[liff] Books You Sometimes Find at Goodwill

2999.

A visit to a used-book section at a Goodwill store is the very definition of a roll-of-the-dice. The distilled quiet desperation of the normal life gives the cast-offs there a certain patina of needy humanity.

The biggest used-self-help-book stocks I've ever found is at a Goodwill store. To me, this is significant, but then I am a hard-core cynic.

Sometimes, though, you strike gold. One of the life's lessons that periodically shopping the Goodwill will teach you is to always check every corner at least once. Because you never know …

Letterhead and Logo Design Volume 5, Letterhead and Logo Design Volume 8, and The Pocket Muse, a writing inspiration book, by Jessica Wood.

The Jessica Wood book is particularly adorable:

… and, inside Letterhead and Logo Design Volume 5, I find this little gem from a local Portland designer whose life I admire a great deal and, well, I'll be honest, envy just a little:

Lesson: Check every corner! 

[type] A Peek In Typographer's Sketchbooks

2722.(via my newsfeeds) One of my favorite things to do is to watch artists work, and artists' sketchbooks are amazingly fun to get a peek inside.

Ryan Heshka, amongst others, have contributed to yet-another-design-book-coauthored by Steven Heller,  Typography Sketchbooks, by him and Lisa Talarico, published by Princeton Architectural Press. I'm hoping to get a look at this myself sometime soon, because it's filled with wonderful pictures of the insides of these wonderful little tomes, including this by Heshka:

Good gosh, I don't draw nearly enough.

Here's also a link to a bit at the Laughing Squid.

[design] About Jeff Fisher's Identity Crisis! @ Designorati

1199. Yeah, I reviewed Jeff's book @ Designorati ... and I'd do it again, see?

The review has been noted at Jeff's Identity Crisis! book blog, and I also shout out to Jeff (since I was unable to attend Portland Graphic Designers Kaffeeklatsch today – I'm planning on doing next month, promise!). I adopted a more catholic tone over there, but this is my personal space, and I can be a bit more unreserved about it; seriously, this book kicks it major ways.

It is a terribly good book, and it will be of especial interest to graphic designers in general and the logo-enabled in particular. But what really impressed me about it was the way it appealed to the 'non-designers' I know (of which there are, of necessity, several). Maybe it's the book's design, and maybe it's Jeff's personable style, or maybe it's both. But they really enjoyed reading it and I did have to do a bit of inveigling to get my review copy back.

My favorite design books are the ones that you read then, in slack moments, browse through – they stick to your brain. Identity Crisis! does just that.

So, it don't matter who you are, mah babies ... hie yourself over to Jeff's blog and read about it, then buy it, you peoples! Srsly!

Tags: Identity Crisis!, Jeff Fisher, Designorati, Samuel John Klein, Book Reviews