A curmudgeon writes.
Time for another five reviews!
Four of them are audiobooks, which some may say don’t count, but fuck those people. Three of them are classics that I’d long wanted to read (or ignored, in the case of one of them) so I was pleased with this brace.
Let’s get into it.
Continue reading “Book review: time, robots, firemen, replicants and gruel”Well well well. It appears that the whole keep-up-to-date-with-reviews intention is something that withers in the overwhelming heat of oh-shit-work-deadlines and oh-shit-spring-gardening.
Consequently, it’s been a while since I’ve written. The good news (for me!) is that I’ve not stopped reading, and so have a raft of things to pontificate about now that I’ve finally got some time to get thoughts down.
(I was considering some kind of Droste effect of a photograph of me editing this post editing this post editing this post but I realised that I lack the technical elan to carry this out without using AI, and given that the world already looks like the image above due to people using this fucked tech to accelerate the Rule 34 singularity, that you could use your brain to picture it instead. I dunno, maybe your version is more handsome or charming or something. We live in hope.)
(Also, did you know that Microsoft once had an OS called ‘Singularity‘? I assume ‘Torment Nexus‘ was taken.)
Continue reading “Book reviews: ten not-so-rapid”Once more, I’ve slackened off a bit in my reviewing duties. So instead of reading one review this time ’round, you’re going to cram six of the buggers into your eyeballs.
Talk about value for money! But that’s not all! There’ll be surveyors, pandemics, pugilistic pain, shoals of teen suicides, bad TARDIS houses, Nazi-influenced ‘shrooms and, er, Simon Callow.
Never let it be said I don’t offer value for money! Let’s get on with it.
Continue reading “Book reviews: six or so (no, it’s six)”
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I came late to Dickens, I think. My mother was always on at me to read A Tale of Two Cities – and I still haven’t, strangely – but I never seemed to click with the novels I tried. I just couldn’t get into his world.
It wasn’t until Year 12 that I had to read Great Expectations for a book report. As was my wont, I didn’t start reading the book until the night before the paper was due. But something strange happened: instead of just skimming, as I’d otherwise have done, I was engrossed. I ripped through the book, paying it closer attention than I’d expected to. I loved it. Continue reading “Book review: Great Expectations”
Yeah nah. 