Stevens Books


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Stevens Books sorted by Average customer review: high to low .

Stevens
Phantoms Don't Drive Sports Cars (Adventures of the Bailey School Kids)
Published in Turtleback by Demco Media (1998-12)
Author: Debbie Dadey
List price:

Average review score:

Very Cute!!!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2006-08-10
The only reason I was buying this book was because I'm a HUGE Phantom Phan;I used to read the series when I was a kid and thought I'd give it a try. So after I read it, I thought it was cute read for kids (duh).

It is great.
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 1998-12-14
I have read almost all the Bailey School Kids books and this is one of the best. The book relly discribes what is going on.

Fun Read
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2000-05-29
This book is really great. Its kind of like the phantom of the opera but with a more exiting twist

Phantoms?
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2005-04-19
There are some weird grownups in Bailey City. But could the strange man who plays in the orchestra, wears a cape and always has one side of his face shaded really be a phantom haunting the opera? THE BAILEY SCHOOL KIDS ARE GOING TO FIND OUT!

Stevens
Photoshop 4 Studio Skills
Published in Paperback by Hayden Books (1997-04)
Author: Steven Moniz
List price: $35.00
New price: $6.98
Used price: $0.01

Average review score:

Exelent book
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2003-01-27
This book is a great tool, I have learn a lot from it. Is well written and explained.

A GREAT PHOTOSHOP BOOK
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2000-01-08
As an advanced Photoshop user, I found this book to be VERY descriptive and easy to understand. Compared to other Phothoshop books that I have seen (that are about 3 times as thick, twice as heavy, and costs twice as much at least), this book provides the same information but in a straight-forward manner. There's no long, boring explanations; instead, it gets right to the point and shows you how to achieve the desired effect. It's at such a great price too . If you are a beginner, you should definitely get this book.

It is simple ,it is easy and most of all it is friendly
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 1998-06-17
I am an Architect , and I found this book the finest there is to learn the Photoshop , it is excellent for begginers and advanced users , and really takes you a step by step .

Greatest way to learn Photoshop 4!
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 1998-07-19
This was hands-down the best Photoshop book I've ever read. It helped me build the skills that have now landed me a job at a large graphic design firm. Thanks, Steve!

Stevens
A Place to Belong (Orphan Train Adventures)
Published in Library Binding by Gareth Stevens Publishing (2000-01)
Author: Joan Lowery Nixon
List price: $23.33
New price: $10.17
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Average review score:

Heart breaking, but surprising.
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 1998-06-27
It will break your heart but it will make you want to read more.

Couldn't put it down
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 1998-07-19
It was souch a great book I finished it in one night! Although it was sad, It was very interesting. You really got to know the characters. I hade to get the three other books as soon as I could! One night I stayed up till one in the morning to finish one of the books!

A Place To Belong
Helpful Votes: 6 out of 9 total.
Review Date: 2001-09-13
When the six Kelly children are split up Danny then sees a fake doctor he heard about in New York while at a medicine show out West. When he reveals the phony doctor's secret to everyone there, the doctor decides to hunt Danny down. It is a race to catch each other first before the other one catches you. A dramatic, heart-warming story filled with love, joy, and the importance of family.

A Place to Belong
Helpful Votes: 7 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2000-07-26
This is a great book. I wouldn't recommend reading this book before: A Family Apart, Caught in the Act, and In the Face of Danger. It is the last book a Quartet about the Kelly children. Unless you don't want to read the first three I suggest you read A Place to Belong last.

Stevens
Playmaker
Published in Paperback by Touchstone (1993-10-01)
Author: Thomas Keneally
List price: $21.00
New price: $1.13
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Average review score:

My fav...
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2006-02-10
If you enjoy the arts, colonial history,
Greek mythology, drama...it's in there...Keneally weaved all these teams brilliantly to create a masterpiece in my opinion.

Lost in space . . .
Helpful Votes: 10 out of 10 total.
Review Date: 2001-01-09
This finely crafted work is one of Keneally's most notable. Portraying a man in an agony of moral conflict over his love for a woman convict yet constantly aware of the family left behind in England, The Playmaker addresses human feelings at many levels. Like so many of his books, Keneally has taken figures from history, weaving a plausible tale of the life they might have led. His examination of the mind and heart of Lieutenant Ralph Clark, during the early years of the Port Jackson [Sydney] prison colony, a is deeply moving account. Far from home, these exiled people face disturbing choices. Keneally compares the founders of the Sydney colony with space travellers, isolated in a dangerous situation with limited resources.

