The ends of the earth is the smooshing together of two anthologies about the arctic and antarctic. It’s a mixture of both the best fiction and non-fiction stories about these two interesting places. I think I preferred the old journals of the first explorers and the science excerpts more than any of the non-fiction prose. … Continue reading
Tag Archives: Book review
Book review: Edge of Tomorrow
Or the original title, All you need is kill. So, if you’ve seen the film, this has the same basic premise. Alien invaders, leads to massive war, but killing one weird type of alien puts the main character, Keiji, in a time loop. In the movie, Keiji is of course, played by Tom Cruise. In … Continue reading
Book review: Austerity ecology and the collapse-porn addicts
This was fun! I think it is my first book review of someone I actually know – having met Leigh Phillips randomly on a Eurostar to Brussels one terribly early morning a few years ago. Leigh’s book is a no-holds barred assault on de-growth, small is beautiful, return to the land ideologies. It is a … Continue reading
Book review: Annihilation (Southern Reach trilogy)
This is a short, creepy and compelling read. Just shy of 200 pages, you follow a woman’s experience in Area X. We only know what the Biologist knows (no one is given a name, only referred to by their titles) and nothing more. We have her theories, distrust and compulsion to go by to figure … Continue reading
Book review: SPQR
My classics knowledge is about 12 years old now, and only a first year undergraduate class at that, so it nice to read about it once again. Mary Beard’s book is excellent in a many ways. Here are a few of my highlights. Firstly, despite all the history, latin and complicated life and law of … Continue reading
Book review: Ancillary Mercy
So this is the third in the series, following Ancillary Justice and Ancillary Sword and it is as excellent and delightful as the other two in the series. It takes place in the same space station as Ancillary Sword but with a whole host of additional problems (including a showdown with Anaander Mianaai who is … Continue reading
Book review: Population wars
I very much enjoy reading (and listening) to anything written by Greg Graffin, so I guess I’m the perfect audience for his most recent book, Population Wars: a new perspective on competition and coexistence. It’s a tour through biology, zoology and anthropology to argue the points of environmental stewardship, that population wars rarely read to … Continue reading
Book review: Rebel footprints
Okay, everyone just buy this book because it is fabulous. Especially if you live in London and love its history. It’s 10 chapters of radical protest, documenting both campaign successes and failures throughout various bits of London – from Battersea to Bermondsey and Clerkenwell to Shoreditch. It is populated with the most amazing people, union … Continue reading
Book review: A Great Game
About halfway through this book, I looked at the author’s inset and realised that it was written by Canada’s current Prime Minister, Stephen Harper. Oops. It apparently took 8 years to write, with lots of other people helping with the research. I don’t doubt that he wrote a lot of it, because the language feels … Continue reading
Book review: The causal angel
So. It’s still a bit WTF and I’m still not 100% that I actually understood some of the plot but what a bloody brilliant story. It’s even harder to explain the plot by the third book. Basically, there’s a war and Jean has to rescue Mieli, they each have to steal some stuff, and then … Continue reading
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