No, not the library in your castle, but your inspiration books for building!
What are the best books in your Castle library? I'm thinking of either reference books or picture books.
Some of my most-used references are:
Life in a Medieval Castle
Frances & Joseph Gies (who have also authored similar volumes about medieval cities and villages)
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/de ... 8&v=glance
A bit dry, but somewhere between layman & scholarly. It's a pretty down-to-earth guide of what life was like for residents of a castle.
Castles: Their Construction and History
Sidney Toy
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/de ... ce&s=books
It's almost a history of the technical & strategic progress of medieval warfare more than a castle reference book--but that's what drove change in castle building. Excellent look at many different castles in many different regions and how and why they developed. (And the Amazon spotlight review mentions adding it to your Lego room--bonus points!)
The Sutton Companion to Castles
Stephen Friar
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/de ... ce&s=books
A comprehensive alphabetical index of castle-related terms. Some descriptions are a sentence or two long, some are pages. Indispensible if you're reading some of the more scholarly tomes like Tuchman's A Distant Mirror.
Other suggestions?
Carl