Clark's task is the staging of a play in celebration of the king's birthday. Assembling a cast from the convicts, he's confronted with a range of personalities from house maids to forgers. Keneally's research has dredged up backgrounds of these transported felons; the thieves' guild oath is a particularly fine touch. His real talent, however, is in presenting this material through his characters . Each of his figures projects a reality surpassing other writers of historical fiction. While his descriptive narrative may make modern allusions, none of his persona are dragged out of their original time frame. Ralph Clark is particularly well drawn. Keneally has a special talent for presenting us with an 18th Century man's feelings and aspirations as much as it's possible for us to know them.

That this book has been returned to the active sales list is a testament to its value. It should be read by more people. The 18th Century setting is less important than what Keneally has to say about people. Add this book to your shelves with confidence. It's worth more than a single read.

One of the all-time great historical novels.
Helpful Votes: 14 out of 16 total.
Review Date: 2001-10-10
The earliest days of Sydney, Australia, and the prison colony which was its first population center provide a dynamic setting for this ambitious, old-fashioned novel. With a broad scope, grand design, and sensitive treatment of universal themes, it has the weightiness of an epic, but is far more vigorous and more involving than that, with vivid, sympathetic characters who come fully to life.

Transported halfway around the world to a forbidding and alien landscape, men and women prisoners share their personal struggles, providing a vitality and emotional punch one does not often find in fiction. The reader soon discovers that the prisoners are not all that different, of course, from the civil servants and Marines who administer the colony--everyone in Port Jackson (Sydney) is a prisoner in some way or another, be it physical, spiritual, or emotional.

Lt. Ralph Clark's decision to produce George Farquhar's early 18th century comedy, The Recruiting Officer, with an all-prisoner cast leads to many emotional conflicts. Though the play provides the participants with a way to achieve a measure of dignity, they must still bow to the strictures of the colony off stage. Many prisoners wield cruel powers over other prisoners, while Marines and administrators exert power over both the prisoners and the aborigine inhabitants of the area. The restrictions imposed by the church, in the person of Rev. Dick Johnson, aggravate tensions by concentrating on rules of behavior rather than on the human soul.

Against this backdrop of the restrictions on their lives, Keneally's characters are set in high relief, their humanity contrasting sharply with the impersonal forms of government which are imposed upon them. Meticulously depicting 18th century England, its government, its penal system, and its social structure, along with early Australia, its first western inhabitants, the decimation of the aborigine population, and the social conflicts faced by its characters, this is one of Keneally's greatest novels, a timeless story based on real journals, stunning in its effect. Mary Whipple

excellent writing highly recommended
Helpful Votes: 16 out of 18 total.
Review Date: 1999-11-17
I read this book seveal years ago, before Keneally's name became so widely known as a result of the success of Schindler's List (the movie). This book stands out in my memory for the great ability to transport us to a different time, place and way of thinking. I found it to have been very skillfully written. I subsequently read other books of his as a result of the pleasure derived from this one and was not disappointed.This book deserves to be more widely known.

Stevens
Poet in New York (Penguin Modern Classics)
Published in Paperback by Penguin Classics (2002-01-31)
Author: Federico Garcia Lorca
List price: $22.70
New price: $20.53
Used price: $20.37

Average review score:

Nightmare in New York
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2006-05-08
Lorca had a pessimistic and dark impression of the New York during the Great Depression years. Lorca describes a city populated by ghosts and nightmares. This is one of the most shocking poetic works of the XX century.
I recommend the CD 'Omega'. It is an experimental 'flamenco' work by the `cantaor' Enrique Morente, based on the poems of `Poet in New York'. This music album will help you to go deeper into the book.

