We Americans love to have ourselves a big old time. It's not just our waistlines that have exploded outward since the post-WWII era. Our houses have grown larger, as have the appliances within them, the vehicles in their driveways, the income inequalities between ourselves and our neighbors, and the challenges we face on a rapidly warming planet. In his new book, Size: How It Explains the World, Dr. Vaclav Smil, Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Manitoba, takes readers on a multidiscipline tour of the social quirks, economic intricacies, and biological peculiarities that result from our function following our form.William MorrowFrom SIZE by Vaclav Smil. Copyright 2023 by Vaclav Smil. Reprinted courtesy of William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.Modernity’s Infatuation With Larger SizesA single human lifetime will have witnessed many obvious examples of this trend in sizes. Motor vehicles are the planet’s most numerous heavy mobile objects. The world now has nearly 1.5 billion of them, and they have been getting larger: today’s bestselling pickup trucks and SUVs are easily twice or even three times heavier than Volkswagen’s Käfer, Fiat’s Topolino, or Citroën’s deux chevaux — family cars whose sales dominated the European market in the early 1950s.Sizes of homes, refrigerators, and TVs have followed the same trend, not only because of technical advances but because the post–Second World War sizes of national GDPs, so beloved by the... Continue reading at 'Engadget'
[ Engadget | 2023-06-04 14:30:20 UTC ]
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Publishers including Phaidon, Galley Beggar Press, HarperCollins and And Other Stories have pledged to help West Yorkshire indie Book Case Hebden, which has lost all its stock to flood damage. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2015-12-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Spoof titles with vintage artwork strike a chord with Christmas shoppers, selling more than 600,000 copies in less than two monthsNostalgia for the days of learning to read with Peter and Jane appears to have made Ladybird’s series of spoof titles for grownups a must-buy this Christmas, with... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2015-12-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Softening sales for digital books have impacted the bottom lines at HarperCollins and Simon & Schuster, according to both companies' recent earnings reports. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2015-11-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Donald Trump is out with a new book that reads like a campaign manifesto, boasting success stories but offering few details on how he would implement his policy goals as president. But in the book,... To view the full story, click the title link. Continue reading at Crains New York
[ Crains New York | 2015-11-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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We love the Surface Book. We love the Surface Pro 4. But what we haven’t told you yet is the question many of you are asking: Which one is better? And the answer is: the other one. For the last week, we’ve tossed the question back and forth: which one do you like? Why? We both agree that the... Continue reading at PC World
[ PC World | 2015-10-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Fondo de Cultura Económica (FCE), based in Mexico City, is one of the largest publishers in Latin America and has had an office in San Diego since 1990. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2015-10-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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'Explainer,' the upcoming book by 'What If?' writer Munroe, is already near the top of bestseller lists despite not being published until November. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor
[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2015-05-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Hugo Award clowns aside, there's another literary scandal that we should actually be worried about. The post Hey, Book World: Sexism is Way Bigger Than the Hugos appeared first on WIRED. Continue reading at Wired
[ Wired | 2015-04-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Big publishers are likely to feel a squeeze on their supermarket sales as a result of the sector experiencing a “once in a generation change”. Two of Britain’s biggest supermarkets, Tesco and Sainsbury’s, are also big retailers of books. Both retailers reported slumps in profits in their recent... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2014-11-25 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The three-day event runs from November 20 to 22 at the Shanghai World Expo Exhibition Centre. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-11-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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It's been a time of expansion, and experimentation, HarperCollins CEO Brian Murray told a Frankfurt Book Fair audience, from the acquisition of Harlequin, to new strategies such as direct to consumer models, and subscription access. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-10-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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As the publishing world gathers at the 2014 Frankfurt Book Fair, the book business sits on the brink of some major changes, with a wave of new services and devices poised to take digital publishing—and digital reading—to another level. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-10-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Glasgow School of Art replaces 22% of its most popular books that were lost in a fire at its Mackintosh building in June. Continue reading at BBC News
[ BBC News | 2014-09-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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With the success of movies like 'Guardians of the Galaxy,' and more ways to buy comics than ever before, the industry is growing rapidly. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor
[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2014-08-14 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon claims a "key objective" in its ongoing dispute with Hachette is to keep ebook prices low and competitive with other other media. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-07-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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A new competition to find the “next big thing” in children’s literature is being launched by the UK’s National Literary Trust and Bloomsbury Children’s Books. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives
[ Publishing Perspectives | 2014-06-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Lisa Lillien, better known as “Hungry Girl” to her fans, has eight bestselling cookbooks under her belt, and her first diet book, 'The Hungry Girl Diet: Big Portions. Big Results. Drop 10 Pounds in 4 Weeks,' has hit the ground running. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-04-21 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The spirit of literary camaraderie makes itself known at the 19th L.A. Times Festival of Books. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-04-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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With the recent consolidation of Penguin Random House fresh in everyone’s minds, this year’s London Book Fair Great Debate argued the proposition: "It’s all about size, bigger is always better." Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-04-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Samsung's clearly been listening to Venus in Furs a lot recently, which explains why it's gone a bit crazy on the faux-leather all of a sudden. After covering both the Galaxy Note 3, Galaxy Tab Pro and Chromebook 2 in the stuff, the company has now... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2014-03-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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