Have you ever tried to read up on some incredible part of the world, only to find yourself faced with incomprehensible terminology and jargon? It’s nice to know what the parts of a thing are called, but it’s even more interesting to know what they do. What if you had something that could clearly explain it all using simple words?
Thing Explainer, by Randall Munroe, does just that. Using line drawings and only the thousand (or, rather, “ten hundred”) most common words, he provides simple explanations for some of the world’s most interesting things: our food-heating radio boxes (microwaves), our very tall roads (bridges), and our computer buildings (datacenters). He also explains the other worlds around our sun (the solar system), the big flat rocks we live on (tectonic plates), and even the stuff inside us (cells).
Where do these things come from? How do they work? What do they look like if you open them up? What would life be like without them? And what would happen if we heated them up, cooled them down, pointed them in a different direction, or pressed this button? In Thing Explainer, Munroe gives us the answers to these questions and so many more. Funny, interesting, and always understandable, this book is for anyone—age 5 to 105—who has ever wondered how things work, and why.

《蓝狮子•果壳阅读视界5:把恐龙做成大餐》是一本恐龙时代的菜谱，用美妙的食物香味吸引你走进史前世界！作者一边教你料理各种恐龙食材，一边讲述好玩的恐龙故事，幽默的文笔和渊博的知识让你恨不得马上回到侏罗纪抓一只来大快朵颐！软腻幼滑的溏心伤齿龙蛋、外焦里嫩的熏邓氏鱼、脆生生又鲜美动人的瓦蛤刺身、肯德基香酥炸暴龙，再加上一道醇香顺喉的白果炖小盗龙汤，最后来几个爽口弹牙的鱼龙肉丸，好一顿史前恐龙大餐。

The past is a foreign country. This is your guidebook. A time machine has just transported you back into the fourteenth century. What do you see? How do you dress? How do you earn a living and how much are you paid? What sort of food will you be offered by a peasant or a monk or a lord? And more important, where will you stay? The Time Traveler’s Guide to Medieval England is not your typical look at a historical period. This radical new approach shows us that the past is not just something to be studied; it is also something to be lived. Through the use of daily chronicles, letters, household accounts, and poems of the day, Mortimer transports you back in time, providing answers to questions typically ignored by traditional historians. You will learn how to greet people on the street, what to use as toilet paper, why a physician might want to taste your blood, and how to know whether you are coming down with leprosy. The result is the most astonishing social history book you’re ever likely to read: revolutionary in its concept, informative and entertaining in its detail, and startling for its portrayal of humanity in an age of violence, exuberance, and fear.

僵尸生存手册
别让愚蠢和粗心大意毁了你最宝贵的财富--生命。不死的僵尸们现在可能就在跟踪你，而你毫不知情，这本书是你存活的关键。僵尸生存手册提供了完整的、可靠的保护措施，保护你和你的爱人免遭僵尸之灾。这是一本能救你命的书。
僵尸攻击逃生10大要点：
1.在它们来袭之前做好计划
2.它们不会感到害怕，你也不要害怕
3.运用你的头脑。。砍下它们的
4.刀具不需要时间装填弹药
5.理想的防护：短发、紧身衣
6.走上楼梯，然后毁掉楼梯
7.离开汽车，用自行车
8.不停移动，放低身体，保持安静，保持警惕！
9.没有绝对的安全之地，只有相对的
10.僵尸可能暂时离开，但威胁一直存在

Transcending ethnic, linguistic, and religious boundaries, early empires shaped thousands of years of world history. Yet despite the global prominence of empire, individual cases are often studied in isolation. This series seeks to change the terms of the debate by promoting cross-cultural, comparative, and transdisciplinary perspectives on imperial state formation prior to the European colonial expansion.

Two thousand years ago, up to one-half of the human species was contained within two political systems, the Roman empire in western Eurasia (centered on the Mediterranean Sea) and the Han empire in eastern Eurasia (centered on the great North China Plain). Both empires were broadly comparable in terms of size and population, and even largely coextensive in chronological terms (221 BCE to 220 CE for the Qin/Han empire, c. 200 BCE to 395 CE for the unified Roman empire). At the most basic level of resolution, the circumstances of their creation are not very different. In the East, the Shang and Western Zhou periods created a shared cultural framework for the Warring States, with the gradual consolidation of numerous small polities into a handful of large kingdoms which were finally united by the westernmost marcher state of Qin. In the Mediterranean, we can observe comparable political fragmentation and gradual expansion of a unifying civilization, Greek in this case, followed by the
gradual formation of a handful of major warring states (the Hellenistic kingdoms in the east, Rome-Italy, Syracuse and Carthage in the west), and likewise eventual unification by the westernmost marcher state, the Roman-led Italian confederation. Subsequent destabilization occurred again in strikingly similar both empires came to be divided into two halves, one that contained the original core but was more exposed to the main barbarian periphery (the west in the Roman case, the north in China), and a traditionalist half in the east (Rome) and south (China).

These processes of initial convergence and subsequent divergence in Eurasian state formation have never been the object of systematic comparative analysis. This volume, which brings together experts in the history of the ancient Mediterranean and early China, makes a first step in this direction, by presenting a series of comparative case studies on clearly defined aspects of state formation in early eastern and western Eurasia, focusing on the process of initial developmental convergence. It includes a general introduction that makes the case for a comparative approach; a broad sketch of the character of state formation in western and eastern Eurasia during the final millennium of antiquity; and six thematically connected case studies of particularly salient aspects of this process.