One of the most complex and rich books of Lorca
Helpful Votes: 12 out of 14 total.
Review Date: 1998-01-02
Federico GarcĂ­a Lorca is among the most celebrated Spanish poets of all time. The beauty of his writing has given him a place in the gallery of the best Spanish writers. This book he wrote when he was a student at Columbia University relies on the influence he got from the surrealistic movements that were running on Europe at the time. Thus, it gets far from the poetic language used in his other books, most notably in Romancero Gitano: verses leave the regularity of the romance to explore new and rich arrangements; the metaphors grow more complex and ellaborate, making a delicious challenge to the reader; one can read a poem time and again for days and will still be unsure of its real meaning. Besides this some of the poems reach a new height on Lorca's poetry. To anybody just seeking to discover Lorca and his world, Romancero Gitano seems to be a best approach in my oppinion, but if you know it and like it, I can't help recommending Poet in New York as a new horizon to discover. If your approach to this book is open-minded, you won't be disappointed.

Lorca: A True Definition of a Poet
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2005-07-08
After reading "Poeta en Nueva York" I found out that it was really worth learning spanish. I am not exaggerating but some of Lorca's verses make me cry. They have so much emotion and fantasy in them, and they talk about experiences that take place deep inside me. The poems are surrealist but that is also what makes them amazing. The best poem is probably "Fabula y Rueda de Los Tres Amigos" where Lorca beautifully conveys his feelings towards his relationships with others and the struggle he sees within them. Strangely enough at the end of the poem he describes a lot of events concerning his death which actually coincided with his murder a few years later. Lorca's relation with the moon reflected through his simple yet overwhelming words is also charming and inspiring. I discovered through them that there was a lot more in that celestial body orbiting the earth than what I used to see before. You will feel that poetry is just flowing out of Federico. He didn't to exert a lot of effort to sound that marvellous and that right.

powerful and chilling account....
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2004-11-26
After reading "A Poet in New York," I can say this much:
"I don't think I am planning a trip to New York very soon." Lorca's account of the city was so visceral, raw and cruel, I could feel the hauntingly dead interactions between people, and those people's relationships to the material world around them. The accounts of violence in the streets are equally as cold and boldly unapologetic as his observations of the early morning hours when the city is first waking up.

Gabriel Garcia Lorca truly shows that when it comes to the movements as a city with ties to industry, capitalistic gain and material wealth, there is no division between the life of the human being and the life of the machine. There is almost an automated, "conveyor belt" feeling to the mechanical movement of life in the city. As soon as energy is poured into an endeavor, it is also poured out just as easily. People are as disposable as sheet metal. Their blood, their organs and their instruments of movement could be ripped away and demolished as quickly and non-emotionally as one would destroy the framework of a building and it would be of no concern to anyone else.

I believe that Lorca's observations and journal entries are a reflection of not only the mindset of one of the most well known cities in the world, applicable to the 1930s, but is also quite accurately a reflection of the state of the world today.

Stevens
The Principles of Life
Published in Paperback by Steve Norton (2002-02-02)
Author: Steven Norton
List price: $25.53
New price: $19.66
Used price: $26.20

Average review score:

A manual for life!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-03-24
After a rough Christmas and feeling VERY gloomy, I typed the word "depression" into my search engine, which, in turn, took me to Steve Norton's web page. I decided to go to [...] to read some customer reviews and then purchased the book. OH MY GOD has this book changed my way of living. Unlike many self-help books that are so popular today, Steve gives the reader REAL LIFE strategies to get through tough days. He goes beyond "positive thinking" and gives you a manual to refer back to when your thinking, habits, troubles etc... get a little out of hand. Now, when I try to help others out with his techniques, I refer to Steve as my "therapist" and have already recommended his book to many people. I think courses in high school should be taught on his book. In fact, my son overheard me talking to a teenager, who was having problems, and he told me I should speak at high schools. I love it! Steve, a true, heartfelt thank-you for your book. Good luck in getting your word out to the world!

An Extremely Helpful Book
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2004-02-10
I have been an avid book reader for almost 50 years and Steve Norton's "The Principles of Life" is the 3rd favorite book I have ever read. (The "Bible" and "Science & Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary B Eddy having taken 1st and 2nd places.) In fact, "The Principles of Life" actually complements the other two books, which I use for prayer and meditation.

