It Came from Bob's Basement


Book Description

Known to give up precious living space to display a full-size creature from the Black Lagoon or a pair of Frankenstein's clod-hoppers, Bob Burns is the patron saint of special effects for B movies. His storied basement houses the largest private collection of props, models, sketches, storyboards, and other bits of nostalgic debris from a century's worth of films. It Came from Bob's Basement is a colorful journey through the vivid and campy world of fantastic cinema and a true tribute to a man who has dedicated his life to the preservation of incredible movie artifactsfrom the original King Kong's metallic skeleton to the life-size Alien Queen. Including insider stories from the sets of favorites like The She Creature, It Conquered the World, and Plan Nine from Outer Space, Bob Burns brings fellow fantasy buffs up close with props and artwork from the greatest (and most outrageous) sci-fi films of all time. A story told with genuinely irresistible enthusiasm, Bob's Basement honors the beloved cult classics that have shaped movie history.




From the Basement to the Dome


Book Description

How a bottom-up problem-solving ethos, multidisciplinary approach, and experimental mindset has nurtured entrepreneurship at MIT. MIT is world-famous as a launching pad for entrepreneurs. MIT alumni have founded at least 30,000 active companies, employing an estimated 4.6 million people, with revenues of approximately $1.9 trillion. In the 2010s, twenty to thirty ventures were spun off each year to commercialize technologies developed in MIT labs (with intellectual property licensed by MIT to these companies); in the same decade, MIT graduates started an estimated 100 firms per year. How has MIT become such a hotbed of entrepreneurship? In From the Basement to the Dome, Jean-Jacques Degroof describes how MIT's problem-solving ethos, multidisciplinary approach, and experimental mindset nurture entrepreneurship. Degroof explains that, at first, the culture of entrepreneurship sprang from such extracurricular activities as forums, clubs, and competitions. Eventually, the Institute formally supported these activities, offering courses in entrepreneurship. Degroof describes why entrepreneurship is so uniquely aligned with MIT's culture: a history of bottom-up decision-making, a tradition of academic excellence, a keen interest in problem-solving, a belief in experimentation, and a tolerance for failure on the way to success. Entrepreneurship is the logical outcome of MIT's motto, Mens et Manus (mind and hand) ), translating theories and scientific discoveries into products and businesses--many of which have the goal of solving some of the world's most pressing problems. Degroof maps MIT's current entrepreneurial ecosystem of students, faculty, and researchers; considers the effectiveness of teaching entrepreneurship; and outlines ways that the MIT story could inspire conversations in other institutions about promoting entrepreneurship.




Invisible Republic #1


Book Description

Breaking Bad meets Blade Runner. Arthur McBride's planetary regime has fallen. His story is over. That is until reporter Croger Babb discovers the journal of Arthur's cousin, Maia. Inside is the violent, audacious hidden history of the legendary freedom fighter. Erased from the official record, Maia alone knows how dangerous her cousin really is... Creative team GABRIEL HARDMAN (KINSKI, "Intense" - A.V. Club) and CORINNA BECHKO (HEATHENTOWN, "Nuanced" _ Broken Frontier) brought you scifi adventure before (Planet of the Apes, Star Wars: Legacy, Hulk) but never this gritty or this epic.




Tonight I Said Goodbye


Book Description

A remarkable debut mystery from the award-winning author of the 2003 St. Martin's Press/Private Eye Writers of America Prize for Best First Private Eye Novel. Michael Koryta's Tonight I Said Goodbye marks the emergence of a stunning new voice in crime fiction. With its edge-of-your-seat pacing, finely drawn characters, and rock-solid prose, Tonight I Said Goodbye would seem to be the work of a grizzled pro; the fact that the author is just twenty-one years old makes it all the more amazing. Investigator Wayne Weston is found dead of an apparent suicide in his home in an upscale Cleveland suburb, and his wife and six-year-old daughter are missing. Weston's father insists that private investigators Lincoln Perry and Joe Pritchard take the case to exonerate his son and find his granddaughter and daughter-in-law. As they begin to work they discover there is much more to the situation than has been described in the prevalent media reports. There are rumors of gambling debts and extortion, and a group of Russians with ties to organized crime who don't appreciate being investigated--a point they make clear with baseball bats. With some assistance from newspaper reporter Amy Ambrose, Perry and Pritchard believe they are making swift progress. But then they are warned off the investigation by a millionaire real estate tycoon and the FBI. Just when they feel they are closing in on a possible source of answers, another murder forces them to change direction in the case. Perry travels to a resort town in South Carolina and there he finds more than one game being played, and all of them are deadly. The stakes quickly become very personal for Perry, and it's clear that there will be no walking away from this case. In a debut that has already garnered praise from some of today's top writers, Michael Koryta immediately establishes himself as a standard bearer for the next generation of crime writers. Tonight I Said Goodbye is a 2005 Edgar Award Nominee for Best First Novel.




