‘I will seek Vengeance upon those who betrayed my family. I am Ezio Auditore da Firenze. I am an Assassin…’
Betrayed by the ruling families of Italy, a young man embarks upon an epic quest for vengeance. To eradicate corruption and restore his family’s honour, he will learn the art of the assassins.
Along the way, Ezio will call upon the wisdom of such great minds as Leonardo Da Vinci and Niccolo Machiavelli – knowing that survival is bound to the skills by which he must live.
To his allies, he will become a force for change – fighting for freedom and justice. To his enemies, he will become a threat dedicated to the destruction of the tyrants abusing the people of Italy.
So begins an epic story of power, revenge and conspiracy.
TRUTH WILL BE WRITTEN IN BLOOD

I have always been a fan of Assassin’s Creed, the depth of the story was great, so when I saw this novel it peaked my interest. Ezio Auditore leads a very easy life in Florence only to have everything turned upside down and losing his family while discovering secrets of his family as part of a secret society meant to stop evil. This book is a bit hard to grasp initially and keep in mind that I never played the games before, I always admired them but never had the time to play that type of game. When the story started picking up I was enjoying it more and more, you get a feeling for Italy in the 15th century and all that went on during that time. I loved how they brought Leonardo into the mix as the genius that he is and how he helped Ezio to put the Assassin’s weapons together. The story is fun and interesting to read if you like the game, but at certain points it just didn’t tie things very well together and would lose you. I liked it but wouldn’t recommend it too much except if you like the game.

Link: Amazon
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It no news that I am a huge fan of Moleskine products and almost every notebook they have come up with, I haven’t had enough material or things to write and draw in all the books I have from them but still I can’t help picking one up whenever I see it. At last Moleskine has decided to open an online store, after such a long time to find each and every Moleskine is now so easily available on their website and I didn’t realize there were so many different kinds of Moleskines, I was very much tempted to make a purchase while surfing the site but I will myself from clicking the purchase button.

Link: Moleskine

The Stig, Le Mans, the Fast Lane and Me.

The Stig gets his kit off and reveals how he came to be Top Gear’s iconic racing driver and so much more – including what it’s like to thrash an Aston Martin DBS, train for the Army and face the terror of Jeremy Clarkson’s underwear! When the Black Stig disappeared off the end of an aircraft carrier in 2003, we were introduced to The White Stig. Faster. Stranger. Harder to keep clean. And ever since, millions have wondered — who is The Man in the White Suit? They’re about to find out. Ben Collins caught the car the bug young, kicking his dad’s boss in the balls for not giving him a company Jag. This was the attitude that eventually led him to spend seven years sharing a cabin with Jeremy Clarkson’s underwear, James May’s PhD thesis and Richard Hammond’s hairspray. Because he is The Stig. Now he tells all about life inside the iconic white helmet. What it’s like to guide a blind ex-RAF officer around the Top Gear track; pit a drug dealer’s Mitsubishi Evo against a Trojan tank; set a Vauxhall Monara against Chloe the dancing Ninja; and race double-decker Routemasters against bendy buses. Not to mention all the inside stuff on how the show’s amazing driving sequences are made. He also reveals how he got to be there — setting a Dunsfold lap time faster than Michael Schumacher’s. Breaking records with the best of the best at Daytona and Le Mans. It’s an awesome story, told by an amazing man.

When I first heard that Ben Collins was the Stig I wasn’t sure what to think, and there was so much drama from so many people that he outed himself, and anger from people he worked with, I thought it would be an interesting book to read since BBC tried so hard to block the book but they failed. This book is defenitly for petrol heads and fans of Top Gear, I wasn’t sure what to expect from the book but I started enjoying it more and more as the story picked up. For once you get inside the head of The Stig and know what he is thinking about when he is driving balls out and out of his mind with celebrities right next to him in the most ridiculous of cars. Its fun to see and understand the workings of Top Gear from inside point of view, and you also get an understanding of a racer’s mindset. Half of the book is about Ben Collins development as racer and the other half as The Stig and what he had to do to keep The Stig hidden and sharp. If you can relate to this book then you will really enjoy it.

Link: Amazon
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I had somethings on hold for a while in my mailbox and my Amazon cart was full for a good two months, I was trying to hold off on making any purchases. Two weeks ago I decided to go ahead with the purchase, got to my mailbox and shipped it with all the items there. It was shipped two weeks back at this point, four days to deliver and the rest it got stuck in customs for while only to be delivered on the first day of Ramadan, a nice start to the day, I didn’t have a chance to open all the stuff up until later in the day but it felt like Christmas.

The items delivered:

• Two Green Lantern Models
• Game of Thrones – Goerge RR Martin Book Set
• Two Batman Begins Pieces
• Lord of the Rings Model
• Three Large Volume Transformers Comic Books
• Red Robin (Cool New Comic)
• 007 Carte Blanche (A preorder that I forgot about and its my third copy! lol! I love James Bond novels)
• Two Lens Caps to replace the missing ones
• LifeHacker Book Volume 3 updated

I have had a lot of books pile up over the last year, I keep buying more books then I read and some of them are pretty damn good. I wish I read faster or more, I always feel satisfied whenever I’m done with a book and these days I have some very good books such as the one below. Ben Collins is The Stig from Top Gear and you a get a glimpse into his life and how he became a racer then The Stig, you even get some insight into what The Stig was thinking when doing these crazy stunts which is pretty cool when you remember the episodes that go with it, if you are fan then you have to pick up this book. Shit My Dad Says is purely hilarious, seriously, this guy’s sarcasm is over the top and upfront, you will love it. Simon Pegg is a comic genius and you will love his a book which you gets you laughing form the start. Going to give a full write up once I’m done with these books.

