UDM Libraries Book of the Week

By Eric Broug Islamic geometric designs are admired worldwide for their beauty and marvelous intricacy, yet they are seldom understood. In this handsomely illustrated volume, Eric Broug analyzes and explains these complex designs in their historical and physical context. Broug shows how, over the centuries, craftsmen were able to adorn buildings with wonderful geometric patterns using the simplest of tools and without recourse to mathematical calculations. Design elements created from straight lines and circles were placed in grids and then...

By Hod Lipson and Melba Kurman Fabricated tells the story of 3D printers, humble manufacturing machines that are bursting out of the factory and into homes, businesses, schools, kitchens, hospitals, even the fashion catwalk. The magic happens when you plug a 3D printer into today’s mind-boggling digital technologies. Add to that the Internet, tiny, low cost electronic circuitry, radical advances in materials science and biotech and voila! The result is an explosion of technological and social innovation. Fabricated provides readers with practical...

Edited by Mark Connelly   Whether we love or hate it, Christmas has always played a special role in the cinema, and Christmas movies like “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “Miracle on 34th Street” have a special place in popular affections. They almost constitute a mini-cinematic genre. So what does Christmas in the movies mean to societies across the Anglo-Saxon and European world and what does it have to say about them? The contributors to this book take a good...

by Harvey Levenstein There may be no greater source of anxiety for Americans today than the question of what to eat and drink. Are eggs the perfect protein, or are they cholesterol bombs?  Is red wine good for my heart or bad for my liver? Will pesticides, additives, and processed foods kill me?  Here with some very rare and very welcome advice is food historian Harvey Levenstein: Stop worrying! In Fear of Food Levenstein reveals the people and interests who...