This collection supports and promotes awareness to the important mission and framework of the Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here Coalition's focus on the lasting power of the written word and the arts in support of the free expression of ideas, the preservation of shared cultural spaces, and the importance of responding to attacks, both overt and subtle, on artists, writers, and academics working under oppressive regimes or in zones of conflict, despite the destruction of that literary/cultural content.

"The Latin word for book is 'liber' which also refers to the inner bark of a tree, and the concept of freedom. The front cover of a book is most often compared to skin, or perhaps clothing. As much as it is a flat surface, a smooth, glossy, hard, or paperback object, it is also a bodily relatable entity; it is very human. Before it can be called a book, Controlled Detonations is an imaginary term coined to help us denote primary meanings of words and images, and challenge processes of abstraction that assign them symbolic significance for ideological purposes. By constructing a poetic/metaphoric discourse around the 2007 car bombing on al-Mutanabbi Street, the book aims to transform itself into a shared, moral act. It is an anthology of found visuals and a critical essay regarding Internet's distribution and ownership of images and words in the recording and preservation of the history of 2007 al-Mutanabbi Street car bombing. Controlled Denotations uses one last metaphor with profound intentions to make realize that ideology itself is a metaphor. It can, however, be overcome through our very literal acts as simple as breathing, touching skin, changing clothes, or reading a book"--Book Arts at the Centre for Fine Print Research, UK.