• The Man In The White Suit – Ben Collins
• Shit My Dad Says – Justin Halpern
• Nerd Do Well: A Small Boy’s Journey to Becoming a Big Kid – Simon Pegg

I am a huge fan of Moleskines, always looking for the different ones, the customized ones always seem to catch my eye. Mohammed AlTurki is a creative Kuwaiti who is interested in everything artistic, tech, and graphic design. One of is interesting projects is designing Moleskine covers and it looks great, you can see that form the video above. Check out more from him below.

Link: NumberXIV

I have always been amazed by the universe of Star Wars, dreaming of building my very own fully armed and operational battle station. Star Wars: The Blueprints brings together for the first time more than 500 photographs and illustrations that show how the Star Wars galaxy was designed, from R2-D2 and the Cantina to the Millennium Falcon and the Death Star, accompanied by commentary by J. W. Rinzler and many of the original draftsmen who worked on the designs themselves. I have been looking to getting some of the models to display in my office either a legendary Lego piece or one of the large realistic one of the Mllennium Falcon, and this book is just a fantastic addition to the Star Wars Memorabilia.

Limited to 5,000 hand-numbered copies, this massive, oversized volume brings together for the first time more than 250 of the original blueprints created for the filming of the Star Wars saga. Drawn from deep within the Lucasfilm Archives, all-new photographs of the blueprints and images of concept design, production models, and film stills are combined with insightful commentary and new interviews. A must-have for every serious Star Wars fan!

Link: TheBluePrintsBook

The I DRAW CARS Sketchbook & Reference Guide is an indispensible tool for students, designers, hobbyists, artists and car enthusiasts. We’ve designed the ultimate car design field guide by pairing commonly used industry reference materials with a ubiquitous and iconic moleskine-style sketchbook.

I have always thought about being an vehicle designer or an industrial engineer, some one who gets to design those amazingly cool cars. Matt Marrocco and Adam Hubres are two designers/engineers who work in this industry and wanted to provide a book and tool that can help people develop this skill. I love that they have gone with the Moleskine look for this book and they have put a lot of effort into it, all the different perspectives and designs. I for one have zero skill in drawing even though I sketch a lot in my Moleskine so I pledged right away, I love that they have a sketch over section so I can improve my horrible skills and I would love to add this to my collection. If you like this sort of thing check out their website and then head over to Kickstarter to pledge for the book. I hope this is a first edition and they come up with other design books soon.

Link: IDRAWCARS
Link: Kickstarter

Four years ago, you were cool. You read Freakonomics when it first came out. You impressed family and friends and dazzled dates with the insights you gleaned. Now Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner return with Superfreakonomics, a freakquel even bolder, funnier, and more surprising than the first.

After the first book I couldn’t wait to read SuperFreakonomics, the first one shocked and entertained me so I was looking forward to this one. What’s fun about SuperFreakonomics is that it makes you think about a lot of “truths” that we take for granted, this book actually made me change some of my thinking about global warming. The book is very interesting, and lots of information that you’d be hard-pressed to find in your typical daily reading; and, it “sexes-up” the fields of microeconomics and behavioral economics. It was an enjoyable read and looking into the different topics but this time around it isn’t the work of Dunber but the works of other people and his other angle when looking at it. I had very high expectations after the first book but it didn’t measure up in comparison to the first one, it didn’t connect everything together as much and the style of writing was just very different between each article. Its an interesting look into behavioral economics and microeconomics but thats about it.

Link: Amazon
Rating:

As America and the Soviet Union race to build their nuclear stockpiles, two extraordinary heroes must form an uneasy alliance. These studies in opposites shadow and light must overcome their distrust of each other to battle evil and injustice.

Sputnik silently circles in the skies above the fabled cities of the United States as danger lurks in the Earth’s darkest corners.

In Gotham, the shadowy vigilante known as the Batman haunts Gotham’s streets . . . and the police are just as afraid of this Dark Knight as the city’s criminals are.

In Metropolis, the notorious Lex Luthor is leveraging international tensions to build LuthorCorp into a military-industrial empire, competing against his business rival Wayne Industries, which is run by Gotham’s enigmatic millionaire, Bruce Wayne. Luthor’s activities have raised the interest of Daily Planet reporter Lois Lane, who is beginning to realize that Luthor may stop at nothing to achieve success.

At the same time, Clark Kent and Jimmy Olsen are investigating the rumored crash of a flying saucer. Clark is desperate to know if there may be other lost interplanetary visitors on Earth secretly living among them visitors like himself.

When Batman’s and Superman’s paths cross, their lives change, and history will never be the same.

This is one of the books that I was saving, anything to do with Batman & Superman is something to look forward to. I remember not reading some comics to I can watch the movie then go back to the comics so the movie wouldn’t be ruined if I knew too much. This starts off with Batman and Superman in the 1950s/60s with tension high between the United States & USSR, and it has a warm feeling to it. Technology and life are a different level but you have a familiarity with the characters, they mention the characters as if you are just getting to know them. It picks up pace and I do enjoy the contrast and back & forth between Batman and Superman but I kept reading with higher expectations, with something bigger. With so many stories to Batman and Superman you always keep expecting to learn something you about them and to overcome impossible odds but in this case the story was fun but didn’t give me what I wanted at the end, its an enjoyable book but it could have been better.

Link: Amazon
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