A Burglar's Guide to the City
/a-burglars-guide-to-the-city-21457.jpg "A Burglar's Guide to the City")
- Atlas of Remote Islands - $20.00
- Unruly Places: Lost Spaces, Secret Cities, and Other Inscrutable Geographies - $19.15
- Rap Tees: A Collection of Hip-Hop T-Shirts 1980-1999 - $25.75
- How to Talk about Videogames (Electronic Mediations) - $17.80
- This Book Is a Planetarium: And Other Extraordinary Pop-Up Contraptions - $22.00
Looking for a new pastime? I wouldn't say Geoff Manaugh's A Burglar's Guide to the City is a how-to manual for breaking into and thieving buildings, but...that's only because I don't want to be considered an accomplice when the book comes out next month and America experiences a sharp rise in bank, art museum, jewelry store, and weed depot robberies. A Burglar's Guide to the City is, in fact, just that: "an unexpected blueprint to the criminal possibilities in the world all around us."
Manaugh consulted with FBI Special agents, reformed [hmmm, I wonder] bank robbers, private security consultants, the LAPD Air Support Division, and building architects to pen his detailed discussion of architecture and infrastructure as seen through the eyes of someone about to take advantage of their weaknesses. Readers will travel through walls and elevator shafts to get to the goods, into panic rooms and bank vaults to steal them, and across rooftops and breaks in building surveillance systems to make their escapes unscathed.
A Burglar's Guide to the City also includes real-life anecdotes, such as stories of home invasions in ancient Rome, and tales of newsbreaking heists ranging from spectacular to absurd. (I hope Anthony Curcio gets a shoutout).
DudeIWantThat.com is reader-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Learn more.
/salt-self-defense-gun-32170.jpg?mode=crop "SALT Self-Defense Gun")
SALT Self-Defense Gun
Lorenzo Maggiore already figured out how to A-Salt bugs in an effort keep our extermination of insects simple, clean, and green. Now we have a means of SALTing humans, this time in an effort to keep our defense against...
/gablok-diy-wood-block-house-45510.jpg?mode=crop "Gablok DIY Wood Block House Kit")
Gablok DIY Wood Block House Kit
Gablok had a vision: a LEGO house that was life-size. Structurally sound. Insulated and livable. Up to code. And like the building bricks and blocks of our childhoods, constructed by our own hands...
AbleNook: Rapidly Deployable Modular Dwelling
I'm nearly sold on AbleNook, a collapsible housing unit that requires neither appreciable time nor skill to assemble, based on its Kickstarter project's opening quote alone. From Albert Einstein: "We can't solve problems...
/havenshield-door-barricade-40891.jpg?mode=crop "Havenshield Door Barricade")
Havenshield Door Barricade
The Havenshield Door Barricade is a home security device for quickly blocking interior access to intruders. It installs over any standard door in your home (or office or classroom) like a wreath. Not exactly a bearer...
/rift-recon-red-team-kit-10441.jpg?mode=crop "Rift Recon Red Team Kit")
Rift Recon Red Team Kit
Rift Recon terms themselves Physical Security Specialists. They explain what that is in about 500 words of fancy and circumlocutory jargon, the essence of which I'm pretty sure means they cater to high-class Shady McShadersons...
Bike Mine Exploding Anti-Theft Alarm
Bike Mine is a thing that makes you go boommm! At least if you're a dirty thief trying to make off with a dude's bicycle or motorcycle (or boat or jet ski if you live the kind of high rollin' life where that's a risk.)...
/doorricade-door-security-bar-61285.jpg?mode=crop "Doorricade Door Security Bar")
Doorricade Door Security Bar
Dooricade: for your front door. For your back door. For your bedroom door. For your bathroom door. It's a door security bar for anywhere you are that you want those on the other side to know You! Shall! Not! Pass!...
Laser Tripwire
If you just want people to keep the F out, get an Add-a-Lock. But if you want them to believe for a split second that they have successfully encroached your space, only to disrupt the blaze of an invisble light that in...
Go Guarded Self Defense Ring
I bought my girlfriend, She-Ra: Princess of Power, a purple Brutus the Bulldog keychain to serve as her attacker ass-kicking assistant, but I'll admit when it arrived, it turned out to be a lot bigger and clunkier that...
/the-best-safes-stash-jars-32987.jpg?mode=crop "The Best Safes & Stash Jars")
The Best Safes & Stash Jars
Whether you lock it up, tuck it away, or hide it in plain sight, it's better to be safe than sorry. And it's a better safe that's going to protect you from the sorry. I'll grant, some of the best safes and stash jars...
/pod-space-prefab-backyard-44140.jpg?mode=crop "Pod Space Prefab Backyard Office Cabins")
Pod Space Prefab Backyard Office Cabins
Working from home could get even better for some of us, and become bearable for others, if our WFH office were a Pod Space office cabin. The prefabricated structures are Red Dot design award winners made to install simply...
/pepperalarm-automatic-pepper-29660.jpg?mode=crop "PEPPERALARM - Automatic Pepper Spray Anti-Theft Device")
PEPPERALARM - Automatic Pepper Spray Anti-Theft Device
The PEPPERALARM is a burglar alarm system that sets out to be a little more...proactive, shall we say? Its creators call it "The Robber Stopper!" and while they don't include any testimonials from robbers the PEPPERALARM...