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[Book Searches] [Online Books - Free] [Online Bookstores] [Realworld Bookshops] [Authors] [Humour] [Recommended Reading]

Book Searches

Powells.com for out-of-print / hard-to-get books (USA, will mail overseas).
日本の古本屋 lets you search for 2nd-hand books in Japan (Delivery within Japan only, however)
ABE (Advanced Book Exchange) - browse for out-of-print / hard-to-get books (US).
Google Book Search
Most online bookstores have browsable catalogues.
Fantastic Fiction has compiled bibliographies of Science Fiction, Horror and Fantasy authors, including obscurities like Neil R. Jones who do not appear in other catalogues

Online Books - Free

Out Of Control by Kevin Kelly -- a marvellous tour of emergent behaviour in complex systems, artificial life etc.
The Adventure of the Field Theorems by science-fiction writer Vonda N. McIntyre
An English translation of Frank Zolf's Autobiography On Foreign Soil
Project Guttenberg is a large collection of classic books on-line, but it sadly lacks Ben Franklin's more unorthodox essays.
Read Richard Darsie's Tales of Wonder - a collection of Folk and Fairy Tales from Around the World
"Yea, ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath, and the seed of an homer shall yield an ephah." - Isaiah 5:10. And you can't argue with that. Searchable copies and concordances of the Bible

Online Bookstores

Amazon books (Text-only search) - USA with international delivery
Cokahama Books - Australia, will mail books overseas
Abbeys Bookstore, 131 York St, Sydney (Opposite the Queen Victoria Building). (02) 9264-3111. Includes the indispensible Language Book Centre
China Books Shop F7, Level 1 Citymark Building, 683 George Street (below Marigold Restaurant) (02) 9280 1885
The ABC Shop carries many books & other material associated with Australian culture.
Kinokuniya Books - Shop RP2.02, The Galeries Victoria, 500 George Street, Sydney
Collins Bookstores
Co-op bookshops - Australia
Dymocks - Australia. Online Catalog
Blackwell's bookstores - UK
See the origami page for specialist paper-folding bookstores.

Realworld Bookshops

Some Sydney Bookstores

Authors

David Brin's Web Site - his articles on Enlightenment vs. Romanticism

Humour

Are you a reading addict?

Recommended Reading

Hell's Bibliophiles has lots of links to reading material to challenge your thinking

