The New Way Things Work

Features

• Cover Type: Hard Cover with 400 pages
• Published by: Houghton Mifflin/Walter Lorraine Books
• Edition: 1st Edition October 26, 1998
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 0395938473
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-0395938478
• Book Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.5 x 1.2 inches
• Weighs: 3.6 pounds

Product Review
"Is it a fact--or have I dreamt it--that, by means of electricity, the world of matter has become a great nerve, vibrating thousands of miles in a breathless point of time?" If you, like Nathaniel Hawthorne, are kept up at night wondering about how things work--from electricity to can openers--then you and your favorite kids shouldn't be a moment longer without David Macaulay's The New Way Things Work. The award-winning author-illustrator--a former architect and junior high school teacher--is perfectly poised to be the Great Explainer of the whirrings and whizzings of the world of machines, a talent that landed the 1988 version of The Way Things Work on the New York Times bestsellers list for 50 weeks. Grouping machines together by the principles that govern their actions rather than by their uses, Macaulay helps us understand in a heavily visual, humorous, unerringly precise way what gadgets such as a toilet, a carburetor, and a fire extinguisher have in common.

The New Way Things Work boasts a richly illustrated 80-page section that wrenches us all (including the curious, bumbling wooly mammoth who ambles along with the reader) into the digital age of modems, digital cameras, compact disks, bits, and bytes. Readers can glory in gears in "The Mechanics of Movement," investigate flying in "Harnessing the Elements," demystify the sound of music in "Working with Waves," marvel at magnetism in "Electricity & Automation," and examine e-mail in "The Digital Domain." An illustrated survey of significant inventions closes the book, along with a glossary of technical terms, and an index. What possible link could there be between zippers and plows, dentist drills and windmills? Parking meters and meat grinders, jumbo jets and jackhammers, remote control and rockets, electric guitars and egg beaters? Macaulay demystifies them all. (Click to see a sample spread of this book, illustrations and text copyright 1998 David Macaulay, Neil Ardley, published by Houghton Mifflin Co.) (All ages) --Karin Snelson

From School Library Journal
Grade 4 Up-The popular "guide to the workings of machines" (Houghton, 1988) has been updated to include the digital world. Of the eighty new pages advertised on the cover, sixty are found in the added section on computer technology. Very few items (parking meters and bicycle brakes) have disappeared into obsolescence, a few new ones have appeared (camcorders and airbags), and cosmetic changes are evident throughout in the enhanced color printing. The features that made the first edition a publishing phenomenon remain. Macaulay's clear and comprehensible drawings are accompanied by Neil Ardley's explanations, and in this edition the technical writer gets credit for his expertise on the title page. The bemused woolly mammoth of the original edition continues to demonstrate his prehistorically simple ideas on such concepts as heat, pressure, fire fighting, sending messages, etc., adding whimsical entries to entertain browsers. While much of the material remains unaltered, the significance of computer technology in our world makes this new edition a vital update or new purchase.
Shirley Wilton, Ocean County College, Toms River, NJ
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Reader Reviews
My god, this has to be one of my favorite books. When I was a kid, I was FASCINATED (well, I still am) by mechanical things. I must have checked this book out of the library twenty times, and it never got old. It is PACKED with info, the drawings are great, and it is very educational. Well, I was at the library today checking out books for a mechanical engineering class, and there it was on the shelf. I checked it out again for old times sake, and here I am at Amazon.com (to buy my very own copy of course), writing a reveiew. Nuff said. Anyway, if you have a child, boy or girl, old or young, smart or not, it doesn't matter- this book ROCKS! Comment | | (Report this)