The Heart of Midlothian by Sir Walter Scott 'On the day when the unhappy Porteous was expected to suffer the sentence of the law, the place of execution, extensive as it is, was crowded almost to suffocation.' Edinburgh 1737: Captain John Porteous, King's officer, is confined in the Tolbooth prison for firing on a crowd …
Author: Andrew G Lockhart
My name is Andrew Lockhart and I grew up in Coatbridge, Scotland. I studied at Glasgow University. After spending three decades in planning, statistics and international sales and marketing, I am now an author, family historian and owner of Magda Green Books. Apart from writing (and reading great books) and blogging, my other interests are science, music of all sorts, and traveling the world.
The Taxidermist's Daughter by Kate Mosse
".... Connie lined up the scalpel and cut. At first, a gentle shifting, nothing more. Then the tip of the blade pierced the skin, and the point slipped in." Kate Mosse returns to her native Chichester for the setting of her new novel, The Taxidermist's Daughter. The year is 1912, a time of mackintoshes, umbrellas, …
Going Dutch
The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton "The funeral is supposed to be a quiet affair, for the deceased had no friends. But words are water in Amsterdam, they flood your ears and set the rot, and the church's east corner is crowded." My daughter gave me The Miniaturist as a Christmas present and when I began …
Banks Don't Change!
A Dangerous Fortune by Ken Follett Banks and bankers are in the news a lot. Usually it's bad news: the directors and presidents get obscene bonuses; they manipulate the tax system; they crash and leave millions of people out of pocket. Rarely do the newspapers carry stories about the honest bankers and their shareholders - …
An Appetite For Wonder
The Making of a Scientist by Richard Dawkins Professor Dawkins is one of the few dedicated scientists who can write about the most complex subject and make it both interesting and comprehensible. In An Appetite For Wonder, the first part of his intended two-part autobiography, we do not …
In the Fortress of the Assassins
First Love Today, I'm posting another extract from my novel The Tiger and the Cauldron " Two figures detached themselves from the shadows of the lower terrace and climbed the steps towards him. 'Hassan.' It was Sayyid’s voice. 'The Captain has commanded me to relieve you.' 'An hour, no more, Sayyid,' said Doquz who accompanied …
The Cuckoo's Calling
I knew before I even opened this book that the author, Robert Galbraith, was actually JK Rowling of Harry Potter fame. I think everyone knew that, almost from the day it was published. My hesitation and delay before reading it stemmed from my disappointment with The Casual Vacancy. That just wasn't my thing at all. …
Gosho, Geisha and Gion
Memories of Japan (Part Four) From the eleventh floor of the Isetan department store in Kyoto station, you can see the whole city. Its rectilinear boulevards of clean, modern buildings - shops, offices and hotels - stretch away into the haze of the hills that surround it on three sides. Criss-crossing them are neat, narrow …
Just an ordinary guy …
Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami (translated by Philip Gabriel) Straight off, I will say that I loved this character-driven story. Tazaki is just your average guy but he carries a lot of emotional baggage. He likes railway stations, he likes music, he plays sport and (we'll come to this …
Hypatia of Alexandria
The Beautiful Mathematician "The greatest loss of all, however, is the absence of your divine spirit. I had hoped that this would always remain with me, to conquer both the caprices of fortune and the evil turns of fate." (Syrenios of Cyrene to Hypatia) I wrote recently in a post of how history and historians …
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