What We Are Reading: Reference Works With Staying Power
A reading note on useful companions, reference habits and the shelf beside the novel.
Read noteDated editorial notes
The Logbook
Source notes, edition checks and useful reading routes from the Quarterdeck desk.
Nautical Book Collecting: A Practical Guide
A calm first route through editions, condition, provenance and the questions worth asking before a shelf grows.
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How to Identify a First Edition
Edition, printing, issue and state are related terms, but they do different work.
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Book Condition Terms for Illustrated Nautical Books
A field guide to the faults and strengths that descriptions often compress into a few words.
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Provenance and Association Copies
How to tell documented ownership from a label that merely looks persuasive.
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Build an Age of Sail Library
A staged shelf for readers who want history, ships, people, primary records and fiction in conversation.
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Patrick O'Brian Reading Order
A spoiler-light route through the Aubrey-Maturin novels, related works and useful companion timing.
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Patrick O'Brian Companions Without Spoilers
Choose a reference tool by function and by how much future plot it may reveal.
Read routeBuying Second-Hand Sea Books in the Netherlands
A short route through Dutch antiquarian listings, the condition terms a buyer meets first, and a safe way to buy at a distance.
Naturalist Volumes in a Ship's Library
How the scientific volumes of a surveying voyage were made, and what a reader can still check in their plates and locality lines.
A Library for a Small Crew
What a ship's library had to do with a fixed shelf and a few readers, and how a small congregation plans its own reading.
Baptist Baptism, Sunday Order, Two Conventions
Believer's baptism by immersion, the shape of an ordinary Baptist Sunday service, and how American Baptists differ from Southern Baptists.
Be On Our Side: Transit Posters and Their Answer
How the Be On Our Side transit poster campaign began, where it ran in American systems, and the counter-advertising that answered the 2011 subway posters.
Inside a Contemporary Gallery: Dealer, Show, Label
What an art dealer does day to day, how a gallery exhibition is mounted, and how to read a wall label in a contemporary gallery, explained plainly.
El día de los niños: Día, 30 April and 1997
What Día is, who began El día de los niños / El día de los libros in 1997, and how Children's Day is kept in Mexico on 30 April.
Reading Kangaroo, Wombat and Koala Signs
Field notes on telling grey kangaroos from wallabies, reading wombat burrows and koala scratches, and naming the calls of kookaburras, rosellas and black
Kobe Mosque: 1935 Founding and War Years
Kobe Mosque opened in 1935, funded by Indian Muslim traders and designed by Czech architect Jan Josef Švagr. Its war years and survival examined.
Adult Classes at a Municipal Cultural Centre
How adults choose a dance, theatre, art or language class at a municipal cultural centre, what paperwork follows, and how a season is programmed.
Local Radio Clusters: Broadcast Sound and Studio Posts
How a local radio cluster divides its airtime and engineering work, from FM multiplexing and AM propagation to microphone technique and loudness.
American Film Noir: Formation, Craft, Legacy
How American film noir formed in the 1940s, how chiaroscuro and the fatal woman shaped it, and what neo-noir made of that inheritance.
Civil War Haiku: Terrain, Camp Life and Loss
A short-form collection on the American Civil War: poems grouped by battlefield, camp life and mourning, plus the counting and season word of haiku.
Sword Typology, Early Steel and Blade Care
A reading-room guide to European sword typology, the making of iron and steel before industry, and the conservation of blades in public collections.
David Beghè: Reading a Nineteenth-Century Fresco
David Beghè, the Pinacoteca Beghè at Castello Doria Malaspina, and a method for reading nineteenth-century frescoes in Liguria.
Games and Activities for Children Aged One to Ten
A reading-room note on indoor and outdoor games, age-banded activities from one to ten, and a rainy-day kit built from what is already at home.
Aperitivo, Negroni Balance and Bar Order
A reading-room guide to aperitivo hour, how a Negroni is balanced, and how Italian bars run from the counter to the till, with notes on ice, soda and vermouth.
Working Papers of a Traditional Pop Act
How theatre programmes, session sheets and record storage keep the working papers of a traditional pop act in order, from tour to shelf.
Santa Fe: Sleep, Arrival and the City Calendar
A practical guide to Santa Fe stays: where to sleep, how to reach the city from Albuquerque, and which dates fill the calendar through the year.