The Grand Complication

Author : Stacy Perman
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1439190100
Total Pages : 525 pages
Book Rating : 4.04/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Grand Complication written by Stacy Perman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-02-19 with total page 525 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two wealthy and powerful men engage in a decades-long contest to create and possess the most remarkable watch in history. James Ward Packard of Warren, Ohio, was an entrepreneur and a talented engineer of infinite curiosity, a self-made man who earned millions from his inventions, including the design and manufacture of America’s first luxury car—the elegant and storied Packard. Henry Graves, Jr., was the very essence of blue-blooded refinement in the early 1900s: son of a Wall Street financier, a central figure in New York high society, and a connoisseur of beautiful things—especially fine watches. Then, as now, expensive watches were the ultimate sign of luxury and wealth, but in the early twentieth century the limitless ambition, wealth, and creativity of these two men pushed the boundaries of mathematics, astronomy, craftsmanship, technology, and physics to create ever more ingenious timepieces. In any watch, features beyond the display of hours, minutes, and seconds are known as “complications.” Packard and Graves spurred acclaimed Swiss watchmaker Patek Philippe to create the Mona Lisa of timepieces—a fabled watch that incorporated twenty-four complications and took nearly eight years to design and build. For the period, it was the most complicated watch ever created. For years it disappeared, but then it surfaced at a Sotheby’s auction in 1999, touching off a heated bidding war, shattering all known records when it fetched $11 million from an anonymous bidder. New York Times bestselling author Stacy Perman takes us from the clubby world of New York high society into the ateliers of the greatest Swiss watchmakers, and into the high-octane, often secretive subculture of modern-day watch collecting. With meticulous research, vivid historical details, and a wealth of dynamic personalities, A Grand Complication is the fascinating story of the thrilling duel between two of the most intriguing men of the early twentieth century. Above all, it is a sweeping chronicle of innovation, the desire for beauty, and the lengths people will go to possess it.

Author : Allen Kurzweil
Publisher : Hyperion
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 372 pages
Book Rating : 4.74/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Grand Complication written by Allen Kurzweil and published by Hyperion. This book was released on 2002-08-21 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critically acclaimed for his international bestseller, "A Case of Curiosities," Kurzweil presents "The Grand Complication"--a modern-day tale of literary intrigue, deviant passions, and delicious secrets.

Author : Grit Laskin
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781927958841
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.49/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Grand Complications written by Grit Laskin and published by . This book was released on 2016-10-04 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Grand Complications is the story behind the story of fifty of these original designs from 2003 to the present. It is a look inside guitarmaker William "Grit" Laskin's creative process: how he teases out a client's interests and intentions, how he develops and refines his ideas, and how he brings them to life in his mind and on paper. From "Short Stories" that fill only the headstock of a guitar to full narratives that run the length of the neck, each inspired design is the product of research, deep thinking, and a little alchemy. Featured here are projects ranging from an homage to John Lennon to a paean to humpback whales to a tribute to the fall of the Berlin Wall."--

Author : Allen Kurzweil
Publisher : HMH
ISBN 13 : 0547350864
Total Pages : 381 pages
Book Rating : 4.68/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Case of Curiosities written by Allen Kurzweil and published by HMH. This book was released on 2001-08-10 with total page 381 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This tale of an ambitious inventor in France as the Revolution looms is “brilliantly playful . . . full of lore and lewdness” (Chicago Tribune). “A portrait of a young mechanical genius in 18th-century France, delivered along with a gallimaufry of odd and intriguing facts and a rich, lusty picture of society in that time and place.” —Publishers Weekly In France, on the eve of the Revolution, a young man named Claude Page sets out to become the most ingenious and daring inventor of his time. Over the course of a career filled with violence and passion, Claude learns the arts of enameling and watchmaking from an irascible, defrocked abbé, then apprentices himself to a pornographic bookseller and applies his erotic erudition to the seduction of the wife of an impotent wigmaker. But it is Claude’s greatest device—a talking mechanical head—that both crowns his career and leads to an execution as tragic as that of Marie Antoinette, and far more bizarre. “Like a joint effort by Henry Fielding and John Barth” (Chicago Tribune), this “captivating novel” (San Francisco Chronicle) marked the debut of one of the finest literary artists of our time. “A Case of Curiosities . . . really is brilliant. Also witty, learned, ingenious, sly, and bawdy.” —Entertainment Weekly “What John Fowles did for the 19th century with The French Lieutenant’s Woman and Umberto Eco did for the 14th with The Name of the Rose . . . Kurzweil now does for the late 18th century.” —San Francisco Chronicle

