The abridged and edited versions were somewhat disappointing to me. I remember looking through these books as a kid and how there was so much in them. While t

The abridged and edited versions were somewhat disappointing to me. I remember looking through these books as a kid and how there was so much in them. While they are dated, there are insights in some of them. If they had a bakery, they also had a mill where the flour was ground, and that required wheat which was gathered. The houses had cross-sections showing the pipes and where water came into the house and distributed to the faucets/showers. It connected to the fireplugs outside. There was an inter-connectedness to this world that is still simplified, of course, but so much deeper than anything else I can think of in that format. The only thing vaguely comparable would be the DK books which are packed with info. Most kids books are ultra-simplified and not meant for exploration, they are just a linear "show this".