Building Bots $13.97 (expected October 1, 2002)
by William Gurstelle

This is the definitive guide to designing and building warrior robots like those seen on BattleBots, Robotica, and Robot Wars. It walks robot enthusiasts of all ages step-by-step through the design and building process, enabling them to create any number of customized warrior robots. With a strong emphasis on safety, chapters include designing a robot, choosing materials, radio control systems, electric motors, robot batteries, motor speed controllers, gasoline engines, and drive trains. Clear instructions are accompanied by photos, line drawings, and detailed diagrams throughout. For inspiration, a color section showcases a variety of glorious fighting machines along with their stats. Profiles of well-known designers and builders also enliven the text. For beginners, there is machine shop 101 and robot physics, and, of course, chapters on weaponry that include spinner robots, thwackbots, cutting blade robots, lifters, and chameleon robots. When the bot of their dreams is built, suggestions on where to compete and game-day strategies and tactics help readers take the next step. An extensive resource section lists parts suppliers, pertinent Web sites, a radio frequency chart, and a glossary.

Backyard Ballistics $11.87
by William Gurstelle

Ordinary folks can construct 13 awesome ballistic devices in their garage or basement workshops using inexpensive household or hardware store materials and this step-by-step guide. Clear instructions, diagrams, and photographs show how to build projects ranging from the simple-a match-powered rocket-to the more complex-a scale-model, table-top catapult-to the offbeat-a tennis ball cannon. With a strong emphasis on safety, the book also gives tips on troubleshooting, explains the physics behind the projects, and profiles scientists and extraordinary experimenters such as Alfred Nobel, Robert Goddard, and Isaac Newton. This book will be indispensable for the legions of backyard toy-rocket launchers and fireworks fanatics who wish every day was the fourth of July.

Look inside the book!

Pocket Ref $10.36
by Thomas J. Glover

This concise reference guide covers Air & gases, Computers, electronics, General information, Geology, Hardware, Math, Money, Steel and metals, Surveying and mapping, Weights and measures and more. Paper.

The New Way Things Work $24.50
by David Macaulay, Neil Ardley

Is it a fact--or have I dreamt it--that, by means of electricity, the world of matter has become a great nerve, vibrating thousands of miles in a breathless point of time?" If you, like Nathaniel Hawthorne, are kept up at night wondering about how things work--from electricity to can openers--then you and your favorite kids shouldn't be a moment longer without David Macaulay's The New Way Things Work. The award-winning author-illustrator--a former architect and junior high school teacher--is perfectly poised to be the Great Explainer of the whirrings and whizzings of the world of machines, a talent that landed the 1988 version of The Way Things Work on the New York Times bestsellers list for 50 weeks. Grouping machines together by the principles that govern their actions rather than by their uses, Macaulay helps us understand in a heavily visual, humorous, unerringly precise way what gadgets such as a toilet, a carburetor, and a fire extinguisher have in common.

Look inside the book!

Books by Neal Stephenson

Books by William Gibson

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (Graphic Novel) $10.47
by Frank Miller (Illustrator), Klaus Janson (Illustrator), Lynn Varley, Bob Kahan (Editor), costanza

If your one of those people who think comic books are only kid stuff than you should really pick this up. Frank Miller's "Dark Knight Returns" may well be the greatest storyline in the history of comics, and those who have never read it will see Batman in a very new light. The storyline picks up 10 years after Batman's retirement. Bruce Wayne, now in his fifties, watches the world around him continue to be filled with social decay. Eventually we see how obsessive he was with crime fighting begin to come back to him, and soon enough he dons the cape and cowl and Batman makes his return. But this isn't the Batman that most people will expect to see, we see him battle a gang called The Mutants with no holding back, and he deals with the return of a now "rehabilitated" Two-Face, and the return of his all time arch nemesis The Joker. The graphic novel is shockingly violent and disturbing at some points, Miller's gritty art really gives the book life (although I will admit I was turned off by the artwork the first time I read it, but I realized it is like this for a reason and it grew on me), and the climatic final battle between Batman and Superman has to be seen to be believed. Do yourself a favor, if you even remotely like Batman and have never read this, than buy it as soon as you can, "The Dark Knight Returns" is a stunning landmark in the Batman saga, as well as it is a landmark in comics history.

Watchmen (Graphic Novel) $13.97
by Alan Moore, Barry Marx (Editor), Dave Gibbons (Illustrator)

Is Alan Moore's "Watchmen" the greatest comic book ever written? Quite possibly so. "Watchmen" is a self-contained story that follows two generations of costumed superheroes over several decades of their history (the story spans from the 1930s to the 1980s). Moore's characters are truly unforgettable: the violent Comedian, the Batman-like Nite Owl, the disturbed Rorschach, the dazzling Ozymandias (known as "the world's smartest man"), the sexy female crimefighter known as the Silk Spectre, the godlike Dr. Manhattan, and more. Much of these characters' lives are lived in the shadow of the Cold War and possible nuclear armageddon (a particularly resonant theme for those of us who remember that era).

Moore's complex story moves back and forth in time, and shifts in perspective among the main characters. As he skillfully deconstructs the concept of the costumed superhero, Moore deals with a host of potentially explosive issues: sexual violence, politics, mental illness, etc. This is very much an adult story.

One of the book's most intelligent devices is the alternation of the comic book format with excerpts of the story told in other media: a newspaper clipping, personal correspondence, a psychiatric report, chapters from one character's autobiography, etc. This gives the book as a whole a richer texture and a powerful satiric thrust. Along the way Moore also riffs on classic superhero story elements: the origin story, the superhero teamup story, etc.

The visuals in "Watchmen" are amazing: some scenes are graphically violent and horrific; some magical and hauntingly beautiful. This world is populated with rich, fully developed characters who have complex emotional and moral lives. To sum up, "Watchmen" is a truly epic story that is told with consummate skill and power. It's a book that should, I believe, be read by both comic book fans and by those who don't normally read that medium.