Books are earthquake proof. Fallen Books is a book project that brings together images of toppled books housed in seismically-active libraries. The photographs, often taken by librarians, are laid out as a chronological index of libraries in the aftermath of an earthquake and include earthquake names, locations, dates and the relative intensity of the earthquake as measured by the Modified Mercalli Scale. The accompanying captions are quotes from newspapers and librarian’s notes. The Mercalli Scale is a descriptive and graphic alternative to the Richter Scale, that quantifies how strongly an earthquake affects the Earth’s surface, humans, man- made objects and nature, on a scale of I through XII. Topographic maps of earthquake areas use the Mercalli Scale color code to indicate how far away from the epicenter the earthquake was felt and at what degree of intensity. This book in the hands of the reader will always refer to the copies of Fallen Books introduced into the featured libraries. The book is both an archive and a forecast. Melissa Dubbin and Aaron S. Davidson
