Random books from Dystopos's library

Bright Earth : Art and the Invention of Color by Philip Ball

Domestic revolutions: A social history of American family life by Steven Mintz

Designing Disney's Theme Parks : The Architecture of Reassurance

Dissertation - An Architectural Student's Handbook (Architectural Students Handbooks) by Iain Borden

Our own words by Mary Helen Dohan

The valley and the hills : an illustrated history of Birmingham & Jefferson County by Leah Rawls Atkins

2666: A Novel by Roberto Bolano

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Friends: alarob, rierie, trav

Interesting libraries: christiguc, Discard, kittentheverb, lmclayton2, mkjones, vlexor

LibraryThing authors: Derek Blyth (TheAccidentalWriter)

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Member: Dystopos

CollectionsBhamwiki (56), Your library (616), Currently reading (5), To read (2), Read but unowned (7), All collections (624)

Reviews31 reviews — see reviews

Tagshistory (102), architecture (81), alabama (58), birmingham (56), reference (52), fiction (52), sociology (46), architecture history (44), guidebook (37), humor (35) — see all tags

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GroupsArchitext, Baseball, Birmingham Alabama, Deep South, Edward Gorey, Maps and Atlases, Non-Fiction Readers

Favorite authorsDoris Burn, Edward Gorey, David Macaulay, Oliver Sacks, Richard Sennett, Gore Vidal, Bill Watterson (Shared favorites)

Favorite bookstoresAlabama Booksmith, Greencup Books, Jim Reed Books / Museum of Fond Memories

Favorite librariesBirmingham Public Library

About meI have been called a documentarian, a devil's advocate, a tricky guy, a pedant, and a master of sitting in one place.

About my libraryI am currently expanding my small library of Birmingham, Alabama related books and documents (see link below).

Homepagehttp://www.bhamwiki.com

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Real nameJohn

LocationBirmingham, Alabama

Account typepublic, lifetime

Connection NewsConnection News

URLs http://www.librarything.com/profile/Dystopos (profile)
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/Dystopos (library)

Common KnowledgeSeries (48), Awards (130), Characters (803), Places (266)

Member sinceNov 7, 2005

Most recent activity

Dystopos added:
Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas Hofstadter

Dystopos added:
Procopius: The Secret History by Procopius

Dystopos added:
The African American Church in Birmingham, Alabama, 1815-1963: A Shelter in the Storm (Studies in African American History and Culture) by W Wilson Fallin

Dystopos added:
Cul-de-Sac Syndrome: Turning Around the Unsustainable American Dream by John F. Wasik

Dystopos rated:
The Unconsoled (Vintage International) by Kazuo Ishiguro

Dystopos rated:
America: The Book: A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction by Jon Stewart

Saw your pic and pick in the Birmingham Magazine today. It sounded pretty good as did the story behind finding it. I thought I was the only one buying books because of who did the cover. I'm a sucker for anything Alvin Lustig did.

posted by trav at 12:28 am (EST) on Jun 4, 2009

I do have some info on Al. It's historical (books) about Comer family.
PS City Federal Building was built by B.B.Comer and was named The Comer Building

rierie

posted by rierie at 4:23 am (EST) on Aug 27, 2008

Thanks for the invite. I am interested.Im a beginner so I need guidance.

rierie

posted by rierie at 4:21 am (EST) on Aug 27, 2008

Hi, thank you for your invite. I enjoyed Gods in Alabama very much, so would like to join the discussion.

Thanks again,
Ruth

posted by Book_Junkie at 2:20 pm (EST) on Aug 10, 2008

Hey,
Since as of this morning you and I are the only two Deep South members to post a review of Father and Son, I figured I'd drop in with a suggestion for the next book of the month: Gods in Alabama by Joshilyn Jackson. If you want to wait to see if more reviews come in I totally understand, but I'm just so fond of the Book of the month that I'd hate to see it go by the wayside for lack of suggestions.

posted by RandomSpiffiness at 11:01 am (EST) on Aug 7, 2008

My aplogies for not responding sooner. Was away on holidays for five weeks returning this past weekend. I would be interested in joining your group but not at this time. Read Father and Son several years ago and would have to pick it back up to refresh myself. Good luck and let me know your next book.

posted by jbelyea at 2:15 pm (EST) on Aug 3, 2008

Thanks again, D, and hope we can round up a few more for the Father and Son reading group. I've still got about 80 pages left in the Edgar Sawtelle book, but I'll start F & S as soon as I finish. I read the thing when it first came out, thought it was terrific, lent it to someone and never saw it again. The trade paperback I just got from Amazon shows it as an 11th printing, and the biographical info on Brown was written when he was much among us, still a sad thing his leaving.

posted by LouisBranning at 5:00 pm (EST) on Jun 22, 2008

D, would you mind putting up a new header for the Deep South group, showing Father and Son as the featured book, so we can begin to maybe collect some new members, and Thanks!! for your help.

posted by LouisBranning at 6:21 am (EST) on Jun 18, 2008

Hey D, please continue rounding up a few folks for our Deep South book thread, and I promise I'll come up with a good 'un. All the luck!!

posted by LouisBranning at 6:10 pm (EST) on Jun 14, 2008

Thanks for the invite into the Deep South group. Other others I would put into this category would be Daniel Woodrell and William Gay.

posted by hayduke at 2:34 am (EST) on Mar 14, 2008

thank you for your invitation. A film that qualifies as "deep south" is Wise blood (John Houston). I wonder if it was inspired by a book

posted by briconcella at 8:43 pm (EST) on Dec 5, 2007

Thnk you for your invitation, I now have an excuse to read this book and move off my Tbr Mt!
Cheryl

posted by chaoscat60 at 2:41 pm (EST) on Oct 2, 2007

I'm very sorry that we don't yet share any books, but perhaps as the cataloguing of my library continues we shall yet find similar interests. As for diversionary reads, my collection does contain many works of poetry and fiction, but those lazy cataloguers haven't gotten there yet. They really ought to work harder.

