy
Trans-Mambo Chicken and the Trans-Human Condition: Science Slightly Over the Edge Ed Regis
The Culture Cult: Designer Tribalism & Other Essays Roger Sandall
Ideas Have Consequences Richard M. Weaver
The Culture We Deserve: A Critique of Disenlightenment Jacques Barzun
A Republic, Not an Empire Patrick Buchanan
Business
Strategic Planning for Public Relations Ronald D. Smith
Servant Leadership: A Journey into the Nature of Legitimate Power and Greatness Robert K. Greenleaf
Generations at Work: Managing the Clash of Veterans, Boomers, Xers, and Nexters in Your Workplace Ron Zemke
Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do And Why They Do It James Q. Wilson
Economic Principles Applied to Space Industry Decisions Paul Zarchan
The Handbook of Strategic Public Relations and Integrated Communications Clarke L. Caywood
Market Education: The Unknown History Andrew Coulson
Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands: How to Do Business in Sixty Countries Terri Morrison
Creating Public Value Mark Harrison Moore
Biography
Isambard Kingdom Brunel L.T.C. Rolt
Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War Robert Coram
My Grandfather's Son Clarence Thomas
Korolev: How One Man Masterminded the Soviet Drive to Beat America to the Moon James Harford
Tramp Royale Robert A. Heinlein
Grumbles from the Grave Robert A. Heinlein
I went over my Amazon wish list to "get serious" about my reading plan for 2008. My goal is to focus on some of those books that have stayed on that list for awhile. Consider this a premiere of coming attractions, though other reviews might pop up as my "book habit" strikes me.
Fiction
To the Stars Robert A. Heinlein
The Historian Elizabeth Kostova
Mother of Storms John Barnes
The Shield of Time Poul Anderson
The Decameron Giovanni Boccaccio
Faust Johann Wolfgang Goethe
Inferno Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
Fleet of Worlds Larry Niven and Edward M. Lerner
The Crook Factory Dan Simmons
Maus: A Survivor's Tale Art Spiegelman
History
The Guns of August Barbara Tuchman
The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny Victor Davis Hanson
The Heritage of World Civilizations Albert M. Craig
Reflections on a Ravaged Century Robert Conquest
100 Decisive Battles: From Ancient Times to the Present Paul K. Davis
The Crusades: Iron Men and Saints Harold Lamb
The Great Frontier Walter Prescott Webb
American Diplomacy: A History Robert H. Ferrell
The American Way of War: A History of United States Military Strategy and Policy Russell F. Weigley
The Influence of Sea Power on World History Alfred Thayer Mahan
Science, Technology, & Space
Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming Bjorn Lomborg
The Anthropic Cosmological Principle John D. Barrow
The Bottomless Well: The Twilight of Fuel, the Virtue of Waste, and Why We Will Never Run Out of Energy Peter W. Huber
Arcology: The City in the Image of Man Paolo Soleri
Project Orion: The True Story of the Atomic Spaceship George Dyson
The Space Elevator: A Revolutionary Earth-to-Space Transportation System Bradley C. Edwards
Angle of Attack: Harrison Storms and the Race to the Moon Mike Gray
Toward Distant Suns T. A. Heppenheimer
Colonies in Space T. A. Heppenheimer
Terraforming: Engineering Planetary Environments Martyn J. Fogg
Philosophy & Politics
The Two Cultures C. P. Snow
The Conscience of a Conservative Barry Goldwater
Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method Kenneth Burke
Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds Martin Fridson
Space and the American Imagination Howard McCurdy
Trans-Mambo Chicken and the Trans-Human Condition: Science Slightly Over the Edge Ed Regis
The Culture Cult: Designer Tribalism & Other Essays Roger Sandall
Ideas Have Consequences Richard M. Weaver
The Culture We Deserve: A Critique of Disenlightenment Jacques Barzun
A Republic, Not an Empire Patrick Buchanan
Business
Strategic Planning for Public Relations Ronald D. Smith
Servant Leadership: A Journey into the Nature of Legitimate Power and Greatness Robert K. Greenleaf
Generations at Work: Managing the Clash of Veterans, Boomers, Xers, and Nexters in Your Workplace Ron Zemke
Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do And Why They Do It James Q. Wilson
Economic Principles Applied to Space Industry Decisions Paul Zarchan
The Handbook of Strategic Public Relations and Integrated Communications Clarke L. Caywood
Market Education: The Unknown History Andrew Coulson
Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands: How to Do Business in Sixty Countries Terri Morrison
Creating Public Value Mark Harrison Moore
Biography
Isambard Kingdom Brunel L.T.C. Rolt
Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War Robert Coram
My Grandfather's Son Clarence Thomas
Korolev: How One Man Masterminded the Soviet Drive to Beat America to the Moon James Harford
Tramp Royale Robert A. Heinlein
Grumbles from the Grave Robert A. Heinlein
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