What Fred Has Been Reading Lately

Sep 2008 - Donald E. Knuth, Things a Computer Scientist Rarely Talks About
Aug 2008 - George Monbiot, Bring on the Apocalypse
Jul 2008 - Stanislav Andreski, Social sciences as sorcery
Jul 2008 - Started to read, but quickly abandoned, Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich (I highly recommend the appendix, but that was written by someone else)
Jun 2008 - Stephen Pinker, The Stuff of Thought
May 2008 - Clifford D. Simak, Strangers in the Universe [Short Stories] [quotes]
May 2008 - Robert Tralins, Android Armageddon [quotes]
May 2008 - Julian Burnside, Watching Brief : Reflections on Human Rights, Law and Justice
May 2008 - Alan H. Cromer, Connected Knowledge : Science, Philosophy, and Education
May 2008 - Sudhir Venkatesh, Gang Leader for a Day
May 2008 - Victor Borge, My Favorite Intermissions in Music
Apr 2008 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Miracle at Speed Motors [quotes]
Apr 2008 - Leonard Mlodinow, Euclid's Window - The Story of Geometry from Parallel Lines to Hyperspace [quotes]
Mar 2008 - Victor Borge, My Favorite Comedies in Music
Mar 2008 - Tom Holt, Faust Among Equals [quotes]
Mar 2008 - Tom Holt, You don't Have to be Evil to Work Here, But it Helps [quotes]
Feb 2008 - Tom Holt, Earth, Air, Fire and Custard [quotes]
Feb 2008 - Tom Holt, In Your Dreams [quotes]
Feb 2008 - Tom Holt, The Portable Door [quotes]
Jan 2008 - Umberto Eco, Mouse or Rat? : Translation as Negotiation
Jan 2008 - Patrick Hughes & George Brecht, Vicious circles and infinity : a panoply of paradoxes
Jan 2008 - Stanislaw M. Ulam, Adventures of a Mathematician [quotes]
Jan 2008 - Alan H. Cromer, Uncommon Sense: the heretical nature of science
Jan 2008 - Paul R. Halmos, Selecta -- Expository Writing
Jan 2008 - Norman E. Steenrod, Paul R. Halmos, et al., How to Write Mathematics [quotes]
Jan 2008 - Travis Taylor, The Quantum Connection
Jan 2008 - Travis Taylor, Warp Speed
Dec 2007 - C. Northcote Parkinson, Parkinson's law, or, The pursuit of progress
Dec 2007 - Eric Abrahamson & David H. Freedman, A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder [quotes]
Dec 2007 - Randall Garrett, Unwise Child [quotes]
Dec 2007 - Terry Pratchett, Making Money [quotes]
Nov 2007 - Karl Kruszelnicki, Dr. Karl's collection of great Australian facts & firsts [quotes]
Nov 2007 - Sheila E Anderson, The quotable musician : from Bach to Tupac [quotes]
Nov 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Careful Use of Compliments [quotes]
Nov 2007 - Hugh Lunn, Lost for Words
Nov 2007 - Clifford D Simak, Out of Their Minds
Nov 2007 - Doris Piserchia, Spaceling
Impressions: One of her earlier and (for me) more appealing novels. Good story, likeable protagonist.
Oct 2007 - Doris Piserchia, Doomtime
Impressions: Very imaginative. The protagonist and his philosophical connundrums remind me of A Billion Days of Earth, another novel by Piserchia.
Oct 2007 - Doris Piserchia, The Deadly Sky
Impressions: Odd, mildly annoying characters, but imaginative.
Favourite & most Bulwer-Lyttonish paragraph:
Above me the mountain waited as it has since the day I was born, and perhaps long before that, a huge and patient escarpment full of mystery. There was about it more than one enigma. Always I ascended it but, more significantly, sooner or later I always descended it.
Oct 2007 - D. E. Elis, A Thousand Ages
Oct 2007 - Peter F. Hamilton, Judas Unchained
Oct 2007 - Peter F. Hamilton, Pandora's Star
Sep 2007 - Neal Stephenson, Cryptonomicon [quotes]
Aug 2007 - Duncan McGeary, Ice Towers (sequel to Snowcastles)
Aug 2007 - Joseph Mazue, Euclid in the Rainforest
Aug 2007 - Darrell T. Langart [Pseudonym of Randall T. Garrett], Anything You Can Do ...
Jul 2007 - Greg Bear, The Serpent Mage
Jul 2007 - Greg Bear, The Infinity Concerto
Jul 2007 - Doris Piserchia, The Spinner
Impressions: The monster attacking the city is more believable and attractive than many of the human protagonists.
Jul 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Good Husband of Zebra Drive [quotes]
Jul 2007 - Karla Jennings, The Devouring Fungus: Tales of the Computer Age
Jul 2007 - Nury Vittachi, The Amazing Life of Dead Eric [quotes]
Jul 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (7) - The River Wall
Jul 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (6) - Return to Eddarta
Jul 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (5) - The Search for Kä
Jul 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (4) - The Well of Darkness
Jun 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (3) - The Bronze of Eddarta
Jun 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (2) - The Glass of Dyskornis
Jun 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (1) - The Steel of Raithskar
Jun 2007 - Doris Piserchia, The Fluger.
Impressions: Not a bad story, but ends abruptly. To paraphrase: "... and then the monster died. The end."
Jun 2007 - Doris Piserchia, A Billion Days of Earth.
Impressions: The monster carries out philosophical discussions, convincing its victims to surrender to absorbtion.
Jun 2007 - Eat the Rich
Jun 2007 - Ross Gittons, Gittinomics
Jun 2007 - Duncan McGeary, Snowcastles

Earlier reading ...

	This page last changed: 1 Sep 2004
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