Who is this Mark Twain fellow you speak of? Name sounds a bit made up to me ...

posted by ThomasJefferson at 10:25 pm (EST) on Sep 4, 2007

Thanks for the invite to the Deep South Group.

Also just a FYI...you mentioned Deep South in your message but the link used was for Architext. I was a little confused at first but then my morning coffee kicked in and I figured it out. *lol*

posted by Irisheyz77 at 1:25 pm (EST) on Jul 31, 2007

Letting you know that the odd bug in works with 3 reviews has been fixed. (The earliest review was not displaying).
There was a message you posted 30th April in Bug Collectors about Ecology of a Cracker Childhood that the Deep South Group was reviewing. Cheers, ryn

posted by ryn_books at 7:48 am (EST) on Jun 3, 2007

Thanks for the invite. Other Deep South authors I've recently enjoyed reading include Will Clarke ("Lord Vishnu's Love Handles" and "The Worthy") and Steven Carter ("The Famous Writers School").

posted by KevinJoseph at 8:39 pm (EST) on Mar 22, 2007

Oh, wellll, if it (A Confederacy of Dunces)were familiar, it wouldn't be quite so funny! It might be ... tragic. Or worse: boring. And improbability doesn't make it automatically untrue. For when we subtract the impossible, Watson ... Oh, dear. Now I suppose I have to accept that provenance, and thus I disappear in a puff of logic. (Pfft!)
Thanks for your comment! One writes these little nothings and has no idea what happens to them, if anyone sees them or even cares.

posted by marfita at 5:49 pm (EST) on Nov 6, 2006

I debated a long while about listing loaned books, but the JCLC tag has helped a lot with friends wanting to get books that I've recommended.

I'm anxious to see what you dig up from the stacks!

posted by trav at 10:05 am (EST) on Aug 11, 2006

Wow - I had a feeling you knew your stuff! The B'Ham project looks interesting - you have a surprising amount of material. I'm not sure if I have anything at this point to contribute that isn't already out there. Let me take a more-detailed look at the site and see if my knowledge is extensive enough to add anything of value. Thanks for the book titles. Oddly enough, several years ago I was given one of the original editions of the Armes book, and I think I also have the White book - it certainly sounds familiar. (Obviously, I have not yet begun to catalogue, having just recently discovered the site.) The bhamrails site looks as if it will be extremely helpful, so thanks for the tip. Have you tried the GPS location strategy that John Stewart describes in the site?
posted by BasilBlue at 9:46 pm (EST) on Aug 1, 2006

Hi - I'm by no means a Birmingham expert although I do have some knowledge, and I've bought all the area-related books I've come across. My primary interest is economic history, and Birmingham is fertile territory for that sort of exploration. Are you an expert on the city and area, particularly on their industrial past? I'm particularly interested at the moment in the old Acton mines and mining town. (I think the company was Alabama Fuel & Iron.) Any suggestions?
posted by BasilBlue at 9:34 pm (EST) on Jul 31, 2006

Thank you for the invitation to join the Deep South group! I just accepted.

Becky in Georgia
posted by writeart at 12:46 pm (EST) on Jul 31, 2006

Hey, we're currently the only two have Andrea Kahn's Building Drawing Text. It's one of my favorite architecture books!
posted by ibbetson at 10:25 am (EST) on Jun 5, 2006

Welding With Children is a good collection. It's Southern fiction. Don't quite remember what the title refers to. The author did a reading at my school.
posted by FizzyLizzy at 6:23 pm (EST) on Mar 13, 2006

re: your comment about my confusing tags on Ms. Katherine Tucker Windhams' books -- "library discard" means that I bought it at a library discard sale & it has ususal library markings on it. Not read means not read in full as of yet (I'm a stickler for completion). As a fellow Alabamian, I treasure Ms. Windham, and collect her books where I can. I even have a 13 AL ghosts book "signed" by Jeffery. :) I'm putting a tag translation key on my profile page now.
posted by patruska at 2:48 pm (EST) on Feb 21, 2006

If you like Typographers on Type, I would also recommend Texts on Type. There might be a bit of overlap (I can't recall), but both are good reads. There are quite a few that I have in my Amazon Wish List as well. Someday . . .
posted by spoko at 9:35 am (EST) on Dec 22, 2005

Re: Your comment about my review of Stop Stealing Sheep

No problem. That book seems to get a lot of positive reviews. I don't know if people are just desperate for contemporary typography books, or if they're wowed by how flashy the book is (I think it's horribly designed, largely because I subscribe to Beatrice Warde's "crystal goblet" paradigm and also because I hate the ultra-modern practice of printing typography books on shiny paper), or what. But I really dislike the book, and I think there are much better alternatives out there. I would highly, highly recommend Robert Bringhurst's The Elements of Typographic Style. Great book.
posted by spoko at 3:15 pm (EST) on Dec 21, 2005

You know it's funny but what I was saying on the blog (me not appearing to share a book with anyone because most of my library is in italian) applies right with you! We share one book ("History of private life", which is my "La vita privata" by Ariès/Duby) but LT says no! :-)
posted by Moloch at 3:44 pm (EST) on Dec 7, 2005

RE: your comment about my comment about etc...

that's okay, no problem at all :-)
posted by Moloch at 3:37 pm (EST) on Dec 7, 2005