The folks over at No Starch Press have sent a new book over for review. Jacob Berg’s The Great LEGO Puzzle book does just what it says on the cover: It brings 120 building challenges using just a handful of basic bricks. Is this the perfect way to while away time during the holiday season?
Let’s take a closer look.
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As a kid growing up in the 70s, I was a little excited about the idea of space travel. I missed the moon landing: The Apollo programme had drawn to a close, Skylab was preparing to burn up in the atmosphere above Western Australia, and we were eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Next Big Thing in space travel – the Space Shuttle.
And so it is into this milieu that as LEGO® Minifigures were unleashed on the world, that we had worlds of Castle, Town and Space unleashed on the world. Past,Present and Future. One had a passing interest, one was the mundane and every day and the other captured my imagination from the moment I saw the catalogue that read “… coming in 1979.” I may not have had many space sets as a child, but the ones I had I could still assemble by heart after 40 years, as I emerged from my dark ages and returned to my childhood LEGO Collection. Of course, while 1979 was the release date in Australia and Europe, a limited range was released in The USA in 1978.
As I have continued to explore the worlds of LEGO Classic Space and beyond, I have seen it through old catalogue scans, battered box photos and crumpled, stained instructions, while cleaning the dust and grime off bulk lots of elements, assembling weathered spacemen and wondering if I need to get my glasses cleaned.
When I saw early mentions of Tim Johnson’s book “LEGO Space: 1978-1992” turning up for preorder on Amazon, I was excited. Tim is a passionate fan who grew up in a similar era to myself and, as a self confessed parts nerd and founder of the website NEW ELEMENTARY, he was always going to bring some interesting insights to the project.
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The LEGO® MINDSTORMS® 51515 Robot Inventor set was released a little over a year ago, and represents a conceptual shift in programming the LEGO Robotics platform. Offering both Scratch and Python-based programming, the core set comes with 5 models for construction and programming. I have looking to obtain a copy of this set for exploring the current MINDSTORMS paradigm. But I have my reservations about the LEGO group’s ability to provide comprehensive documentation for their automation platforms such as Powered Up and MINDSTORMS. These reservations were eased when, just as I was setting out to place my order for a copy of the set, I was offered a pdf copy of Daniele Benedettelli’s ‘The LEGO® MINDSTORMS® Robot Inventor Activity Book for review by the publishers, No Starch Press.
Daniele Benedettelli has been involved with LEGO MINDSTORMS in some shape or form for the better part of 2 decades, both within the wider community, as well as helping The LEGO Group test and develop software for the LEGO MINDSTORMS Product line. He has published books about LEGO BOOST as well as EV3, and now works as a freelance model builder and high-school robotics teacher.
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Henry Pinto and Cade Franklin shot to fame during the first season of LEGO® Masters Australia when they brought home the winners’ trophy. With a generous dose of creativity, to say nothing about a fair bit of talent in the ‘building with bricks’ department, Henry and Cade have released a book, in time for Fathers’ Day here in Australia.
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The home of the brick, the LEGO House, in Downtown Billund dominates the landscape. Entering the building is simple. You don’t even need a ticket. You enter, and find yourself in the main ‘town square’ you can visit the LEGO Store, cafe’s and the ticket office. And beyond that… well, how much time do you have?
You can probably see most of the LEGO House in a day. You probably won’t do much else, and by the end of the day, you will be determined to finish it, just as a matter of principle.
But this is not a post about the LEGO House, but rather the latest book from Chronicle Books. – The Secrets of the LEGO House: Design, Play and Wonder in the Home of the Brick by Jesús Díaz. This volume landed on my desk at an unexpected time, and is available to order now.
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Now that the world is opening up, and live fan events are starting to sporadically appear around the world, we are starting to turn our attention to building models for exhibition. There is no doubt that a little bit of movement can help add life to a model – whether it’s an automatic door, a radar dish, or a slowly rotating turntable. These are not so challenging if you have grown up with a bit of basic mechanical knowledge. However, sometimes the right way to achieve such mechanisms using LEGO Bricks can be just a little bit obscure.
But help is readily available, if you know where to look.
I was recently sent pre release samples from the latest books from Yoshihito Isogawa, and I realise that they are now available from the No Starch Press website. Isogawa has been producing simple to read Ideas books for LEGO Technic for a number of years, and these books build on the previous ones, with emphasis in new areas. His latests Books, LEGO Technic Non-Electric Models: Simple Machines and LEGO Technic Non-Electric Models: Clever Contraptions build on his previous books, looking at Technic Ideas, as well as Power function and Boost Ideas (all available from No Starch).
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I love a good LEGO® Spaceship. I love looking at them. I love the stories behind them. I would love to enjoy building them, but my spaceship design skills appear to be trapped somewhere in the late 1970’s. As such, I was quite excited when No Starch Press told me that Jeff Friesen’s (aka jeff_works on Instagram) new book was going to offer 52 such models, with extra inspiration and parts lists, in his latest book, LEGO® Space projects. Due for release in June, to coincide with world Astronomy month, it is currently available for pre-order, with a 25% discount on the list price of $USD24.99 (print and ebook). The eBook’s list price is $USD19.99.
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