Book Description
This totally original architecture book—the first comprehensive work on brick, the essential building material—ranges over every culture throughout history. It follows the story of brick from 5,000 BC to the twenty-first century, from the vast baths and basilicas of ancient Rome, through the wonders of Gothic brick in Germany, Buddhist shrines in Burma, and Mughal mosques in Iran, to the modern revival of brick in the hands of architects like Gaudí.
Marvelously illustrated with specially taken photographs, the book is at once an historical account of how bricks have been employed by architects of every period, a technical survey of brickmaking and bricklaying, and an essay in architectural and cultural history. More than one hundred themes are covered, from bricks in ancient Egypt to their distinctive use by Louis Kahn, Alvar Aalto, and Renzo Piano. Works of engineering—railway tunnels, viaducts, dams, and bridges—are given prominence alongside the great cathedrals and country houses, castles and temples, testifying to the versatility and importance of brick and brickwork.
An illustrated glossary explains all technical terms and the various construction and bonding methods in use. The book will prove indispensable to anyone professionally involved in, studying, or simply interested in architecture, design, and materials. Over 600 illustrations, 570 in color.
Customer Reviews:
Excellent!.......2006-01-17
Purchased this for my father's, who is a retired brick mason, 67th birthday. The quality of the book, pictures, and writing are all excellent. Upon receiving it, my father immediately began reading and studying the book which is a real testament to its ability to capture and maintain ones interest.
Surprising Brick.......2005-03-05
A powerful and original book. Wonderfully rich and beautiful photographs accompany a lucid text.
A must have.......2004-11-09
This is, simply, an outstanding book. While Campbell delivers in taking an unlikely subject (brick? who would have thought?) and making it interesting to the general reader, the real draw of this book is its breathtaking photographs. Suffused with light, stunning in composition, masterful in perspective they practically glow as one turns the page. Will Pryce is clearly one to watch. This is a book that will delight general audiences and architectural historians alike. Buy it!
Particularly nice book design and photography.......2004-05-18
The author writes easily, seems to know everything, and has a completely unpretentious style. He also chose his subjects well, with many less-well-known examples and only a few icons. As a historian, he occasionaly suffers from their tendency to document, say, the names and ruling periods of the Middle Ages Persian kings before getting to the interesting parts about the use of brick in that era. The photographs are all similar to the one on the cover--deep colors and bright sunlight--and their consistency adds a nice touch. The organization of the book was good too, presenting the subject in manageable bites.
Great pictures, great text, a truly beautiful book.......2004-01-01
After reading favourable reviews by architectural critics, I was pleased to find that this book exceeded my expectations. The book is an authoritative history of the use of world's oldest building material. Despite its massive size, it is easy to read and covers a lot of ground, from the origins of the brick in mud-bricks in the Near East to the modern day. The clearly written text is complemented by sumptuous colour photographs. For these reasons, it stands out.
This book certainly opened my eyes to the variety of buildings in which brick has been used and introduced many that I would like to visit myself. It makes you look at the world in a whole new way. It not only covers the shows the wide range of design possibilities but also the practical aspects of building in brick. For the serious student, there is an illustrated glossary at the end. A fascinating book for both students and laymen alike.
Book Description
The author of "Cod" and "The Basque History of the World" takes an extraordinary look at an ordinary substance--salt, the only rock humans eat--and how it has shaped civilization from the very beginning. Unabridged. 14 CDs.
Average customer rating:
- Skimped on CD version
- A History Lesson
- Interesting, then boring, then interesting again
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Salt: A World History
Mark Kurlansky
Manufacturer: New Millennium Audio
ProductGroup: Book
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Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World
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Salt: A World History
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Team of Rivals
ASIN: 1590072472 |
Book Description
"Salt is the fascinating, indispensable history of an indispensable ingredient. Like Kurlansky's earlier work, Cod, it's a must-have book for any serious cook or foodie." - Anthony Bourdain, Author of The bestselling Kitchen Confidential
Customer Reviews:
Skimped on CD version.......2004-08-24
Just a note on the CD version only. Each disc contains only one 60-70 minute track. This forces me to listen in my car because that is the only CD player I have that "remembers" where I left off. Also, the 14 CDs came in three jewel cases with identical packaging. There's no way to tell which case contains which CDs without opening them. Scott Brick does a good job reading and I'm enjoying the story. I just wish the CD version were more user friendly.
