Review - Murder in the Basement, by Anthony Berkeley: really cleverly constructed, and actually pretty entertaining too. Not sure it's a 100% fair play mystery, but still entertaining. Rating: 4/5 ("really liked it").
A VIRTUOSO RIFF ON AN AMERICAN classic: the inimitable Percival Everett retells the story of Huckleberry Finn from Jim’s perspective, transforming it from a familiar picaresque to a more complex adventure and a meditation on code-switching. A MINUS
My #bookreview is brief/won't spoil, to spread good, great, & spectacular #horror#books far & wide.
💙📚 You may presume you'll know the story that unfolds in I THINK I'M ALONE NOW, but you'll be wrong as hell. I read this novella in a single sitting: Ali Seay has written a thoroughly enjoyable, vivid, violent, deliciously dark chunk o' horror set in the 80's that's, like, totally rad. (Grindhouse Press)
@bookstodon Another really good graphic nonfiction book I've read recently, and recommend, is WE HEREBY REFUSE, regarding the Japanese-Americans forced into internment camps in WWII.
The story addresses a common victim-blaming response to the plight of others: "Why didn't they fight back?" It's almost always the wrong question, even though indeed, they did fight back. Victim-blaming is a pernicious permission structure, allowing us not to care about terrible events that happen to other people.
1/ There are great books about mathematicians and about physicists. There are some good biology books. But chemistry seems to get very little coverage, despite being so fascinating and central. Sharon Bertsch McGrayne's /Prometheans in the Lab/ sets that straight. #BookReview ↵
AAPIHeritageMonth is still going strong, and we're celebrating with This Is Not My Home by local authors Eugenia Yoh and Vivienne Chang.
This is a humorous and heartfelt story about moving from the US to Taiwan and finding that home is where the people we love are.
Learn more about what we do at #ChildrensBookProject. Check out the link in bio to Give Books, Get Books, Volunteer, and Donate, and see the review of this book and more on our website Reviews page!
Heather Burns has an absolutely deft way of turning the sometimes-dull world of digital privacy into entertaining, informative, and actionable prose. Too many of these sorts of books end up being a list of woes and end with "someone should do something, I guess?". Understanding Privacy is different. A…
STUMBLING TOWARD ENLIGHTENMENT in Seoul: university friends now in their thirties find heartbreak and lesser forms of anomie in this eloquent, multivocal experimental novel rich with details of life in today’s South Korea. B PLUS
"Mystery interwined in a pioneering supernatural world. It can easily make a fantastic bestseller."
Recent reader's words
"As I reach the edge of the opening, my blood pressure is rising. Never have I seen something like this before."
Marquise Gertain, THE HIDDEN FACE by M. I. Verras
📢 Calling all tech enthusiasts and Linux aficionados! 📚
Excited to introduce our latest release, "Linux Kernel Programming." We're seeking passionate readers to review the book and share their insights on Amazon.
Another #bookreview - Unfortunately, this is my first negative review of the year.
Book: The Sage, The Swordsman and the Scholars
Rating: 3 / 10
The book is historical fiction focusing on the Ming Dynasty in China. A shady foreign power enters the scene brokering a dangerous level of influence in the local governments. A secret society protective of the empire begins to intervene - discovering this interlopers as evil sorcerers using drugs and magic in an attempt to overthrow the Emperor.
Reservoir builders in South Wales used an astonishing array of railways, gauges and engines!
This is a book for the devotee of industrial locos and the systems which they worked
It includes huge variety of machines - in an industry beset with problems!
See our latest review online (text/audio): ‘Reservoir Builders of South Wales’ by Harold D. Bowtell & Geoffrey Hill from The Industrial Locomotive Society
Borrowed The Lost Cause, written by @pluralistic (from the library), and was an enjoyable sci-fi novel, although perhaps too close for comfort to the present, and most certainly more optimistic than some of us here would be about the future; but, well recommended nonetheless. The hero of the book most certainly would be a denizen of this slice of the Fediverse. #bookreview#books#bookstodon
🆕 blog! “Book Review: Red Side Story - Jasper Fforde”
★★★★⯪
Fourteen years ago, I read Fforde's Shades of Grey and my life hasn't been quite the same since. It was a magical tale, almost totally devoid of exposition, building in an fantasy world like no other. Fans have been clamouring for a sequel ever since. The first few chapters of the sequel do an excellent […]
🆕 blog! “Book Review: Fallen Idols - Alex von Tunzelmann”
"History is not erased when statues are pulled down. It is made." Some people celebrated when Saddam's statue was toppled in Iraq. Yet those same voices condemn the felling of Coulson, Rhodes, and a dozen other statues. Why? Alex von Tunzelmann has a knack for getting to the heart of history in an accessible man…
My #bookreview is brief/won't spoil, to spread good, great, & spectacular #horror#books far & wide.
💙📚 HOT DEMON BITCHES NEAR YOU from J.E. Erickson is an exuberant blast of gore & grue. The Horrors are heavy here, but balanced with deliciously devilish delights & a LOT of heart. (Lots of OTHER body parts, too.) You'll be disturbed, delighted, horrified- but also cackling. HELL, yeah! (Self-published)
🆕 blog! “Book Review: The Doors of Opportunity”
★★★★★
Did you know that a Suffragette invented the UK's electrical plug? Dame Caroline Haslett was an electrical engineer who foresaw the way that electricity could be used to remove domestic drudgery from women's lives. There is a slim biography of her, written by her sister, which is sadly out of print. Luckily, the book is […]
Dame Caroline Haslett was an electrical engineer who foresaw the way that electricity could be used to remove domestic drudgery from women's lives. There is a slim biography of her, written by her sister, which is sadly out of print.
It is a curious book. It dwells on her faith as much as her technical prowess. Her waistline is the subject of wry amusement. There's also the (naturally) dated views of the day to contend with along with an odd segue into spiritualism.
And, of course, you'll see nothing much has changed in the last 100 years.
With the Women's Engineering Society safely launched, Caroline found that she had two recurring types of problem with which to contend. The first was to deal with the difficulties that arose at factory floor level from the intrusion of women into what had been traditionally a masculine preserve, difficulties which she herself had area to admirably tackled by the enlightened management of the Cochran Boiler Company.
The second, and probably the more important task, was dealing with the problem posed by the steadily increasing number of highly trained women competing with men for managerial posts in the world of engineering. She was not interested in the problems merely for their own sake, but in the people behind the problems and in the whole field of industrial relationships.
It isn't enough to merely launch a product or service. It takes years to embed knowledge, experience, and desire into users. Haslett's power was recognising that the advantages of electricity weren't self-evident. It took a sustained campaign of education to get the public to understand the why and how of a new invention.
If you want to understand how the development of domestic electricity use in the UK happened, this is an interesting and useful book. It perfectly demonstrates how one headstrong person can influence the world.
It is a stunning look at how feminism directly influenced industrial policy.
Caroline herself wrote a book - "Problems Have No Sex" - which is completely unavailable as far as I can see. If any readers know where I can obtain a copy, please leave a comment.
1911, on a winter's night in arid New South Wales wool country, mounted trooper Augustus Hawkins discovers the bodies of three young people. They are scions of the richest family in the district...