Urban City

Life is complicated. I mean, life has always been complicated, but there's a difference between monsters-are-trying-to-kill-you complications and monsters-are-in-love-with-you complications. I'm still not sure which is more dangerous. G'day. I'm Pet. Two-thirds of a pet, anyway: The vampire isn't claiming ownership these days, but he's definitely encroaching. On the list of other encroaching complications is the threat of heirling trials, a certain fae lord, and a mysterious librarian - not to mention the thing that's killing people on Hobart's waterfront....

Don't get too close to humans. That's rule number one. Well, it is if you're an emotionally constipated fae lord. As far as I'm concerned, the vampire could do a better job of keeping his distance, but he's never been that good at following the rules. G'day. I'm Pet. Schrödinger's Pet, these days; depends who's asking. I'm human, but when you hang around with enough Behindkind, it starts getting dangerous for the other humans around you. Humans like my friend Morgana. I tried to stay away, but now she needs my help and don't-get-too-close-to-humans isn't exactly gunna cut it anymore.

Oklahoma City was born from chaos. It was founded in a bizarre but momentous "Land Run" in 1889, when thousands of people lined up along the borders of Oklahoma Territory and rushed in at noon to stake their claims. Since then, it has been a city torn between the wild energy that drives its outsize ambitions and the forces of order that seek sustainable progress.

Beatrice Kizza, a woman in flight from a homeland that condemned her for daring to love, flees to London. There, she shields her sorrow from the indifference of her adopted city and navigates a nighttime world of shift work and bedsits. Howard Pink is a self-made millionaire who has risen from Petticoat Lane to the mansions of Kensington on a tide of determination and bluster. Yet self-doubt still snaps at his heels, and his life is shadowed by the terrible loss that has shaken him to his foundations.

In the year 2008, a Malamute arrives in New York City, followed by a pack of German Shepherds, Dobermans, and Great Danes, all dressed in grand old Prussian style. They become the toast of Manhattan - Monster Dogs. But who, or what, are they really? Outfitted with voice boxes and prosthetic arms, the dogs are the result of an experiment begun years ago in a tiny Canadian village. But their creators did not anticipate that these decadent dogs would be threatened by a strange, incurable illness.

Tras décadas de expansión descontrolada, más personas que nunca están volviendo a la ciudad. La vida urbana densa se ha prescrito como la panacea para la crisis medioambiental y de recursos de nuestro tiempo. ¿Pero es mejor o peor para nuestra felicidad? ¿Son el metro, las aceras y las torres de apartamentos una mejora respecto a la dependencia del coche en los suburbios?

Over the past 10 years, urban planners, technology companies, and governments have promoted smart cities with a somewhat utopian vision of urban life made knowable and manageable through data collection and analysis. Emerging smart cities have become both crucibles and showrooms for the practical application of the Internet of Things, cloud computing, and the integration of big data into everyday life. Are smart cities optimized, sustainable, digitally networked solutions to urban problems? Or are they neoliberal, corporate-controlled, undemocratic non-places?

There may not be such a thing as a perfect city, but all great cities have moments of perfection - perfect streets or buildings, perfect places to raise a family or to relax with a coffee - and all of them strive for perfection when they undertake grand projects...Joe Berridge, one of the world's leading urban planners, takes us on an insider's tour of the world's largest and most diverse cities, from New York to London, Shanghai to Singapore, Toronto to Sydney, to examine what is working and not working, what is promising and what needs to be fixed in the contemporary megalopolis.

G'day. I'm Pet. Not, not Pet - I am a pet. Well, I was a pet: I used to belong to two fae and a stroppy vampire. Now I'm homeless. I mean, I was always technically homeless, but this time it's different. I just got used to having some kind of family, and now we're back to everyone wanting to kill each other - and guess who the weak link is? I'll give you a hint: it's not the vampire, and it's sure as heck not the fae.

During the Roaring Twenties, two of the most revered and influential men in American business proposed to transform one of the country’s poorest regions into a dream technological metropolis, a shining paradise of small farms, giant factories, and sparkling laboratories. Henry Ford and Thomas Edison’s “Detroit of the South” would be 10 times the size of Manhattan, powered by renewable energy, and free of air pollution. And it would reshape American society.