A History Lesson.......2003-10-26
I am not a big history buff. And this is not a book that I would normally pick up and read let alone buy. I picked up this CD in the library because all the other CDs that I wanted to listen to were checked out. I was impressed and intrigued that there were 14 discs to this book. On such a simple subject such as salt? How much could someone possibly write about salt? I checked it out. I thought what the heck. I didn't lay out any money for it. If I didn't like it I could just turn it back in. Well, I got a real education about salt. It turns out that this was a very valuable commodity at one time. Wars were fought over this stuff. I like how this author takes you from the beginning to the present time through each step. Salt, going from being very valuable to increasingly losing it's value and what took place in history, what was invented and what was discovered, and by who, to make it lose it value. There was even some recipes. I don't think I'll be using any of them anytime soon but they were interesting. I still wouldn't pick this up in book form and read it but I would listen to it again. And I am going to buy a copy of the CD for a friend who is a history buff, I think he'll enjoy it.
Interesting, then boring, then interesting again.......2002-11-29
Starts off very well...the first hundred pages or so are filled with interesting facts about salt and world history. Then it falls apart in the middle, droning on and on about how various countries produced salt and tried to corner markets. It felt like I was doing homework and just had to get through it. It gets interesting again near the end, discussing Gandhi's protest of the salt tax in India, and British colonialism.
I'm glad I finished it, but if I had to start again I think I'd rather shave my scrotum and pour salt on the open wounds that would likely result
Average customer rating:
- A journalist's clear narrative about a complex world
- Fantastic insight into the modern East End of London
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Salaam Brick Lane: A Year in the New East End
Tarquin Hall
Manufacturer: John Murray
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Binding: Paperback
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Snow
ASIN: 0719565561 |
Book Description
After 10 years living abroad, Tarquin Hall wanted to return to his native London. Lured by his nostalgia for a leafy suburban childhood spent in south-west London, he returned with his Indian-born, American fiancee in tow. But, priced out of the housing market, they found themselves living not in a townhouse, oozing Victorian charm, but in a squalid attic above a Bangladeshi sweatshop on London's Brick Lane. A grimy skylight provided the only window on their new world—a filthy, noisy street where drug dealers and prostitutes peddled their wares and tramps urinated on the pavements. Yet, as Hall got to know Brick Lane, he discovered beneath its unlovely surface an inner world where immigrants and asylum seekers struggle to better themselves and dream of escape. Salaam Brick Lane is a journey of discovery by an outsider in his own native city.
Customer Reviews:
A journalist's clear narrative about a complex world.......2006-10-02
When confined to observation and its presentation, good journalists tend to make good writers. Hall is one such journalist/writer. His clear and precise style comes very handy when reading about a complex and intricate world of London East End.
His own discovery of East End is told through the lives of people he meets and gets to talk. It's not a distant and cold narrative, though. On the contrary, he is directly involved in the intricate fabric of immigrant society through his American-born Indian fiancee. Yet he manages to limit the account of his personal story to the amount that relates to people he observes.
Overall "Salaam Brick Lane" is an honest and clear account of a short slice through East End.
Fantastic insight into the modern East End of London.......2006-01-20
Mr. Hall's work on London's East End is beautifully written and truly makes you feel as if you are a voyeur into a world that few of us have ever experienced. The author shows a genuine sympathy for his neighbors on Brick Lane in the East End and weaves their stories into the broader tapestry of the neighborhood's history as well as that of England as a whole. Without being preachy or condescending, you feel like you know and understand the characters that Mr. Hall met in his time there; the landlord running a sweatshop in his basement, the Indian "auntie" interviewing him on behalf of his future wife's mother, and the list goes on. This is what makes the book such a pleasure and it goes so quickly that in they end you wish Mr. Hall had spent even more time on Brick Lane.
