Doom Towns


Book Description

"Explains critical technological developments and the policies that drove weapons innovation within the context of the specific environments and communities where testing actually took place ... [and] emphasizes the people who participated, protested, or were affected by atomic testing and explains the decision-making process that resulted in these people and places becoming the only locations and groups to actually experience nuclear warfare during the Cold War"--




Doom


Book Description

"All disasters are in some sense man-made." Setting the annus horribilis of 2020 in historical perspective, Niall Ferguson explains why we are getting worse, not better, at handling disasters. Disasters are inherently hard to predict. Pandemics, like earthquakes, wildfires, financial crises. and wars, are not normally distributed; there is no cycle of history to help us anticipate the next catastrophe. But when disaster strikes, we ought to be better prepared than the Romans were when Vesuvius erupted, or medieval Italians when the Black Death struck. We have science on our side, after all. Yet in 2020 the responses of many developed countries, including the United States, to a new virus from China were badly bungled. Why? Why did only a few Asian countries learn the right lessons from SARS and MERS? While populist leaders certainly performed poorly in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, Niall Ferguson argues that more profound pathologies were at work--pathologies already visible in our responses to earlier disasters. In books going back nearly twenty years, including Colossus, The Great Degeneration, and The Square and the Tower, Ferguson has studied the foibles of modern America, from imperial hubris to bureaucratic sclerosis and online fragmentation. Drawing from multiple disciplines, including economics, cliodynamics, and network science, Doom offers not just a history but a general theory of disasters, showing why our ever more bureaucratic and complex systems are getting worse at handling them. Doom is the lesson of history that this country--indeed the West as a whole--urgently needs to learn, if we want to handle the next crisis better, and to avoid the ultimate doom of irreversible decline.




The Doughnut of Doom


Book Description

It's another ordinary day in Food Town, and Nancy McNutty, peanut butter sandwich and rookie reporter, desperately needs a big break. So when news comes in of a monster doughnut on the rampage, she's on the case. And boy, is that doughnut hungry! It's eating everything in sight, and not even the police, the fire department, or the military can bring it down. Whatever will President Bacon do? They need a plucky hero to save the day for the good of all food kind!




DOOM


Book Description

In December 1993, gaming changed forever. id Software's seminal shooter DOOM was released, and it shook the foundations of the medium. Daniel Pinchbeck brings together the complete story of DOOM for the first time. This book takes a look at the early days of first-person gaming and the video game studio system. It discusses the prototypes and the groundbreaking technology that drove the game forward and offers a detailed analysis of gameplay and level design. Pinchbeck also examines DOOM's contributions to wider gaming culture, such as online multiplay and the modding community, and the first-person gaming genre, focusing on DOOM's status as a foundational title and the development of the genre since 1993. Pinchbeck draws extensively from primary data: from the game itself, from the massive fan culture surrounding the title, and from interviews with the developers who made it. This book is not only the definitive work on DOOM but a snapshot of a period of gaming history, a manifesto for a development ethos, and a celebration of game culture at its best.




Gloom Town


Book Description

Twelve-year-old Rory and his friend Izzy try to foil the plans of Lord Foxglove, for whom Rory works as a valet, and his inhuman accomplices from taking over the world.




Rise of the Balloon Goons: A Branches Book (The Notebook of Doom #1)


Book Description

Monsters + Humor + Fun = THE NOTEBOOK OF DOOM! This series is part of Scholastic's early chapter book line called Branches, which is aimed at newly independent readers. With easy-to-read text, high-interest content, fast-paced plots, and illustrations on every page, these books will boost reading confidence and stamina. Branches books help readers grow!Alexander has just moved to a new town where he uncovers all sorts of monsters! He finds an old notebook with the word "DOOM" inscribed on the front cover. The Notebook of Doom, which Alexander now holds, contains top-secret information about the monsters! In this first book, Alexander goes up against spooky balloon goons--unique and twisted arm-waving balloon guys! This book is full of humor, engaging black-and-white illlustrations, and of course...monsters!




Atomic Culture


Book Description

Eight scholars examine the range of cultural expressions of atomic energy from the 1940s to the early twenty-first century, including comic books, nuclear landscapes, mushroom-cloud postcards, the Los Alamos suburbs, uranium-themed board games, future atomic waste facilities, and atomic-themed films such as 'Dr. Strangelove' and 'The Atomic Kid'. Despite the growing interest in atomic culture and history, the body of relevant scholarship is relatively sparse. Atomic Culture opens new doors into the field by providing a substantive, engaging, and historically based consideration of the topic that will appeal to students and scholars of the Atomic Age as well as general readers.