"Aspects of Roman History 82BC--AD14" examines the political and military history of Rome and its empire in the Ciceronian and Augustan ages. It is an indispensable introduction to this central period of Roman History for all students of Roman history, from pre-university to undergraduate level. This is the first book since H.H. Scullard's "From the Gracchi to Nero", published two generations ago, to offer a full introductory account of one of the most compelling and vital periods in the history of Europe. "Aspects of Roman History 82BC--AD14": brings to life the great figures of Pompey, Caesar, Antony, Cleopatra and Augustus, and explores how power was gained, used and abused; covers the lives of women and slaves, the running of the empire and the lives of provincials, and religion, culture and propaganda; offers both a survey of the main topics and a detailed narrative through the close examination of sources; and, introduces students to the problems of interpreting evidence, and helps develop the knowledge and skills needed to further the study of ancient history.

Ancient Greek Religion provides an introduction to the fundamental beliefs, practices, and major deities of Greek religion. Focuses on Athens in the classical period Includes detailed discussion of Greek gods and heroes, myth and cult, and vivid descriptions of Greek religion as it was practiced Ancient texts are presented in boxes to promote thought and discussion, and abundant illustrations help readers visualize the rich and varied religious life of ancient Greece Revised edition includes additional boxed texts and bibliography, an 8-page color plate section, a new discussion of the nature of Greek “piety,” and a new chapter on Greek Religion and Greek Culture

Over the past two decades, no field of scientific inquiry has had a more striking impact across a wide array of disciplines–from biology to physics, computing to meteorology–than that known as chaos and complexity, the study of complex systems. Now astrophysicist John Gribbin draws on his expertise to explore, in prose that communicates not only the wonder but the substance of cutting-edge science, the principles behind chaos and complexity. He reveals the remarkable ways these two revolutionary theories have been applied over the last twenty years to explain all sorts of phenomena–from weather patterns to mass extinctions.
Grounding these paradigm-shifting ideas in their historical context, Gribbin also traces their development from Newton to Darwin to Lorenz, Prigogine, and Lovelock, demonstrating how–far from overturning all that has gone before–chaos and complexity are the triumphant extensions of simple scientific laws. Ultimately, Gribbin illustrates how chaos and complexity permeate the universe on every scale, governing the evolution of life and galaxies alike.

Since humans first looked towards the heavens, they have attempted to predict and explain the motions of the sun, moon, and planets. This book describes the theories of planetary motion that have been developed through the ages, from the homocentric spheres of Eudoxus to Einstein's general theory of relativity. It emphasizes the interaction between progress in astronomy and in mathematics, demonstrating how the two have been inextricably linked since Babylonian times.

Accounting for the enormous and amazing development cosmology has made in the past ten years, this long awaited second edition of Malcolm Longair's highly appreciated textbook has been extensively and thoroughly updated.It tells the story of modern astrophysical cosmology from the perspective of one of its most important and fundamental problems a " how did the galaxies come about? Longair uses this approach to introduce the whole of what may be called "classical cosmology." Moreover he describes how the study of the origin of galaxies and larger-scale structures in the Universe has provided us with unique and direct information about the physics of the very early Universe.The material is presented in an informal pedagogical manner. This includes a comprehensive introduction to relativistic astrophysics needed for the clarification of cosmological ideas.

Here are ten examples of the different kinds of mysteries scientists have yet to crack, some plausible theories and a few less likely ones. Find out why these questions, and others like them, remain, and when- or indeed whether- we might get some answers. Take a tour of how some of the big gaps in our knowledge are being probed and how much there is still to know.

John Robbins, the man who started the "food revolution" with the ground-breaking Diet for a New America, boldly posits that, collectively, our personal diet can save ourselves and the world. His latest book presents compelling new information regarding the fields of nutrition, heart disease and cancer, agribusiness, and bioengineering. It discusses the latest discoveries about the relationships between diet and longevity, aging, and vitality. Armed with powerful statistics, fascinating viewpoints, and incisive exposes, Robbins argues for adopting a vegetarian diet for personal well-being as well as for the well-being of the planet.

At last, here’s what you should’ve learned in high school biology! This paperback edition is an Everyman’s humorous look at the real differencesbiological, historical, psychologicalbetween men and womenwith fun and provocative insight into what really drives behavior and interactions between men and women. Men talk about women to men. Women talk about men to women. Men and women talk to each other (or try to) about relationships. It’s Not You, It’s Biology provides insight, ammunition, snappy comebacks, and interesting cocktail party banter for everyone who ever wondered why we do what we do vis-a-vis the opposite sex. It’s Freakonomics for the Relationship-Challenged.

Ice cream as we recognize it today has been in existence for at least 300 years, though its origins probably go much further back in time. Though no one knows who invented ice cream. The first ice cream making machine was invented by Nancy Johnson, of Philadelphia, in the 1840s. The Science of Ice Cream begins with an introductory chapter on the history of ice cream. Subsequent chapters outline the physical chemistry underlying its manufacture, describe the ingredients and industrial production of ice cream and ice cream products respectively, detail the wide range of different physical and sensory techniques used to measure and assess ice cream, describe its microstructure (i.e. ice crystals, air bubbles, fat droplets and sugar solution), and how this relates to the physical properties and ultimately the texture that you experience when you eat it. Finally, some suggestions are provided for experiments relating to ice cream and ways to make ice cream at home or in a school laboratory. The Science of Ice Cream is ideal for undergraduate food science students as well as for people working in the ice cream industry. It is also accessible to the general reader who has studied science to A level and provides teachers with ideas for using ice cream to illustrate scientific principles.