All places are not created equal. In this groundbreaking book, Richard Florida shows that where we live is increasingly a crucial factor in our lives, one that fundamentally affects our professional and personal prospects. As well as explaining why place matters now more than ever, Who's Your City? provides indispensable tools to help you choose the right place for you.

By early 1977, New York City was in the grip of hysteria caused by a murderer dubbed "Son of Sam". And on a sweltering night in July, a citywide power outage touched off an orgy of looting and arson that led to the largest mass arrest in the city's history. As the turbulent year wore on, the city became absorbed in two epic battles: the fight between Yankee slugger Reggie Jackson and team manager Billy Martin, and the battle between Ed Koch and Mario Cuomo for the city's mayoralty.

Through 10 unique cities, from the founding of ancient capitals to buzzing modern megacities, Paul Strathern explores how urban centres lead civilisation forward, enjoying a moment of glory before passing on the baton. We journey back to discover Babylonian mathematics, Athenian theatre and intellectual debate, and Roman construction that has lasted millennia. We see Constantinople evolve into Istanbul, revolutionary sparks fly in Enlightenment Paris, and the railways, canals and ships that built Imperial London.

America is an urban nation. More than two thirds of us live on the three percent of land that contains our cities. Yet cities get a bad rap: they're dirty, poor, unhealthy, crime ridden, expensive, environmentally unfriendly. Or are they? As Edward Glaeser proves in this myth-shattering book, cities are actually the healthiest, greenest, and richest (in cultural and economic terms) places to live.

The post-Katrina New Orleans of The City of Lost Fortunes is a place haunted by its history and by the hurricane's destruction, a place that is hoping to survive the rebuilding of its present long enough to ensure that it has a future. Street magician Jude Dubuisson is likewise burdened by his past and by the consequences of the storm, because he has a secret: the magical ability to find lost things, a gift passed down to him by the father he has never known - a father who just happens to be more than human.

Jess and Hannah Ballard's determination to protect the Gateways brings them to Edinburgh's Old Town, where a strange phenomenon threatens to disturb the delicate balance between the worlds of the living and the dead. Spirits who wish to cross over are vanishing, and it is up to the Ballard sisters to discover why.

The Power of Art is an epic work of non-fiction that will transform our understanding of the world by unlocking the human stories behind millennia of art. Taking listeners from ancient Babylon to contemporary Pyongyang, the eminent curator Caroline Campbell explains art's power to illuminate our lives, and inspires us to benefit from its transformative and regenerative power.

In his small New England hometown, Mark Vanhoenacker spent his childhood dreaming of elsewhere—of the distant, real cities he found on the illuminated globe in his bedroom, and of one perfect metropolis that existed only in his imagination. These cities were the sources of endless comfort and escape, and of a lasting fascination. Streets unspooled, towers shone, and anonymous crowds bustled in the places where Mark hoped he could someday be anyone—perhaps even himself.

The staff at Salem, Massachusetts's local station, WICH-TV, is looking forward to the wedding of their program director, Lee Barrett. But when Lee heads off on her Maine honeymoon, she'll be haunted by the ghosts of her own past. Lee and Detective Sergeant Pete Mondello are finally tying the knot - and Lee is tying up loose ends before the big day. After the celebration, complete with a cake made by the station magician, there should be time to relax—but the Maine island happens to be near the site of the crash that killed Lee's parents, a mystery she's never been able to solve.

Although Greenwich Village takes up less than a square mile in downtown New York, rarely has such a concise area supported and nurtured so many groundbreaking artists and genres. Musician used the Village’s smokey coffeehouses and clubs to chronicle the tumultuous Sixties, rewrite jazz history, and take rock & roll into eclectic places it hadn’t been before. Based on new interviews with surviving participants, previously unseen and unheard archives, and author David Browne's years immersed in the scene, Talkin’ Greenwich Village lends the saga the epic, panoramic scope it has long deserved.