What is so good about this book? It is an extremely clear and concise explanation of how we can train our mind to work in our favor and to stop the ways in which the mind works against us. When we train our thoughts to work on our behalf, our lives begin to immediately improve, and this book gives us the tools to do just that. (This book should be a must for late teens to read, as an aid in helping them to solve life's problems.)
An excellent investment!

a chance to rescue your life..........
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2005-09-09
If you feel like your life is getting out of control, this book is for you. Im not religious, perfect, super sucessful - just an ordinary man looking to work out my life problems and find happiness again. Things have a habbit of going wrong at the same time...health, career, relationships etc etc - its not just coincidence, I have learned so much from this book - and it wont just stick, but keep going back to this. Think of it as an owners manual for your body. Keep using it and YOU will suceed and find peace again. Life is for enjoying not worrying over!

Very good book!
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2004-01-16
I stumbled upon this book while I was on Steve Norton's website and am glad I did. All I can say is this, the book puts things really clearly into perspective and gives straight to the point advice which really helped me overcome my demons! Basically it teaches you how to control your mind.

The book is more like a total mind program that is idiot proof. I really liked the style of writing which was easy to understand and the examples help too. Having read many self help and personal development books and not received what was promised I can say that this book actually made a difference.

If you are thinking about buying this book I will say go for it you won't be disappointed!

Stevens
Production and Operations Analysis
Published in Paperback by McGraw Hill Higher Education (2004-08-01)
Author: Steven Nahmias
List price: $85.35
New price: $49.00
Used price: $38.00

Average review score:

Nice book for IE undergraduate level
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2003-08-19
This book is a nice book for introduction to manufacturing system for undergraduate level for industrial engineer. The book covers Forecasting, Aggregate Planning, Inventory control (certain and stochastic demand), Push vs. Pll Production Control Systems, Scheduling, Facility Layout, Facility Location, Quality control and Reliability. In Forecasting chapter, the book provides a lot of good basic forecasting methods such as moving average, exponential smooting, trend-based method, and seasonal series. In Aggregate Planning chapter, the book covers just the basic concepts and models which can be done better. For inventory control chapters, the book does a nice job and cover a lot of detailed basic models which is a good introduction. In the Production Control Systems chapter, this book also has done a nice job in covering detailed basic ideas of the MRP subject such as lot sizing methods in MRP but JIT section could be done better by adding some more detaile on key factors of JIT's success and the use of time buffer instead of inventory buffer. In Scheduling chapters, the book covers a very basic models for scheduling which is again good for introduction. The rest sections of the book are nicely written with the level of introduction. Overall, this book is good and nice to have. One comment on the cover page is that the formulation for EOQ is very wrong and should not happen for the book on manufacturing system.

Definitly one of the best books about operation management
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 1997-07-14
The book provides an easy introduction to the complex area of production and operation analysis. Nevertheless the relevant instruments and solutions in production and operation analysis are covered and the big picture of dealing with production and operations is shown clearly. The clear language, the illustrations and the examples make it a book best suitable for education and self-study.

Very clear, concise introduction into Operations Management
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2000-04-15
This is an excellent book for Operations Management electives at an MBA level or an introductory text for Operations majors at graduate school (both business and engineering). The book is self-contained and all the chapters can be studied independently. All the basics of the classical Operations Management are covered.

Estupendo!
Helpful Votes: 6 out of 13 total.
Review Date: 2000-03-28
Lo he usado para cursos de administracion (licenciatura y posgrado)y de ingenieria industrial. Resulta muy apropiado para ambos tipos de cursos. Existe version en espanol.

Stevens
The Quantum Theory of Fields, Vol. 2: Modern Applications
Published in Hardcover by Cambridge University Press (1996-08-13)
Author: Steven Weinberg
List price: $95.00
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Average review score:

If you appreciate Vol 1, you'll want Vol 2.
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2005-03-25
I have found this text extremely useful as a guide to the essentials of modern renormalization theory, as well as modern quantization techniques for Non-abelian gauge theories. The chapter on extended field configurations is nice, though it is meant as an overview and guide to the literature. What I like most about this volume is the discussion of experimental or phenomenological issues that complements many of the discussions. He has a broad base of knowledge in particle physics, as well as field theory. If you don't have volume 1, get that first.

Excellent, despite some idiosyncracies
Helpful Votes: 13 out of 15 total.
Review Date: 1999-01-21
This is another gem of a book by Weinberg. The discussion is fairly modern at places (for instance nice discussion of BRST, BV Formalism, RG and Anomalies), but could have been more modern and compact in certain other places (like chiral lagrangians, standard model etc.). However, even those parts are a pleasure to read. It is just that some other aspects could have been discussed (as I hope he does in the third volume), such as SUSY, especially QFT dualities. Anyway, an excellent book!

