A charmingly illustrated, funny—of course— and very informative work of science outreach. I’m proud to have helped crowdfund it and I hope to lend my A charmingly illustrated, funny—of course— and very informative work of science outreach. I’m proud to have helped crowdfund it and I hope to lend my copy to many friends....more
In this novel, Janina Woods has turned the side character of Mycroft Holmes, only a little fleshed out in the original works, into a compelling (anti)In this novel, Janina Woods has turned the side character of Mycroft Holmes, only a little fleshed out in the original works, into a compelling (anti)hero. Reluctantly compelled by his inconvenient brotherly affection for Sherlock onto a quest across Europe and Egypt to rescue him from shadowy forces, Mycroft is forced to cooperate with the quavering John Watson and confront relationships from his past that he might have preferred to leave there. We follow him through a Grand Tour of mysterious cities, where modern treachery threads through the ancient foundations and the true stakes only slowly become clear.
Throughout the journey, Woods's set-pieces consistently hit the right notes, whether with action, drama or humour (for example, (view spoiler)[the moment when Watson realises exactly which locomotive they have requisitioned... (hide spoiler)]). It's an absolute joy to spend time with Woods's secret agent Mycroft: crafty, sarcastic, ultra-competent and yet, at times, suprisingly vulnerable. I can't wait for the sequel....more
As a matter of self-care, I decided to jettison Proust again for the Christmas holidays and read this instead. I loved it: light without being frothy,As a matter of self-care, I decided to jettison Proust again for the Christmas holidays and read this instead. I loved it: light without being frothy, with a real mystery at its core (in fact, a series of interlinked mysteries!), good characterisation despite a setting that encourages stereotyping, and a well-observed friendship between the two main characters....more
The Terror is a strange novel, defying exact classification. It's a fantasy, a saga, that starts with its feet planted firmly on the deck but nonethelThe Terror is a strange novel, defying exact classification. It's a fantasy, a saga, that starts with its feet planted firmly on the deck but nonetheless never shakes off the reader's suspension of disbelief. It's an inquest into the minds of the officers and men aboard Captain Sir John Franklin's two ships, which rakes through their bodies and souls with no less penetrating a touch. The roster of those who survive with their humanity--if nothing else--intact may surprise you. It's a masterclass in writing on the Arctic, visceral and subtle in its descriptions of the shattered-ice landscape around the lost sailors, and its unremitting effect on them. It's arguably overlong, but I never wished for it to move faster, except possibly in those times when the tension and my concern for certain characters got too high for my poor stomach to cope with!...more
I loved this book: an unusual science fiction/fantasy novel set in 1950s Switzerland, which integrated the fantastic parts of its narrative seamlesslyI loved this book: an unusual science fiction/fantasy novel set in 1950s Switzerland, which integrated the fantastic parts of its narrative seamlessly into a suspense-filled plot about murder, deception and organic chemistry.
Stuck in the regressive society of her birth after an adolescence in comparatively freer Boston and her father's death, the protagonist Peppa means to lie low for a few weeks until she can claim her inheritance. Instead, the machinations of a sinister German doctor (with the deliciously apposite name of Unruh) force her onto the run, haunted by dreamlike memories of flying across the landscape like a bird of prey. Peppa finds help from a range of allies, including a character drawn from the real-life discoverer of LSD, Albert Hoffman. To clear her name and secure her future, however, she must put herself in danger, use all the scientific skills she learned working in the lab with her father, and confront dark truths about her family's past.
The Falcon Flies Alone was a completely absorbing read, from its startling opening scene to the very end. Peppa makes for an engaging yet realistically flawed protagonist: intelligent but not socially sophisticated, determined to the point of stubbornness, she bristles against the strictures put upon her by Swiss society but has her own blind spots as well. I'm looking forward to the next volume of her adventures.
Some content warnings, cut for spoilers: (view spoiler)[rape, incest, pregnancy, miscarriage. (hide spoiler)] These are mostly not major themes but they do each feature in the story at some point. I can provide more details if you message me....more
I started reading this book while travelling in Romania, through the very same countryside visited by Jonathan Harker and, later, the whole group of vI started reading this book while travelling in Romania, through the very same countryside visited by Jonathan Harker and, later, the whole group of vampire hunters, and the travel and reading material certainly lent something to my experience of each other!
This was, oddly, my first time reading this classic of vampire literature in its full version, after reading what was probably an abridged edition as a child, and I enjoyed it more than I’d actually expected, thanks to all the complaints I’d seen in the meantime that the epistolary form made it slow and too verbose. I didn’t think so at all! For me, the pacing was fine (except for the short period in the middle, when the men foolishly decide they must manage without Mina’s aid). I loved how excited both novel and characters were about the new technologies of the late nineteenth century, and how they pressed those tools, and their various professional skills, into service against the monster. Dracula and his three brides are as ominous and irresistible in this maiden outing as in any of their later interpretations.
The dissatisfactions I had with the novel were all traceable to its era, though some of them sadly pop up in modern fiction as well. Everyone, even the marvellously competent Mina, professes such bizarre ideas about the nature of men and women. There is a very uncomfortable passage in which Mina and Van Helsing rhapsodise on the theories of Lombroso and Nordau—which at least, I suppose, jerks the modern reader enough out of the action to throw a critical eye across the novel as a whole and say, “Please stop talking about the snowy flawlessness of Mina’s complexion, Stoker, I really just wanted an adventure tale and this is getting weird.”
Other gripes: Seward is an atrocious psychologist even (just about) by the standards of his era, and that such a dunce was the great Van Helsing’s star pupil strains credulity almost as much as the Dutchman’s embarrassingly broken English. What is he covering up with this comical ineptitude with the language? It is never revealed.
On the whole, though, as a story, Dracula was thrilling and highly enjoyable....more
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