A Burglar's Guide To The City by Geoff Manaugh
I recently finished reading A Burglar's Guide To The City by Geoff Manaugh. It is probably one of the best books I've read this year so far. At the core of the book is a realization that not everything we see is as it seems by appearance. Sometimes there are hidden walls, objects that could be "ladders", and hiding places right in plain sight that burglar's use to commit crimes. I'm no burglar, but some of the things in this book really remind me of myself and how I tend to look at urban environments around me. It's those little details that I'm fascinated by and apparently, those little details on building facades also just so happen to lend nicely to theft. Go figure.
Geoff Manaugh gives a ton of examples of successful and unsuccessful burglars, many of whom could easily have been a separate book by themselves. If you want to a peek into the life of a burglar and the oddities that surround the definition of architectural space, this is a great intersection of the two fields.
In Pictures: Reddit's first physical AMA book
Well that was fast. I only posted about this a day ago and in my hands is now the physical culmination of years of AMA threads on Reddit. The "best of" from Reddit, so to speak.
It's much bigger than I imagined, although I knew it was going to be about 400 pages or so. Anyway, here are some first photos of it.
Reddit printed a physical volume of their best AMA's
This is very, very interesting and cool in my opinion. Reddit just announced that they are publishing a 400-page book that compiles some of the best answers and questions from the history of the site's popular Ask Me Anything (AMA) threads.
The book is available now for just $34.99 and you should purchase right away if you want to make sure you snag one of the 10,000 copies being printed.
These are the books I read in 2015
It was another wonderful year of reading for me. In 2014, I started my one-book-a-month goal in order to get myself off the internet and reading actual books more. I haven’t quite made the transition yet to E-readers (I like carrying a physical book around even if it does take up more space) so for this year, I’m going to continue reading physical books.
Here’s what I read last year (in order from left to right, top to bottom).
The standouts were definitely Going Clear by Lawrence Wright, The Martian by Andy Weir (the movie was great too!), and One More Thing by B.J. Novak. Unfortunately, I ended the year on a very tough to read book, The Man In The High Castle, which came highly recommended, but I just couldn’t get through it fast enough. It was my least favorite book of the year.
So what am I reading to start off the new year? I am just starting The Shallows by Nicholas Carr. It’s supposed to be about how the internet is changing human behavior. I like those sorts of books so hopefully this will make up for a lackluster end to my reading list.