Author : Allen Kurzweil
Publisher : Harper Collins
ISBN 13 : 0062033964
Total Pages : 356 pages
Book Rating : 4.63/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Leon and the Champion Chip written by Allen Kurzweil and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2011-02-08 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Leon's back. Having survived the sweatshop methods of Miss Hagmeyer, his needle-wielding fourth grade teacher at the Classical School, Leon braces himself for fifth grade. He arrives armed with a backpack full of pens and pencils, binders and notebooks . . . plus a rag doll that's the spitting image of Henry Lumpkin, the bully who has Leon in his sights. If the doll works the way it's supposed to, Leon (and his buddies P.W. and Lily-Matisse) won't have to worry about Lumpkin the Pumpkin! Better still, Leon has a fabulous new teacher, Mr. Sparks, who conducts science experiments using that most miraculous of research materials -- the potato chip. And a good thing, too. Mr. Sparks's lab work will come in handy when Leon is forced to take on Alphonse "The Chippopotamus" Cipollini at the annual Chipapalooza! Chip-Off. Once you've sunk your teeth into Leon and the Champion Chip, the hilarious sequel to Leon and the Spitting Image, you'll never eat potato chips the same way again!

Author : Stacy Perman
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1439190089
Total Pages : 342 pages
Book Rating : 4.81/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Grand Complication written by Stacy Perman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-02-19 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The race between two ambitious, complicated men in the early 1900s to create the most extravagant, complicated timepiece ever"--

Author : Devin King
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780999719855
Total Pages : 96 pages
Book Rating : 4.58/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Grand Complication written by Devin King and published by . This book was released on 2019-06-15 with total page 96 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Poetry. "Devin King's GRAND COMPLICATION is a dizzy fugue of forms--regular stanzas in radical variety. And the sources of its argument are just as varied--The Thebaid of Statius, A Midsummer Night's Dream, or Melrose Place. It's reminiscent of Zukofky's omnivorous, inventive formalism. King orchestrates actors and narratives into a weltering long poem: William leads stoners to his apartment, thinking Julia will follow, but instead, she leads Abbie into Luke's room and Mike follows, though Mike had flirted with Julia before she jumped in the pool while Amphiaraus was swallowed by the earth. I know. It's complicated."--John Tipton

Author : Random House
Publisher : Arrow
ISBN 13 : 9780434883745
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.43/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Grand Complication Proof written by Random House and published by Arrow. This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Stacy Perman
Publisher : Simon & Schuster Export
ISBN 13 : 9781476726793
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.95/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Grand Complication written by Stacy Perman and published by Simon & Schuster Export. This book was released on 2013-02-05 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The race between two ambitious, complicated men in the early 1900s to create the most extravagant, complicated timepiece ever"--

Author : Howard of Warwick
Publisher : The Funny Book Company
ISBN 13 : 0992939372
Total Pages : 281 pages
Book Rating : 4.73/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Hermitage, Wat and Some Druids written by Howard of Warwick and published by The Funny Book Company. This book was released on 2015-12-20 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Brother Hermitage is at it again - this time with druids. Is it a murder mystery? Is it a thriller? Is it just something gone horribly wrong? When his nemesis, the Norman conqueror Le Pedvin orders him to Wales, Brother Hermitage knows it is going to go wrong. He's had a prophecy it's going to go wrong. And from his first steps on the road it strides firmly in that direction. Brother Hermitage, Wat, weaver of pornographic tapestry and Cwen, weaver in her own right and the fiercest of the lot, are commanded to find one dead Norman in the whole of Wales - as usual under pain of death. Add to that some treasure and a druid curse or two, and we have the recipe for a laugh out loud historical tale like no other. (Apart from the other Chronicles of Brother Hermitage) It's all complicated enough, but when what seems like the whole of the country wants to join in, things get very messy. And then there are the druids, and stone circles, and sacrifices.... "he who has laughter on his side has no need of proof" Theodore Adorno