Book features and first impressions

First: per request, here are some more photos of the actual books.

• Front Cover
• Back Cover
• Top Edge of the Binding
• Outside Front Cover Hinge
• Inside Front Cover Hinge
• Contents, open to a random topic mid-As
• The Entire Thing and It is Glorious

The spine art differs from book to book to make the spacescape, but the front and back cover art is identical on each.

These books are casebound like a lot of high school-level textbooks are, but these covers and hinges are stiff. I had a moment of wondering if I was about to break something the first time I opened this one.

They arrived in two boxes, collectively weighing somewhere north of 80 pounds. Each book was individually wrapped in plastic. They were not packed in alphabetical order!

It is possible to order individual replacement volumes, which might explain the individual wrapping and the packing. Thank you to whoever has to pack full sets of these eight hours a day.

I'm currently as far as "adjuntant bird", and here are some observations as I start this process. (In no order)

• I actually disliked the World Book as a kid. I grew up in a house that had two sets of Britannica - the 1964 full size version and the 1986 junior set - and I found both to be more complete and thorough than the World Book at the time. I was cool with reading it now, though, because I'm aware how badly my attention span has been damaged by social media. I figured the simpler language, shorter entries, and many color photos would support where I am now.

• And they do, but I'm still beaming uncut knowledge directly into my brain - no ads, no popups, no comments telling me to kill myself for liking aardwolves. It's still A LOT for my brain to handle. Probably in the good way (nature is healing), but it's still a lot.

• Some of the conventions used in the text weirded me out at first. Like the use of "early," "middle," and "late" to discuss general periods within centuries. The first time I encountered "the late 1900s" to describe an event I remember, I felt confused and then old.

• The entry on "acid rain" explains that acid rain results from air pollution caused by burning fossil fuels. We've known this at least as long as I've been alive, but I can't help but imagine how many people would condemn these books as "liberal propaganda" for mentioning it. How far we have fallen.

• "Addiction: see drug abuse." I mean, I get it, but...oof.

• Presidential bios go for several pages, if the biographies of John and John Quincy Adams are any standard. They're long because they cover each President's entire political career in reasonable detail (I never knew Quincy was an ambassador or that he became a House rep after being President!). I'm resisting the urge to skip ahead to Trump's to see if they detail his business doings or just let his entry be short.

• Years (or maybe days, I can't tell anymore) ago, I read an article that argued that hyperlinks damage our attention span during reading whether or not we click on them. Just the presence of an in-text link forces the brain to make a decision whether or not to click, which disrupts the flow of reading. I didn't really believe it until I noticed that I had zero urge to flip to the "see also" recommendations or the italicized words (which indicate an entry for that term also exists in the World Book) while reading.

So far, my favorite entry is about aardwolves. The aardwolf is now my favorite animal.