Book Description
The 417th Night Fighter Squadron USAAF was only the forth such unit to be formed. In the early days of WWII, the US sent observers to England to study how the latest form of air warfare would take shape and it very soon became apparent to them that a night fighting capability was of increasing importance. When they joined the battle against the Reich they found themselves without a suitable American aircraft and were forced to utilize RAF Beaufighters. Having 're-learned to fly' this British design the 417th were sent to North Africa. Most of the ex-RAF aircraft they had inherited were battle weary and no supplies of spares were available through the US supply chain. The squadron found an elderly B-25 bomber, nicknamed the "Strawberry Roan," and they ranged throughout the Mediterranean in search of Beaufighter parts. 417 soon built a healthy score of downed German and Italian aircraft and as the war progressed they were moved to Corsica to support the Italian invasion, After D-Day they were moved to Le Vallon from where they attacked the night-time movements of the German Army. Perhaps their most famous operation was to attack the low flying German Condor that ran the route from the Reich to Spain carrying Nazi gold and treasures.
Customer Reviews:
A Father's Legacy.......2007-09-18
My review would be quite biased since this was my father's unit. I have learned a lot of the extraordinary circumstances my father and others went through. I didn't know much about the Beaufighter and that my father was actually one of two people in the plane. I feel the book was well written and well researched. An easy, enjoyable read.
a worthy subject but lacks effort.......2007-08-15
The author has done well to focus on a little known aspect of World War Two. However, the writing seems padded, as if the manuscript required a minimum number of pages to be published. Too often, facts and figures appear on one page only to be reiterated one or two pages later, as if they had not been mentioned before, to flesh out the chapter.
It doesn't help that minor errors that should have been caught prior to publication weren't. One example is the statement, "Vice-Admiral Sir James Somerville, who had been brought out of retirement and taken a considerable demotion from his original career rank of Admiral of the Fleet: in other words, Somerville had gone from five star rank to three stars to serve his country." Sir James Somerville retired from the Royal Navy in 1939 as a Vice-Admiral and returned to that rank when recalled to duty. He did not achieve the rank of Admiral of the Fleet until VE Day in 1945.
As a slimmer volume, this book would have done better at keeping the reader's interest.
Book Description
It was the summer of 1940, and World War II had been raging for nearly a year. Buoyed by his successes on the Continent, Hitler was now planning an invasion of England to seal Europe's fate.
Though the United States was still a neutral country, a few Americans decided they couldn't remain on the sidelines. They joined Britain's Royal Air Force to defend the country - with the future of civilization hanging in the balance.
The Few tells the dramatic and unforgettable story of these Americans who defied their own country's neutrality laws and risked their very citizenship to fight side-by-side with England's finest pilots. Flying the lethal and elegant Spitfire, they became “knights of the air” who, with minimal training but plenty of guts, dueled the skilled and fearsome aces of Germany's Luftwaffe.
By October 1940, they had helped England win the greatest air battle in the history of aviation. Some five years later, at war's end, just one of them would be alive. Winston Churchill once said famously of all those who fought in the Battle of Britain, “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.” These daring Americans were the few among the “few.”
Customer Reviews:
Very, very interesting........2007-09-03
I learned much about the "Battle of Britain" and the eight Americans (one was listed on the RAF rosters as Canadian) who faught in it. Occuring before the US entered the war, this account is about the people who defended Britain from Hitler's attempt to destroy the RAF and London before invading the island. Hitler almost succeeded but for the heroism of the entire RAF including the eight Americans who, against the laws if the US enlisted and fought. Well written. Battle accounts are riviting. I highly recommend this book.
God Bless You Boys, Every One, For Your Sacrifice to Freedom.......2007-06-23
Well, as I come here to review this awesome book, I see that many have beaten me to it! And that, certainly, is a very good thing! This shows that I am not alone in trumpeting this book to you.
