book

Rated Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban 10/10

I read this to my son, who turned 7 just after we started. We did end up doing some epic bedtime reading sessions to complete whole chapters. And as with books I've read to him, I shall let his own words dictate this review :)<br/><br/>---<br/><br/>I liked the bit where Harry goes underground and in the house, because I wish I had a scary house under the whomping willow.<br/><br/>When Black came into the room, I thought it was scary, and I thought it was going to happen in my bedroom!<br/><br/>The sad bit was when Buckbeak died (but oh yeah, they rescued him).<br/><br/>It's good, and a little bit scary.<br/><br/>---

Rated Spike Milligan: Man of Letters 6/10

A book of letters…kinda made me want to write letters…<br/><br/>I picked this up based on "funny books" though I'm really not sure how I landed on this book. I know, sort of, Spike Milligan's work, but only from TV. I didn't know he was an author, particularly from funny war stories so I missing considerable context. Arguably I'm not sure why I read this book.<br/><br/>The back cover quotes appeared almost immediately at the start of the book and it was pretty clear that this read like a bottom-of-the-barrel book, just printing every letter that could be found. There was the odd occasion that the correspondence was funny, but unfortunately not laugh-out-loud-funny, just a bit of a snicker.<br/><br/>In the last part of the book (part 4: words of support), the letters are about mental health (dating back to the late-60s), which was interesting to read as it feels like in the real world we've only started to talk openly about mental health in the last decade or so. Milligan would write letters offering support to others, and would often talk about how the NHS support was missing the love and understanding and rather delivered pills (which he says helps, but only as a band-aid).<br/><br/>It was these last group of letters, mostly about sending out love and positivity to the world that brought this up from 2 stars to 3. It definitely made me want to actually _write_ words down to people rather than the usual email, and it was nice to see some silly humour throughout his decades.

Rated The Time Machine 6/10

Facinating for when it was written, but felt like it was sort of missing a _story_.<br/><br/>I'm definitely reading these older classics so that I acquaint myself with what I've assumed all my peers read when they were younger, so this eventually made its way into my reading list.<br/><br/>It's an incredible story given when it was written, late 1800s, and I can imagine it blowing minds at the time when it was read. The technicality of the book is interesting too, how there's a story inside of the story whereby the … character we're following (not narrator, but not really the protagonist) is sharing the experience with the reader. In fact, the majority of the book is a straight up monologue. Then to compound this, it's the Time Traveller (I guess the protagonist) in the present, sharing their past experience of living in the futre!<br/><br/>Timey wimey.<br/><br/>But I wasn't really expereiencing the technical feats, more following the story along, and that's where, for me, it was sort of lacking. There wasn't _really_ a story. In the sense that there were cause effect, struggles to overcome and character arcs.<br/><br/>The Time Traveller meets and partners with a woman in the story, but when she's taken by the Morlocks and he just… goes okay "then, I'm off.".<br/><br/>It's likely that I missed something in the story, but it didn't land so well for me. I think it's interesting, but I didn't come away thinking about the content of the story, the questions it could raise.<br/><br/>The very, _very_ end is bold, and I definitely appreciated that, but it really didn't add anything either.

Rated Minority Rule: Adventures in the Culture War 10/10

> Maybe you've read this book, and you feel a sense of despair.<br/><br/>I think _before_ read the book I had a sense of despair. This book did an excellent job of articulating my despair. Articulating ideas that I couldn't put words to on my own.<br/><br/>I bought this book on pre-order after seeing Ash Sarkar on Pod Save the UK. An articulate, intelligent individual with strong opinions, and though I always struggle to read non-fiction, I didn't find this book hard in the way I had expected (sure, still took me a month, but that's pretty good for me).<br/><br/>It's hard to write a review without wanting to just repeat the entire book back to you. If you consider yourself a progressive, left or left leaning, I'd recommend this book. It's definitely not cherry, but it's not angry either. It does the work of laying out what we sort of already know. And importantly it's not anecdotes, around 20%+ of the book are external references that are peppered throughout the main text.<br/><br/>I've highlighted a lot of the content and hope that the messages will stay with me as I feel like her book is a useful tool for arming myself for the political battle we face in the age of 2025.

Rated Redwall: The first book in the beloved, bestselling saga 4/10

Was one of the first "big" books I read as a kid. Sadly it didn't hold up to the test of time.<br/><br/>A nice story about mice and animals (and a Badger I remember being called Constance), but it smacked of heroes are boys and damsels are girls, which might have been fine back in the 80s, but not so much for me now.<br/>

Rated The Murder of Roger Ackroyd 8/10

Surprisingly modern for a book written nearly 100 years ago. A solid murder mystery.<br/><br/>Apparently one of Christie's most (or more?) controversial books which I can believe given it was written in 1926. There's talk of drugs and cocaine and even a dictaphone (which I didn't even know had been invented back then).<br/><br/>I did somehow guess the murderer, but I suspect it's because so many stories have come since, and it was a technique that has been employed many times since.<br/><br/>Still, enjoyable, and holds up well even in 2023.