Makers


Book Description

Make magazine, launched in February 2005 as the first magazine devoted to Tech DIY projects, hardware hacks, and DIY inspiration, has been hailed as "a how-to guide for the opposable thumb set" and "Popular Mechanics for the modern age." Itching to build a cockroach-controlled robot, a portable satellite radio or your very own backyard monorail? Hankering to hack a game boy or your circadian rhythms? Rather read about people who fashion laptop bags from recycled wetsuits and build shopping cart go-karts? Make is required reading. Now, following on the heels of Make's wildly popular inaugural issues, O'Reilly offers Makers, a beautiful hardbound book celebrating creativity, resourcefulness and the DIY spirit. Author Bob Parks profiles 100 people and their homebrew projects-people who make ingenious things in their backyards, basements and garages with a lot of imagination and a little applied skill. Makers features technologies old and new used in service of the serious and the amusing, the practical and the outrageous. The makers profiled are driven by a combination of curiosity, passion and plain old stick-to-itiveness to create the unique and astonishing. Most are simply hobbyists who'll never gain notoriety for their work, but that's not what motivates them to tinker. The collection explores both the projects and the characters behind them, and includes full-color photographs and instructions to inspire weekend hackers. Parks is just the man to track the quirky and outlandish in their natural maker habitats. A well-known journalist and author who covers the personalities behind the latest technologies, Parks' articles on innovations of all kinds have appeared in Wired, Outside, Business 2.0 and Make. He has contributed essays to "All Things Considered" on public radio and discussed trends in technology devices with Regis Philbin and Russ Mitchell on television. As a Wired editor, Parks directed coverage of new consumer technologies and contributed feature articles. All those who love to tinker or who fancy themselves kindred DIY spirits will appreciate Parks' eclectic and intriguing collection of independent thinkers and makers.




Bobs, a Girl Detective


Book Description




We Were Pirates


Book Description

A sailor’s extraordinary experiences on an American submarine in the Pacific are candidly reported in this eyewitness account of war from a torpedoman’s perspective. Robert Hunt managed to survive twelve consecutive war patrols on the submarine USS Tambor. During the course of the war, Hunt was everywhere that mattered in the Pacific. He stood on the bow of the Tambor as it cruised into Pearl Harbor just days after the devastation of the Japanese air raid, peered through binoculars as his boat shadowed Japanese cruisers at the Battle of Midway, ferried guns and supplies to American guerilla fighters in the Philippines, fired torpedoes that sank vital Japanese shipping, and survived a near-fatal, seventeen-hour depth-charge attack. For “exceptional skill and proficiency at his battle station” Hunt received a commendation from Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz. This WWII torpedoman’s account of the war offers the rare perspective of an enlisted seaman that is not available in the more common officer accounts.To capture and recount the progress of the Pacific War through Hunt’s eyes coauthors Robert Schultz and James Shell examined the young submariner's war diary, as well as crew letters, photographs, and captains' reports, and they also conducted hours of interviews. Their vivid descriptions of the ways in which sailors dealt with the stress of war while at sea or on liberty show a side of the war that is rarely reported. The fact that Hunt’s submarine was the first of a new fleet of World War II boats and the namesake of a significant class adds further value to his remarkable story.




Jeremy Q Taylor & The Cyborg In The Cellar


Book Description

What sets humans apart from cyborgs? Sixteen-year-old Jeremy Q. Taylor is about to find out. After losing his mother the year before, Jeremy feels more alone than ever. Then his dad surprises Jeremy with a new "brother." Addison is a cyborg, who looks to be about eighteen. But he's not just any cyborg. He's almost perfect in every way. When the plans to mass-produce the cyborg are sold to a robotics company, things get complicated. Can they reverse engineer the cyborg? What if something goes wrong? The possibility of this occurring creates fear and anger in those who have grown to love Addison. Going into hiding may be his only chance to survive.




Alligator in the Basement


Book Description

A young boy discovers that a wild imagination is a powerful thing--but it can also be a lot of fun!




Headpress Guide to the Counter Culture


Book Description

An indispensable sampling of the vast assortment of publications which exist as an adjunct to the mainstream press, or which promote themes and ideas that may be defined as pop culture, alternative, underground or subversive. Updated and revised from the pages of the critically acclaimed Headpress journal, this is an enlightened and entertaining guide to the counter culture - including everything from cult film, music, comics and cutting-edge fiction, by way of its books and zines, with contact information accompanying each review.




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