Colin Marks's Blog, page 11

Review: Bad Science by Ben Goldacre

This is an excellent book, explaining the tricks of the medical industries, how they can work around the regulator bodies, and how the journalists aren’t censoring their wild claims. There have been a few recent scandals, the MMR and MRSA, which are pulled apart here – showing how the only ‘scandal’ was how people who should know better allowed wild, unfounded claims to escalate. Very entertaining, always interesting, well worth a read.

See review on Goodreads.

Review: The Byzantine World War by Nick Holmes

The oddly titled Byzantine World War mostly covers the rule of Emperor Romanos IV Diogenes and his betrayal and untimely death at the hands of the Doukas family, which led to the demise of the Eastern Roman Empire. The book continues with a brief continuation into the Crusades, with the Fourth Crusade actually sacking Constantinople, the Empire’s seat of power. Oddly titled because the battles and politics were centred around the Levant and modern day Turkey – European and Islamic mercenaries...

Review: Loonshots: How to Nurture the Crazy Ideas That Win Wars, Cure Diseases, and Transform Industries by Safi Bahcall

Safi Bahcall was a recent guest on the Tim Ferriss podcast. He told interesting stories, like his first date with his wife-to-be, though she believed it to be a business meeting, and how he’d sit in a bar for hours studying a single page of a book to appreciate the use of language. He came across well, charming and engaging, knowledgeable but with humility, so I bought the book he came to plug. And, yep, the book comes across exactly the same way – friendly but hugely interesting.

Loonshots a...

Review: Property: Stories Between Two Novellas by Lionel Shriver

This is an intelligent book – from the language, to the character observations and even the clever sub-title (it really is short stories sandwiched between two novellas!). Few people are able to form characters like Shriver, she catches their nuances, their foibles and their strengths, and this makes their behaviour and motivations all the more believable. Some of the stories are little bloated and could’ve benefited from a trim, and I’m a keen reader with a good vocabulary, but I found mysel...

Review: Time and How to Spend It: The 7 Rules for Richer, Happier Days by James Wallman

James Wallman’s Time and How to Spend It is a mixed bag. I found the first half a struggle – trying to overlay a book structure onto your holiday arrangements seems great in theory, but in reality no-one does, or would do, that. Plus, the anecdotes seem shoe-horned into places where they didn’t belong, with a few even seemingly unrelated to the point being make. The writing was wordy and too chummy for describing intelligent lifestyle improvements where a succinct idea economically stated wou...

Review: Summer Crossing by Truman Capote

Summer Crossing is one of those books that aspiring writers bang out, then, when they re-read it, realise it’s tosh and cast it aside. All great writers have these novels – Stephen King has a few, even J. K. Rowling progressed two novels before abandoning them. Unfortunately for Truman Capote, several years after his death this was found. There is good argument for its release – Capote is an American icon, associated with guys and dolls and rich kids swigging martinis. But there is an even gr...

Review: Because We Say So by Noam Chomsky

Because We Say So is a collection of Noam Chomsky’s essays and speeches from the period roughly from 2011 to 2014. Individually, they’re interesting, considered criticisms of America’s foreign policy in the Middle East. The problem is that collectively, they’re very repetitious – all discussing the same themes of how USA and Israel are the regional troublemakers, and not Iran as those two like to suggest. I would’ve preferred more variety in the essays, as by about two-thirds through, I put t...

Review: Walking to Aldebaran by Adrian Tchaikovsky

I haven’t read science fiction for a while. I used to love Clarke and Asimov as a teenager, chuckled at Douglas Adams then had a lull until I was gifted Dune a few years ago. Having just finished Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Walking to Aldebaran, I can see myself looking for more sci-fi novels, and certainly more of his.

His writing is tight – a strong voice with credible characters (well, mostly just the one) and enough exposition to keep it interesting without hand-feeding the reader. The novella i...

Review: Wise Guy: Lessons from a Life by Guy Kawasaki

Guy Kawasaki has had an interesting life, from the early days of Apple, having his shoes polished by Richard Branson, through to turning down the role of Yahoo! CEO (in the days when Yahoo! was still relevant), so there are a few rich seams of stories to tell. Wise Guy is effectively an autobiography with a veneer of self-help – each anecdote of his life is followed with a wisdom section, practical takeaways that we, the readers, can apply to our lives.

Some of these are interesting, such as...

Review: Reasons to be Cheerful by Nina Stibbe

“Reasons to be Cheerful” is the first book by Nina Stibbe that I’ve read, It doesn’t start anywhere, or go anywhere even, but it was a fun, light, holiday kind of book. The book follows the dramas of Lizzie – it’s very much fiction, and by the end I wanted her to exist, with her common sense and straightforwardness, someone simple but layered, kind and principled. Nina has an excellent voice and a very readable style. One to enjoy beside the pool.

Book supplied by Netgalley for an honest revi...