Book reviews for June 2013
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
Letters by Kurt Vonnegut
4/5
Engrossing collection of letters, helpfully sprinkled with context.
I Thought He Came With You (ITHCWY) is Robert Ellison's blog.
Book reviews for May 2013
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
Troika by Alastair Reynolds
4/5
Stonking little novella.
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Book reviews for May 2013
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
Troika by Alastair Reynolds
4/5
Stonking little novella.
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Book reviews for April 2013
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel H. Pink
4/5
Makes sense...
The Mirage by Matt Ruff
4/5
A brilliant and detailed transposition of 9/11 in America to 11/9 in Arabia. I thought it was going to be a one trick pony but Mirage also delivers a solid thriller.
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Reviews and Links for March 2013
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
The Land of Later on by Anthony Weller
4/5
Probably not what happens when you die... but you never know.
Even Faster Web Sites by Steve Souders
4/5
Plenty of solid advice backed up by data and sample code. I picked up a few new optimizations to try and a couple to revisit from reading this book. Well recommended if you want to make a site faster.
The Hunger Games Trilogy Boxset (The Hunger Games, #1-3) by Suzanne Collins
3/5
The first book is very well done, but in the genre of forcing kids to kill each other I have to say I prefer Battle Royale. Battle Royale is more of a horror story, The Hunger Games has this element but it's also a fantasy about escaping poverty to makeovers and banquets as well. The second book sags a little and then the third book really picks up the pace and ends very strongly. Quick and worthwhile read.
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Reviews and Links for February 2013
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
Shift Omnibus Edition (Wool, #6-8) by Hugh Howey
3/5
I read this straight after the Wool series. The Shift trilogy fills in the back story of how the silos were created and then starts to overlap with the events from Wool. Shift didn't have quite the same tension as Wool and I didn't care about the characters as much. Still hooked though and can't wait for Dust later this year...
Wool Omnibus (Wool, #1-5) by Hugh Howey
4/5
Collection of five novellas set in a mysterious silo. A little more is revealed with each chapter and the series gets more compelling and ambiguous as we learn more about what's really going on. Didn't know what to expect (got this as a Christmas Present) but very enjoyable and I've gone straight on to the next omnibus with a final tranche due later this year.
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Reviews and Links for January 2013
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson
2/5
I always want to like Kim Stanley Robinson a lot more than I do. The setup here is an interesting mystery set in a fascinating fully populated Solar System and if 2312 delivered on this premise it could have been a great book. But it's bogged down with exposition and a lengthy middle section on randomly repopulating extinct mammals and ended up just being a slog for me.
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Reviews and Links for December 2012
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
Phantom (Alexander Hawke, #7) by Ted Bell
2/5
Sigh. The man can contradict himself in the space of a single sentence. Must stop...
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Reviews and Links for November 2012
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
Tsar (Alexander Hawke, #5) by Ted Bell
2/5
Good yarn, poorly spun.
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Reviews and Links for October 2012
Updated on Friday, February 24, 2017
Skios by Michael Frayn
4/5
Perfectly well oiled comedy of errors.
The Hydrogen Sonata (Culture, #10) by Iain M. Banks
3/5
Solid but somewhat routine Culture installment.
A Wanted Man (Jack Reacher, #17) by Lee Child
3/5
Solid Reacher installment.
Some Remarks: Essays and Other Writing by Neal Stephenson
4/5
Excellent collection of articles and a couple of short stories. Worth reading just for the Wired article on the technology and politics of submarine cables.