Rated 84K 8/10

After I got used to the technical aspect of the writing, a really engrossing story.<br/><i></i><br/>The book is written in a way that quite often ends right in the middle of a train of thought. Reading on a kindle it was hard to work out if it was intentional or if there was a problem with the Kindle edition! After a while I got used to it, and learnt to just to either let go of the sentiment or ignore it.<br/><br/>The story uses time jumping *a lot* but thankfully the book is written in a way that it was easy to know when we had jumped back or forwards through time.<br/><br/>The story is set in a dystopian alternative reality, which frankly isn't far from our reality now and it's easy to see how our society could get there. Which makes the entire story even more scary. <br/><br/>The story primarily follows Theo Miller a person who has lived in the world as it becomes worse and just gone along with it because "that's just the way the world works". <br/><br/>He weighs crime for indemnity, of course rape has a power indemnity than sexual harassment (because… Men made the rules 🤦), and the rich can afford to pay of any indemnity including murder whereas the poor can't pay the company taxes and are thusly thrown to the Patty lines - effectively slave labour.<br/><br/>I did wonder a few times in the book whether if I'd completely missed a key chunk of the story, but it did indeed come back together and make sense. <br/><br/>A good read. Bleak, but good.

Rated Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? 6/10

Really interesting ideas sandwiched in a bit of a weird trip.<br/><br/>I'm sure there's an English studies thesis for this book, but I'm utterly unqualified. This book was, kind of all over the shop.<br/><br/>I'm very familiar with Blade Runner (both director's cut and OG) and I'd known ahead of time that the book it was based on was _not_ the same. <br/><br/>There's actually a fairly coherent string of plot that's similar to the ideas of the movie: identity and self awareness.<br/><br/>The middle section of the book is actually pretty linear to follow.<br/><br/>It's mostly the sections that involve Mercer and the mind fusing that the characters go through. Specifically when there's no purposeful fusing - in that two characters, Deckard included, seem to just start tripping and interacting with Mercer, or... having "thought" stones thrown at them... I'm not sure. <br/><br/>The Mercer sections, I found myself reading for the ride, but not really knowing what was going on. <br/><br/>I'm glad I've finally got a Philip K. Dick book under my belt, though I was warned that this particular book probably isn't the best choice for a first. <br/><br/>What does stand out is for a book written in 1968, it reads like something that was written recently (perhaps with the exception of the flying cars _still_ using petrol!).

Wants to read The Last Wish

Wants to read Interference

Wants to read Catch-22

Wants to read Light from Uncommon Stars

Rated The Frangipani Tree Mystery 8/10

Rated To Be Taught, If Fortunate 6/10

To Be Taught is another excellent story from Becky Chambers. Gently, honest, touching and inquisitive about the universe.<br/><br/>A novella (so in theory a "short read") is exactly the kind of story I've quickly come to expect from Chambers: about the characters and striving to be better through knowledge and our humanity.<br/><br/>The story is told a message delivered to us - and by "us" the message hopes to be received by Earth. The crew of four humans have been sent to explore outer space and return with their findings.<br/><br/>The mission is entirely a discovery exercise, not "the Earth is doomed, we must quickly find new home" which so many stories would shoot for. So the book tells of the crew landing across four different planets and what they find and tell of their enthusiasm in science and real human struggles in confined spaces.<br/><br/>This is a gentle and easy read, and for me, treated as something to tide me over until the next novel length Wayfarers is released - but equally a solid story on it's own merits.<br/>

Rated The Thursday Murder Club 10/10

So good on all levels. Utterly polished and wonderfully likeable characters.<br/><br/>Not much to add, except that the story was really well drawn out, and the main characters in the "Murder Club" were interesting, had depth and I could really imagine.<br/><br/>Understandable how this series of books have been such a hit. Absolutely looking forward to reading the rest in the series.<br/>

Rated The Name of the Wind 10/10

Absolutely superb stuff. This book was recommended separately by three different friends, and it lived up to expectations. <br/><i></i><br/>It's the first fantasy book I've read (or certainly in the last decade) so initially I wasn't quite sure. As the chapters progressed though, the story fell into really beautiful story telling.<br/><br/>I'm was taken away by how good the writing and prose were. There were turns of phases that were fun and a pleasure to read. The book itself is also broken into small enough chapters that I could read for 15-20 minutes at night and complete a chapter (I like to stop reading at "natural" endings).<br/><br/>The story, or rather the trilogy of books (this being book 1), follows Kvothe and the telling of his life story. Kvothe agrees to tell his story over three days (at which point I realised that I was reading Day 1). <br/><br/>I'd to write more of thorough review, but the story is brilliantly dense that I can't do it justice. The second book in the trilogy is 1,000 pages - which is daunting to me, but it's definitely on my reading list now. There's also a number of novellas that have been written for the world the Rothfuss has written which I've also earmarked. As for the conclusion of the trilogy, I've been told that not only is there no publication date set, but that Rothfuss has been at it for 8 years 😱!!!

