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This really is a masterpiece of science fiction. As well as being astonishingly prolific the author has an astounding imagination as big as the planet of Majipoor itself. We open on a pastoral scene with our hero having nothing of himself other than his name. He becomes a travelling juggler (inspiring me to pick up my own juggling balls again) and from that small beginning attempts to regain the…
A female welsh detective and her romantic partner over the border in the Chesire constabulary investigate their own particular crimes (a murder at an outdoor pursuit centre and a series of burglaries from posh houses respectively) and we also get transcripts of a true crime / cold case podcast interspersed - quite a nice touch. Before long all of these cases are tangled together and things get…
So I have this shelf of Penguin Classics, books that will broaden my mind and improve my self-worth, making me feel smug about my reading habits - but instead I keep picking up the next book in the “Rivers of London” series and reading that instead! We get a few new characters introduced (or expanded on) here, Abigail the junior apprentice; Kimberley the FBI contact and we are still pursuing the…
I don’t recall much of the original TV series from my childhood days, other than I didn’t really like it much, and I haven’t read the books so the level of peril and heartache came as something of a surprise! (I’m sure the 1970’s show was really anodyne…) Lost dogs, lost horses, scary native americans, out of control wild fires, family schisms and truama, a scheming fat controller and a local…
Rintaro talked about Saint-Exupéry in The Cat Who Saved Books so I thought I had better read some to broaden my mind! Memories of school and stories being read out to us in class made me think I had already heard “The Little Prince” but ChatGPT tells me that what I was actually thinking of was Oscar Wilde’s “The Happy Prince” so this story was really new to me. And what a delight it is. The…
Listened to as an audiobook over several weeks – this sometimes leads to abandonment as I drift off too much but in this case I was to pick up from where I left off and enjoyed the story. It is about Imogen (“Immy”) who to her great surprise inherits a large house from an artist she and her mother and sister spent a summer with many years ago. It turns out that there are many secrets from that…
On the sruface the story of a hokikimoro stay at home Japanese and his opening up to the outside world and friendships, but actually a meditation on books, reading, publishing and what it means to own a book, to read a book (ane even to be a book!) This is a quite short, easy read with just a few characters, some simple (real world) locations but has surprising depths. Despite the short length…
An audiobook available as part of my Audible subscription (I really like this particular perk; it makes the annual £109 price really good value). I found this very interesting. The author is an engaging speaker really invested in his material. What comes across to me is that the question in the title cannot ever be definitively answered but is absolutely fascinating to investigate and discuss. As…
This is a good companion piece to the Apollo Guidance Computer work. That book covered the internal workings of the AGC, whereas this one looked much more at the human factors. It was interesting to read about the initial research into questions of just exactly *how* humans should interact with automation, what sort of interface should be provided and what was the split of responsibilities; and…
This carried on neatly from the previous season (which I had largely forgotten), in that the fallout from the corrupt DI revealed in season two still had a major impact on this story. A good reminder that stories never exist in isolation, even in supposedly episodic TV shows. This season we have some murdered teenagers, a traveller encampment and the Laird of the estate they are staying on all…