The most authoritative book on QFT ever
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2006-01-01
Before Weinberg's books, a typical graduate student in theoretical physics would study the standard textbooks (e.g. Itzykson-Zuber, Peskin-Schroeder) to pass QFT courses. When confronted with actual research problems, he would discover that all he has learned is how to do calculations in perturbation theory, that he is unfamiliar with a host of ideas and techniques that are widely used in the present-day research literature and that he has to resort to original papers and reviews to learn them.

Weinberg's three-volume set drastically changed this situation, giving the most authoritative and complete presentation of QFT to appear in a textbook. Although it is not suitable for beginning graduate students, it is invaluable for covering all these topics that are typically omitted in QFT courses and for providing valuable insight missing from other textbooks.

The highlight of the set is Volume 2, which includes most topics where Weinberg has made his own invaluable contributions. In his inimitable style, Weinberg guides us through the great developments in QFT from the 1960's to the 1980's, including most topics that are essential for a working knowledge of modern QFT. The presentation is crystal clear throughout and every topic is presented in as much detail as it deserves. In particular, the chapters on spontaneously broken symmetries are simply masterpieces, the treatment of anomalies is the most complete ever, while the chapter on extended objects is a thorough overview of an ever-expanding subject. This book is a must for everyone working on theoretical physics.

Delightfully insightful
Helpful Votes: 6 out of 6 total.
Review Date: 2002-12-22
This book has some of the most exquisite expositions on the theoretical aspects of quantum field theory that you are ever likely to run into, i.e. Weinberg's name is literally stamped on every page for brilliance. There are topics treated here that are not likely to be found anywhere else, for instance Batalin-Vilkovisky Quantization. Weinberg's treatment of the proof of renormalizability is compact and yet very readable. And his chapter on anomalies is simply speaking the authortiative treatment. This book is a must have for anyone interested in the more theoretical aspects of Field Theory. Though I would recommed a few months with Peskin & Schroeder, and volume 1 of Weinberg to get the full flavour of Weinberg's treatment.

Stevens
Quest for Celestia: A Reimagining of The Pilgrim's Progress
Published in Paperback by Tyndale House Publishers (2006-02-27)
Author: Steven James
List price: $9.99
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Used price: $1.39

Average review score:

an exciting way to be encouraged in your walk
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2006-06-15
Steven James has captured the heart of the true Christian journey. This book is wonderfully entertaining as well a mirror to our own lives and the choices we make. I think this book is marketed for young adults/teens, but it is written in such a way to appeal to adults as well. Definitely worth the read, especially if you need a little inspiration in your Christian walk.

Let THE Story Touch Your Heart Again...
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2006-06-25
There is only one story that really matters: THE story of God reaching down into history to redeem a people for Himself. We live in that story, as we journey as vagabonds toward heaven. Four hundred years ago, a prisoner in an English jail retold THE story in such a fresh and masterful way that his words have been a bestseller ever since. That prisoner, of course, was John Bunyan, and his retelling of THE story was his masterpiece Pilgrim's Progress.

Now, a master storyteller of our generation has taken his turn at retelling THE story with the novel Quest for Celestia: A Reimagining of the Pilgrim's Progress. Patterned after the manner of Pilgrim's Progress, Quest for Celestia follows a young man, Kadin, as his eyes are opened to a great quest to visit a glorious city. His perilous journey takes him through the same type of allegorical adventures and dangers that echo both Bunyan and every Christian's life. Written in a fast-paced first-person style, this novel is an easy read akin to the Chronicles of Narnia. It has both a male and female protoganonist with a mild dash of romance thrown in to better appeal to readers of both sexes. Entertaining and inspiring, Quest for Celestia is a great read for young and old, both those familiar with Bunyan's original masterpiece and those new to the genre of imaginative retellings of God's redemptive story.

Enjoyable and thought provoking
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2006-05-01
The latest of Steven's books marks a step into the fantasy realm, but keeps true to his heritage as a storyteller. I saw this as an homage to Bunyan's original tale, but by his use of symbolism and fantasy characters, Steven made the story appeal to a wider modern day audience. The style reminds me a great deal of C.S. Lewis and his famous Chronicles, and my only complaint is that the book isn't longer. Fortunately, Steven leaves some room for a sequel, and I hope for his fans' sake that he gives us at least one more tale of Kadin and Leira. I give this 5 out of 5 stars for the readability, style, and overall message of this wonderful book. Please give us another book like this!

