Citizens of No Place: A Collection of Short Stories by Jimenez Lai

Citizens of No Place is a collection of short stories on architecture and urbanism, graphically represented using manga-style storyboards. Fiction is used as a strategy to unpack thoughts about architecture. Modeled as a proto-manifesto, it is a candid chronicle of a highly critical thought process in the tradition of paper architecture (especially that of architect John Hejduk and Bernard Tschumi's Manhattan Transcript). The short stories explore many architectural problems through the unique language of the graphic novel, helping usher the next generation of architectural theory and criticism.

Jimenez Lai is currently an assistant professor at University of Illinois at Chicago and the leader of Bureau Spectacular. He graduated with a Master of Architecture from University of Toronto. Previously, Lai has lived and worked in a desert shelter at Taliesin, AZ, and resided in a shipping container at Atelier Van Lieshout on the piers of Rotterdam. Professionally, Lai has worked for MOS, AVL, RE X, OMA /Rem Koolhaas in Rotterdam and New York. Since 2008, Lai s work has been exhibited in many cities including New York, Boston, Athens, Madrid, Los Angeles, Tokyo, Louisville and Toronto. His short stories and drawings have been published in numerous journals around the world.