Lost Towns of Tidewater, Maryland


Book Description

In the years between 1668 and 1751, the government of Maryland envisioned an urban development program unrivaled in scope by any other colony except Virginia. Unwilling to allow development to occur naturally, both the Lord Proprietor and the legislature tried to create towns, ignoring the social, economic, and topographic realities that would doom most of them to short lives. The background of Maryland's attempt at urbanization is complex and perplexing. It is a history laced with proclamations and laws, acts and supplementary acts, all of which flowed against the grain of rural plantation society, as time and experience eventually proved. Of the 130 sites designated in the tidewater section of the state, less than a score exist today as cities or towns of any note. The others, the majority, shared a common end--they disappeared into oblivion, destroyed by the sequence of tumultuous events that shaped Maryland's past. This is the story of ten lost towns, chosen to represent a cross section of all. Each was unique in the manner in which it was given birth, flickered into existence against all odds, matured, and finally expired. The story of Maryland's lost towns is not a simple tale of buildings and wharves, but a history of the people, both freemen and slaves, who created them, lived and worked in them, defended them, and died with them.




Masters of Doom


Book Description

Masters of Doom is the amazing true story of the Lennon and McCartney of video games: John Carmack and John Romero. Together, they ruled big business. They transformed popular culture. And they provoked a national controversy. More than anything, they lived a unique and rollicking American Dream, escaping the broken homes of their youth to co-create the most notoriously successful game franchises in history—Doom and Quake—until the games they made tore them apart. Americans spend more money on video games than on movie tickets. Masters of Doom is the first book to chronicle this industry’s greatest story, written by one of the medium’s leading observers. David Kushner takes readers inside the rags-to-riches adventure of two rebellious entrepreneurs who came of age to shape a generation. The vivid portrait reveals why their games are so violent and why their immersion in their brilliantly designed fantasy worlds offered them solace. And it shows how they channeled their fury and imagination into products that are a formative influence on our culture, from MTV to the Internet to Columbine. This is a story of friendship and betrayal, commerce and artistry—a powerful and compassionate account of what it’s like to be young, driven, and wildly creative. “To my taste, the greatest American myth of cosmogenesis features the maladjusted, antisocial, genius teenage boy who, in the insular laboratory of his own bedroom, invents the universe from scratch. Masters of Doom is a particularly inspired rendition. Dave Kushner chronicles the saga of video game virtuosi Carmack and Romero with terrific brio. This is a page-turning, mythopoeic cyber-soap opera about two glamorous geek geniuses—and it should be read while scarfing down pepperoni pizza and swilling Diet Coke, with Queens of the Stone Age cranked up all the way.”—Mark Leyner, author of I Smell Esther Williams




Incredible Doom


Book Description

“Incredibly strong and not a little disturbing.” —Cory Doctorow, author of In Real Life Welcome to a new age…the age of the internet. Allison is drowning under the weight of her manipulative stage magician father. When he brings home the family’s first computer, she escapes into a thrilling new world where she meetings Samir, a like-minded new online friend who has just agreed to run away from home with her. After moving to a new town and leaving all of his friends behind, Richard receives a mysterious note in his locker with instructions on how to connect to “Evol BBS,” a dial-in bulletin board system, and meets a fierce punk named Tina who comes into his life and shakes his entire worldview loose. Unlikely alliances, first love, and minor crime sprees abound in this teen graphic novel debut about making connections while your world is falling apart. “Perfectly captures the mystery and wonder of the early days of the internet.” —Andy Baio, author of Waxy.org and co-founder of XOXO "A rush of love for brave beginnings—of both the early internet and the teens who used it to find themselves and each other." —Eleanor Davis, author of The Hard Tomorrow and How to Be Happy "A compelling story complimented by pleasingly minimal art that skillfully evokes a sense of loneliness and isolation. " —Savanna Ganucheau, co-creator of Bloom "A sharp and authentic wild ride that brought me back to my teenage years as a punk with a dial-up connection.” —Kevin Panetta, co-creator of Bloom “A poignant and often hilarious reminder that technology is at its best when it’s easing the ache of loneliness and bringing people together." —Jeff Zentner, Morris Award-winning author of The Serpent King