Ever wonder how a suspension bridge can cross a gap thousands of feet wide? Want to know how to build a comfortable lounge chair out of cardboard boxes? Or what keeps a massive cathedral dome from collapsing? Discover the answers to these and many more questions in Steven Caney's Ultimate Building Book, a wonderfully comprehensive exploration of design, construction, and invention that will stimulate the curiosity of children and adults alike. Much as David Macaulay's blockbuster The Way Things Work did for machines and devices a decade ago, this definitive volume from best-selling author Steven Caney details the ins and outs of construction in all its fascinating forms. Packed with exciting building projects guaranteed to engage anyone from age 4 to 104, the Ultimate Building Book gives easy-to-follow instructions for creating amazing models and toys that are as much fun to make as they are to play with! Readers are also introduced to a wide variety of household materials and tools that can be used for building, along with fascinating insights into the architectural and design properties of everything from drinking straws to yurts. A mammoth project in its own right, this book has been under construction for more than a decade. The result is hundreds of superbly illustrated pages that will enlighten and fascinate armchair architects of all ages for years to come.

Building Systems Magazine (BSM) is an award winning United States-based trade magazine read by builders, developers and general contractors using or considering using innovative construction technologies. Once commonly known as "pre-fab," today's modern building systems employ innovative materials and techniques to create residential or commercial structures in a factory setting in a fraction of the time it takes to site build. BSM focuses mainly on log, timber frame, modular, panel, and structural insulated panel building technologies. Since factory fabrication and site preparation take place simultaneously, structures are finished and ready for occupancy in weeks, rather than months or years as required by conventional site-building schedules.

Books and blocks bring together two siblings with nothing in common in this story from Megan Wagner Lloyd (Finding Wild) and illustrator Brianne Farley (Secret Tree Fort). Katie loves to build. She loves the way the blocks click together, the way they crash when they topple to the floor. But most of all, she loves to build something brand-new. Unlike her brother, she hates reading. Owen loves to read. He loves the way the pages rustle when he turns them, the way the paper smells. But most of all, he loves to read something brand-new. But, unlike his sister, he has no interest in building. When their rivalry finally comes to a head, a librarian suggests a solution. Books for Katie to read and books for Owen to shelve. Can they learn to appreciate their siblings hobbies and build something together?

Weak or failed states - where no government is in control - are the source of many of the world's most serious problems, from poverty, AIDS and drugs to terrorism. What can be done to help? The problem of weak states and the need for state-building has existed for many years, but it has been urgent since September 11 and Afghanistan and Iraq. The formation of proper public institutions, such as an honest police force, uncorrupted courts, functioning schools and medical services and a strong civil service, is fraught with difficulties. We know how to help with resources, people and technology across borders, but state building requires methods that are not easily transported. The ability to create healthy states from nothing has suddenly risen to the top of the world agenda. State building has become a crucial matter of global security. In this hugely important book, Francis Fukuyama explains the concept of state-building and discusses the problems and causes of state weakness and its national and international effects.

An engaging introduction to buildings, with a deft mix of nonfiction and fiction elements.

For SCRABBLE(R) and other word-game players, the winner's handbook is here! Become a master of the game with this essential guide for top-scoring play. You'll discover: The 94 all-important two-letter words -- in one handy list A special section of over 800 three-letter words, 550 of which can be

"De Re Aedificatoria, by Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472), was the first modern treatise on the theory and practice of architecture and in its time a model of learned Latin writing. Its importance for the subsequent history of architecture is incalculable; yet this is the first major English translation based on the original text on which Alberti's reputation as a theorist is founded.Joseph Rykwert and his colleagues have been scrupulous in following Alberti's original intentions. Their version is based on the critical text published in 1966 by Giovanni Orlandi. It replaces the only other significant English version, by the Venetian architect James Leoni, whose source was not the original Latin but an Italian translation dating from the sixteenth century.Rykwert's substantial introduction discusses Alberti's life and career - as papal functionary, writer on a wide variety of topics, and architect and discusses the "De Re Aedificatoria itself - its relation to the De Architectura of Vitruvius, its influence on contemporary and later architectural theory and practice, and its bibliographic history. The apparatus also includes an index and a glossary of terms. The translators were fortunate to have the help of eminent Alberti scholar Hans-Karl Lucke of the University of Toronto.Alberti set out to replace Vitruvius's authority, which had been undisputed for over a thousand years. In a Latin which was both more elegant and more precise than that of his ancient predecessor, he succeeded in framing a coherent account of the fragmented knowledge of antique architecture as it had survived through the dark and middle ages. His was the one book which established architecture as an intellectualand professional discipline rather than a craft and gave it a proper theoretical context; by showing how the great examples of ruined antiquity could be emulated in practice, it provided a theoretical basis for the architecture of the Renaissance.Alberti organizes the work of the architect according to solidity, use, and grace. The ten books begin with a book of definitions; there follow two books devoted to materials and constructional methods; books four and five discuss the uses of the parts of the building and the different building types. The bulk of the second part, books six through nine deal with grace: the problems of designing sacred buildings, the problems of beauty and ornament, of proportions. Book ten takes up problems of restoration, water supply, and minor adjuncts to building.Joseph Rykwert is Paul Philippe Cret Professor of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania. Neil Leach is an architect in private practice in Cambridge, and Robert Tavernor is a practicing architect and lecturer in the Department of Architecture at the University of Bath.