christoph bartneck

Dr. Rob Park’s life is out of order. His estranged wife is leaving him, the relationship to his daughters is strained and his career is at a dead end. Slowly he is putting his life back into order by sorting his LEGO collection. Prof. Dr. Smith and his newly found Adult Fans Of LEGO help him to find a new structure for himself, his LEGO collection and his family.

Context:
The Ideal Order is a book in the tradition of Robert Pirsig’s “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”. It interweaves the story of a failing academic with a cross disciplinary investigation in mankind’s obsession with classification systems. The book spans across biology, library studies and computer science. At the same time it follows Dr. Rob Park with a sense of humor not unlike “The Big Bang Theory” through the bizarre world of academia and the LEGO culture. Sorting his bricks enables him to play again with his children and to maintain his sobriety during the separation from his wife.

The strength of The Ideal Order is that it uses platonic dialogues to engage the reader into a discourse on classification systems. Similar to “Sophies World” by Jostein Gaarder, this book uses a vivid story line about the relationship of a father to his wife and children to carry the reader through the chaos of modern life.