Rated A Closed and Common Orbit 8/10

Enjoyed this story - it had a lot of warmth.<br/><i></i><br/>I have to admit, I was fairly upset to realise that Wayfarers book 2 did not continue with the characters I'd grown to love so much from Wayfarers book 1. I'm still secretly hoping to find the crew from the Wayfarer again in another book.<br/><br/>This story however, picks up right after the closing events from book 1 - but instead follows Pepper and Lovelace back to Pepper's adopted world to find acceptance both within and without.<br/><br/>The story focuses on the two characters and bounces back and forth between the two (and along two different periods of time). I didn't find myself laughing in this book (I did in the first which is what spurred me to immediately read this and the third) but it was a touching story of individuals trying to find their place in the world and the loneliness that comes before.<br/><br/>In a way, I felt like the book was a pair of stories about mother and daughter - and whilst I'm neither, I found lots to relate to. And as with Chambers' first instalment of Wayfarers, I find myself wanting this future for our own humanity.<br/><br/>There's something both charming and utterly beautiful about the universe that Chambers has created for us. It was nice to travel to a new place and follow new characters (even though I still want to hear more about Kizzy and Jenks, and Dr Chef and Sissex - I suspect their on their own journey).<br/><br/>Good stuff. Very sweet. Very warm and loving story.

Wants to read The Martian Chronicles

Wants to read Notes on a Nervous Planet

Rated Dogs of War 10/10

Wow. I loved this book. I'm not entirely sure how I found it - I suspect Amazon randomly recommended it to me, and it was definitely a random purchase - but so glad I did.<br/><br/>I'd just finished reading Snow Crash which has a small character which is an enhanced dog (called a Rat), and a few years back I'd read <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22358.We3">We3</a> which has animals who escape a tyranny of human kind…so I think I was expecting something like that. I was wrong!<br/><br/>The book opens from the point of view of Rex, a "bioform" dog - part machine, part dog, part human DNA. The first few pages read as a little trite "I am Rex. I am Good Dog" etc - but this quickly falls away as I realised the darkness of what was being described from Rex's point of view. <br/><br/>Then each chapter is told from different individuals point of view, including Hart - the engineer/carer for the bioforms, Honey - a bioform Bear and many other characters.<br/><br/>The story is split over 5 parts that, I can assume, is covering several years. It starts in a war torn country, but once this part is over, the story goes on to raise the question of the bioform's rights, and whether a human-made thing can be human if it can feel for itself. By <em>human</em>, we mean the condition rather than the species.<br/><br/>The story is a mix of the future of AI and augmented lifeforms, fear of different, corporations and their relationship with slavery - and through it, somehow, the protagonist is a dog that I can actually relate to as he even evolves through the book (the author does a brilliant job of evolving Rex's language and vocabulary as Rex is exposed to more of the world and the story moves on).<br/><br/>Other thoughts that this book brought up for me:<br/><br/>- If humankind make a <em>thing</em> and a thing can think for itself, should it have rights? What does that process look like - and how long does it take?<br/>- Can and should humankind survive in it's current state. Is an augmented human less or more human? <br/>- A fully autonomous intelligence is effectively immortal, so it can also outlive generations of humankind until the generations come to accept it?<br/><br/>If you're interested in how technology can evolve in our future with AI, singularities, and the like, then I'd definitely recommend this book. <br/><br/>I loved this story, really great stuff!

Rated Spectrum Machine Language for the Absolute Beginner 6/10

Pretty gentle and sensible introduction to assembly and machine code. I'm pretty familiar with 8-bit assembly already but this helped to lay some decent foundations.<br/><br/>The pace is a bit weird though. It starts and continues for a good deal of the book as uber simple, almost erring on the side of being patronising with it's weird 16 fingered alien - but it does just about work.<br/><br/>But then, as the later chapters go on, the author suddenly switches from nice and gentle to "obviously", "just" and "simple" and it feels a bit like you're tossed into the deep end with no orientation. I found I had to re-read seemingly short and "obvious" chapters.<br/><br/>Frustratingly the chapters on audio and graphics were exceptionally short only referring to the `out` ports which is technically accurate but didn't offer much advice.<br/><br/>Then around 40% of the book is used to build out a Frogger clone which I'll admit I skimmed.<br/><br/>The appendix is very useful though, with a complete index of opcode to pneumonic and visa versa which I've used a number of times already.

Rated Fae and Fare 9/10

Rated Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory 6/10

Very brief but a good bridging story.

Wants to read All Our Wrong Todays

Rated Sex and Drugs and Sausage Rolls 8/10

Fun stuff. I didn't realise this was the sixth novel of a series, but it really didn't matter - and almost added more depth since the characters had a lot more backstory.<br/><br/>Robert Rankin's writing is really fun too. Lots of quick wit throughout the book, the kind that I wish I could come up with in my daily life!<br/><br/>The story is a kind of comical farce whereby history has somehow shifted and things aren't quite what they're supposed to be.<br/><br/>I'm not quite sure if the story is supposed to have a single protagonist or whether it's more of an ensemble. It certainly _mostly_ follows Jim, John and Soap (great…weird, name!). Then there's multiple side characters that I half suspect might have more story in other Brentwood books. <br/><br/>All the same, it was really fun to read a book that clearly had a wide range of characters with more stories to tell.