Bad Timing by Nicky Peacock A Review 'With his amazing organisational skills, Lyle had arranged for all the humans in Hope nad Glory to donate a pint of blood a month.' The title of my contribution today is in no way meant to be a political or racial statement! In my wholly unexpected (well, unexpected …
Category: Book Review
War – What War?
Whisky Galore by Compton Mackenzie A Review 'Beer does not taste like itself unless it is chasing a dram of neat whisky down the gullet, preferably two drams.' It is 1943, and war with Hitler is dragging on. The inhabitants of the two islands of Todday, like the other peoples of Great Britain, are suffering …
Imagined Light
All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr The market in literature never ceases to amaze me. One moment, we can be in the dark, hidden corners of the human imagination, inhabited by nightmare monsters, the next in a sunlit park, on a wave-lapped beach, or wherever delight and fancy take us. Then, we …
Storm Island
Eye of the Needle by Ken Follett I used to devour thrillers, sometimes two or three a week. Stories by Alistair McLean, Ian Fleming, Desmond Bagley, Hammond Innes, Jeffrey Archer, Michael Crichton and others were often read at a sitting. That being so, it is strange that I waited nearly twenty years after seeing the …
A Vampire with Heart
Bad Blood by Nicky Peacock A Review ‘Modern vampires don’t believe in anything. They strut around with a new self-worth, declaring themselves to all and sundry. They’ve been brainwashed by TV and books into thinking being a vampire is cool.’ I’m way past my teens and vampire horror is not my usual genre. So, when …
Jane's History
The History of England from the reign of Henry the 4th to the death of Charles the 1st by Jane Austen [Henry the 8th] ' . . . [his] last wife contrived to survive him, but with difficulty effected it.' [James the 1st] '. . . had some faults, among which & as the most …
Gaia Revisited
Lovelock - where is our species headed? When James Lovelock sprang to the attention of the wider public in the 1970s with his Gaia hypothesis, not all mainstream scientists were enthused. The idea that the Earth, its atmosphere and all life upon it is a self-regulating mechanism was, for some, too like science fiction. Other …
Getting Away With Murder (3)
The Retired Cop My third (and last) fictional detective of the week is not exactly a 'classic', but he has been around for a few years now. John Rebus, creation of Scottish crime novelist Ian Rankin, was born in 1947 (we are told on Rankin's website). However, he did not make his appearance on the …
In the Land of the Pharaohs
The Egyptian by Mika Waltari 'A woman who combines malice with intelligence and beauty is dangerous indeed - more dangerous still when she can add to this the power of a royal consort.' The Egyptian is a classic historical novel by Finnish writer Waltari and set in the Egypt of the 14th century BCE. The …
Only a Matter of Time
The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov The possibility that we might visit our planet's history - and maybe influence it - is the most tantalising of all fantasies. Perhaps, instead, we might travel into the future and, as observers, discover whether our descendants are still reading books, or watching films. What new mythologies can …
Magda Green Books 