Kershaw is an excellent author, and I shall be seeking out his other books for my library, I'm sure. Through his prose, these sturdy, brave young men come to life again that you may experience their story, and their sacrifice that freedom should still remain throughout the world. Have you ever wondered "I wonder how close Hitler came to taking over the world, really?" Well, this will give you the answer, straight up. Had England lost the Battle of Britain, we would, for sure, be living in a very different world today. Yet, while these eight very brave young Americans were risking life and limb fighting across the Atlantic, we were twiddling our thumbs and looking the other way. What did it take to wake us up? One Sunday morning 9 miles west of Honolulu...that Sunday--December 7, 1941.
I recommend this book so strongly to anyone who is a history lover, or interested in WWII, or The Battle of Britian, or anyone who enjoys the self-affirming "rightness" of those who truly give of themselves, and stand up for what they believe in. Again, "God Bless You Boys, Every One" for standing up and being counted as true heroes against Hitler's Nazi Scourge.
It Was Their Last Full Meassure of Devotion.......2007-06-05
They came from all walks of life. Each with his own personal story and reason for being there; but, the one theme that ran constant throughout. They cherished freedom and love for country even if it was not their own.
Alex Kershaw documents the courage and tenacity of 8 American flyers who defied the odds by circumventing America's neutrality to become " The Few" to serve in the RAF prior to, during, and after the Battle of Britain. Their story has, for the most part, been only a footnote in the titanic struggle that took place in the skies over England. The author, known for his recognition of near-forgotten men in WWII, has once again featured the contributions of men, undistinguished but for the fact that they forsook the safety and security of their country to answer a higher calling, namely to aid in the vanquishing of a world tyrant. The defeat of the German Luftwaffe was the first step in achieving that goal.
The story of the legendary two time olympic gold medalist, William Fiske, was particularly fascinating. The man had everything one could hope for or dream of; but instead, chose to devote his last days to what was then thought of as a losing cause. In addition to his considerable athletic achievements, he is now remembered as the first American airman to die in combat flying for the RAF in Europe.
Prime Minister Winston Churchhill said it most eloqently and appreciatively when he stated: " Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few. " This was in marked contrast to the cowardly utterings pacifist Charles Lindbergh and the defeatist ambassador Joseph Kennedy.
Mr. Kershaw keep writing! The noble warriors of WWII deserve the best and you have neither forgotten or forsaken them.
Wow.......2007-04-04
I couldn't put it down! The Battle of Britain was unbelievable and what these pilots did was beyond belief.A book not for the faint of heart. A book for every pilot to read. A wonderful history lesson,all true and not a Hollywood movie.
Th best war history of the year.......2007-03-13
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Both the writing and the storylinewere excellent. My wife, who normally does't read history of any kind, and very little non-fiction, read this book avidly.
Average customer rating:
- Where did it come from - a history of stones and clay in Jamaica
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Bricks And Stones from the Past: Jamaica's Geological Heritage
Anthony R. D. Porter
Manufacturer: University of West Indies Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 9766401926 |
Customer Reviews:
Where did it come from - a history of stones and clay in Jamaica.......2007-03-28
Fascinating this review on the History of Clay and Stones. The author really knows his "Stuff"as he describes the sources of imported stones going back to pre-Columbian celts of Jadeite travelling to Jamaica from the Central American coast. Then the "dripstone" water filters from Barbados used in every Jamaican home to clarify the drinking water!
Finally to be able to identify from whence came the masses of ballast stones in the form of bricks, paving stones and coblestones quarried in the West Country of England and filling empty ships coming out to the West Indies to take home sugar! Well done and most interesting!
Average customer rating:
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Ancient Indian Bricks and Brick Remains
T.N. Mishra
Manufacturer: Harman Publishing House,India
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 8186622217 |
Book Description
This scarce antiquarian book is included in our special Legacy Reprint Series. In the interest of creating a more extensive selection of rare historical book reprints, we have chosen to reproduce this title even though it may possibly have occasional imperfections such as missing and blurred pages, missing text, poor pictures, markings, dark backgrounds and other reproduction issues beyond our control. Because this work is culturally important, we have made it available as a part of our commitment to protecting, preserving and promoting the world's literature.
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