You may have read about the High School Library in MA that is completely electronic and and has no physical books. How very sad. Now, I am not a Luddite (…yet) and I believe in technology as a force for good in the world, but I also believe in curiosity and serendipity and where better to discover those entities than a bookshelf.

Yesterday, I moved books. It was wonderful, a little dusty and real.

Between the LC Call Numbers G and GA (Class G — Geography. Anthropology. Recreation) on a shelf in the Engineering & Architecture Library at the Catholic University of America I was delighted to find…

Object-Based Image Analysis and Treaty Verification : New Approaches in Remote Sensing – Applied to Nuclear Facilities in Iran by Sven Nussbaum and Gunter Menz.

This book describes recent progress in object-based image interpretation, and also presents many new results in its application to verification of nuclear non-proliferation. A comprehensive workflow and newly developed algorithms for object-based high resolution image (pre-) processing, feature extraction, change detection, classification and interpretation are developed, applied and evaluated. The entire analysis chain is demonstrated with high resolution imagery acquired over Iranian nuclear facilities. [Publisher book description: Springer]

Atlas of Medieval Europe edited by David Ditchburn, Simon MacLean and Angus Mackay.

The Atlas of Medieval Europe covers the period from the fall of the Roman Empire through to the beginnings of the Renaissance, spreading from the Atlantic coast to the Russian steppes. Each map approaches a separate issue or series of events in medieval history, and a commentary locates it in its broader context.
This second edition has over forty new maps covering a variety of topics including:

* the Moravian Empire
* environmental change
* the travels and correspondence of Froissart and travellers in the east
* the layout of great castles and palaces. [From Amazon product description]

and

Cosmography: a Posthumous Scenario for the Future of Humanity by R. Buckminster Fuller

Fuller was one of the truly original thinkers of the 20th century. This book is a collection of his thoughts about life, progress, and humanity’s role in the universe as he voiced them during the last four years of his life. Transcribed by his “adjuvant” Kiyoshi Kuromiya, they range over a panoply of topics. Among other things, he attempts to explain politics, sociology, economics, and history by metaphorically extending physical and mathematical structures to describe human behavior. Although modesty was not his strongest point, Fuller was undeniably an exceptional person. His fame alone suggests that libraries should add this book to their collection. However, most readers will find it difficult to understand. – Harold D. Shane, Baruch Coll., CUNY Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. [From Library Journal]

The mind boggles…what’s on your bookshelf?