A Delightful Reimagining of the Pilgrim's Progress
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2006-04-21
Although many might not fully like this book, it is a refresher to countless fantasties of christian ideas that have lost focus. Some Christian Fantasy have forgotten that the journey to Heaven and the trials that we face is the real battle. The characters are interesting in this story though not fully explored. The perils in this novel are interesting enough to make you want keep reading to the end. This is a delightful reimagining of the classic story, The Pilgrim's Progress.

Stevens
Questions of Perception: Phenomenology of Architecture
Published in Paperback by William K Stout Pub (2007-07-15)
Authors: Steven Holl, Juhani Pallasmaa, and Alberto Perez-Gomez
List price: $49.95
New price: $49.95

Average review score:

Still worth reading even with 15 years history
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-06-02
The book was published more than 10 years ago and it's making its own history by the exclusive way of combining profound theoretical essays and design works together seamlessly. I have to say it works pretty well. Having seen Steven Holl's works and the office expanded, this book and the design deserve more attention than other cheap building constituted with meaningless idea and shallow skins.

typesetting detracts
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2008-01-09
Excellent essays but the typesetting makes it a difficult read (the font is extremely small.)

poetics, instead of polemics
Helpful Votes: 30 out of 31 total.
Review Date: 2007-02-07
Architects and students who are bored to death by OMA, MVRDV, Hadid, and the rest of the New Postmodernists will find consolation -- and inspiration -- in this book.

"Questions of Perception" was originally printed in July 1994, as a special issue of the architectural journal A+U. Back issues have been sold out for some time, and until recently, buying a used copy of the book would have set you back a couple hundred dollars. I'm very glad to see that the publishers of A+U decided to reprint these important essays.

Rather than serving as a polemical manifesto, or another boring iteration of reactionary academic theory, the authors discuss the experience of architecture on a basic psychophysiological level. Unlike the work of many of today's starchitects, this book will never seem dated, because it is focused on human constants -- the way that our minds and bodies respond to space, light, texture, color, and other architectural fundamentals. It is not a manual of style, or a collection of glossy photos for you to copy in your next project. It requires active thought. It requires an attention span. You have to absorb the meaning of the writings, not just look at computer renderings with copy+pasted supermodel silhouettes. It has nothing to do with urbanism, globalism, terrorism, or any of the other "isms" that hopeless, clueless, talentless academics increasingly try to link to the building and construction industry. Instead, it's a quiet reflection on the ways that buildings (and natural environments) shape our daily experiences. Even though 13 years have passed since these essays were written, they are still highly relevant for any designer who wants to infuse their work with quality and honesty.

As far as I can tell, the book's design is identical to the 1994 version, with the exception of the cover artwork. I must admit that $50 is a bit pricey for a book that is so plainly printed and bound. Regardless, it's better than paying a couple hundred dollars for a used copy of the original. And, all things considered, it's only a few dollars more than something like S,M,L,XL. So if you're tired of pretentious, pedantic academese, and you're ready to read something with permanence and substance, do yourself a favor and buy "Questions of Perception" instead.

Meditations on light, space and sense.
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 9 total.
Review Date: 2007-05-13
Anything, of course, is about the sensorial. It's our world. It's your world. What do you feel in it? What do I feel when I'm there, in a space? And this meditation -- regardless of what that space might be -- is really about everything, from architecturally conceived environments, to the nature of truly "natural" space. There is the potential in all, to contemplate the spirit of the space and the character of your presence in it. You are there, you are "in there". And you feel the warmth, the chill, the stillness, the breeze; you experience the scent drifting; you see light, shafts of movement; you hear something of reverberation in the containment of "where you are". Taste might play, balance might offer a sensed component to experience. But it's all about the meditation of what this means, how it can be considered - and how it can be reflected in active design, or in the nature of contemplating this phenom. Either it's meaning full -- and you consider it; or it's not the stuff of absorbed introspection and you simply design for it. Do it. Experience it. One way. Or an other. Surely, both have merit. As does reading this grouping of essays and ideas.


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