Books about Fascinating from Amazon.com

There's never before been a book like Gallop! Employing a patented new technology called Scanimation, each page is a marvel that brings animals, along with one shining star, to life with art that literally moves. It's impossible not to flip the page, and flip it again, and again, and again. A first book of motion for kids, it shows a horse in full gallop and a turtle swimming up the page. A dog runs, a cat springs, an eagle soars, and a butterfly flutters. Created by Rufus Butler Seder, an inventor, artist, and filmmaker fascinated by antique optical toys, Scanimation is a state-of-the-art six-phase animation process that combines the "persistence of vision" principle with a striped acetate overlay to give the illusion of movement. It harkens back to the old magical days of the kinetoscope, and the effect is astonishing, like a Muybridge photo series springing into action�or, in terms kids can relate to, like a video without a screen. Complementing the art is a delightful rhyming text full of simple questions and fun, nonsense replies: Can you gallop like a horse? giddyup-a-loo! Can you strut like a rooster? cock-a-doodle-doo! Every child who opens the book will be amazed�and so will every parent..
Price: $6.15 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Postsecret.com founder Frank Warren is back with an irresistible addition to his bestselling PostSecret series. For The Secret Lives of Men and Women, Warren has selected a never-before-seen collection of postcards bearing the explosive confessions and captivating revelations of men and women everywhere. Created using photographs, collages, illustrations, and more, the handmade cards offer a compelling dialogue on some of today's most provocative topics—from marriage and infidelity, to parenting, office politics, repressed fantasies, and even abortion—daring us to consider how well we really know our friends, family, even ourselves.

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Price: $13.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

One day in 1992, Thomas Friedman toured a Lexus factory in Japan and marveled at the robots that put the luxury cars together That evening, as he ate sushi on a Japanese bullet train, he read a story about yet another Middle East squabble between Palestinians and Israelis. And it hit him: Half the world was lusting after those Lexuses, or at least the brilliant technology that made them possible, and the other half was fighting over who owned which olive tree.

Friedman, the well-traveled New York Times foreign-affairs columnist, peppers The Lexus and the Olive Tree with stories that illustrate his central theme: that globalization--the Lexus--is the central organizing principle of the post-cold war world, even though many individuals and nations resist by holding onto what has traditionally mattered to them--the olive tree.

Problem is, few of us understand what exactly globalization means. As Friedman sees it, the concept, at first glance, is all about American hegemony, about Disneyfication of all corners of the earth. But the reality, thank goodness, is far more complex than that, involving international relations, global markets, and the rise of the power of individuals (Bill Gates, Osama Bin Laden) relative to the power of nations.

No one knows how all this will shake out, but The Lexus and the Olive Tree is as good an overview of this sometimes brave, sometimes fearful new world as you'll find. --Lou Schuler.
Price: $4.85 [Notify me when price goes down.]

At the beginning of 2005, Frank Warren launched a new blog called PostSecret as an experiment in community art, inviting strangers to mail him anonymous postcards that made art out of their innermost secrets and then posting a selection of the cards every week on his blog. Within a year, his blog was one of the five most popular in the world, and his first book, PostSecret, was one of the surprise bestsellers of 2005. My Secret is his second book, a collection of cards from teens and college students--none of which has been shown on the website--that carries the same emotional power and creativity that have made Warren's project a phenomenon.

We are featuring seven postcards from the book here: see two of them on this page, and click on the numbers below to see five more.

Click on the numbers below to see five more postcards from My Secret

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Price: $13.26 [Notify me when price goes down.]

In The U.S. Constitution & Fascinating Facts About It you'll see the entire text of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence--and much more! You'll find interesting insights into the men who wrote the Constitution, how it was created, and how the Supreme Court has interpreted the Constitution in the two centuries since its creation..
Price: $1.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The captivating stories behind fifty of the greatest authors and their most famous literary creations

Before Who the Hell is Pansy O’Hara ?, there had never been a single volume that explored the backstories of so many of the greatest books in the English language. A work sure to captivate all lovers of language and literature, it reveals in short, pithy chapters, the lives, loves, motivations, and quirky, fascinating details involving fifty of the best-loved books of the Western world.
• When stacked up, the original manuscript of Gone With the Wind stood taller than Margaret Mitchell, its 4' 9 1/2" author
• Ian Fleming, creator of James Bond, was part of the Allied team that cracked the Nazi’s Enigma code
• Leo Tolstoy’s wife copied War and Peace by hand . . . seven times

From The Great Gatsby to Harper Lee, from Jaws to J. K . Rowling, Who the Hell Is Pansy O’Hara? offers an entertaining and informative journey through the minds of writers and the life experiences that took these amazing works from notion to novel..
Price: $7.48 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Wonderfully entertaining look at some intriguing oddities, unusual incidents, and colorful personalities connected with the Civil War. Includes 25 names the war was known by, personal quirks of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, and more,.
Price: $1.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

This guide for teachers is the answer to all questions children ask and all the wonders they want to investigate -- from the marvel of a raindrop on a leaf, to the power of a volcano, to the mysteries of the universe.

This award-winning bestseller is the biggest and best collection of science activities for children 6 to 14 years old. There are projects, experiments, games, puzzles, and stories. They cover all areas of science, including matter and energy, the human body, the environment, rocks, plants, animals, insects, weather, stars and planets, and technology.

Activities range in length from the popular 'Quickies' to projects that can be done over several days or weeks. They've all been tested and use simple materials. Easy-to-follow explanations, engaging illustrations, and fun facts (did you know that a cockroach can live for nine days without its head?). Many thousands of copies of Science Is... have been used by student teachers to get started in science class. Make this a book you'll turn to again and again.

"An innovative book ... Youngsters will be intrigued by the exciting activities crammed into this book." (Today's Parent)

"An excellent reference source for parents and teachers!" (School Library Journal)

"A powerful and practical resource... Will enrich any school science curriculum. Highly recommended!" (Appraisal, School of Education, Boston University)

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Price: $22.69 [Notify me when price goes down.]

This complete baby naming resource includes more names and more helpful features than any other book on the market:

- Over 100,000 baby names and their meanings, derivations and famous namesakes

- 5,000 Hispanic names.

- Icons to identify names used for both genders, and to indicate whether they're used evenly, more for boys, or more for girls.

- Updated lists ranking the 100 most popular names for boys and girls in 2004

- Top-hundred ranked names are starred in the main text of the book.

- A new introductory chapter by Bruce Lansky: "How to Pick A Name for Your Baby"

- 300 helpful lists of names to consider, including famous authors, actors, athletes, artists, scientists as well as lists of names that convey an image: attractive, smart, competent, friendly, wimpy, etc..
Price: $5.98 [Notify me when price goes down.]