Archives for reviews - Page 36
Book Review: Trading in Danger by Elizabeth Moon
Trading in Danger by Elizabeth Moon My rating: 4 of 5 stars I came to this from a first chapter included at the end of the kindle edition of Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie. This is a different sort of space opera from Ancillary Justice, but the opening chapter was so gripping that I immediately ordered a copy so that I could read the rest of it. The universe it is set in is sort of recognisable as a fast forward on our current one. The initial setting is in a naval academy that would be recognisable to anyone with military experience (and the author served in the USMC, no doubt she drew on that). That's just the starting point for the story though, and most of the action takes place on board an interstellar freighter. The story is told…
Book Review – Tales of MI7: The Kramski Case by JJ Ward
Tales of Mi7: The Kramski Case by Ward My rating: 4 of 5 stars A modern take on spy thrillers This is the first in a series of modern day spy thrillers with three volumes so far. The author has merged the well known British security & secret services into a single organisation which is known to its operatives and those in the know as MI7. Outwardly the old designations (MI5 & MI6) are still used, this is a neat twist as it allows more scope for story telling. The Kramski Case features an ensemble cast of believable characters that all have their own ways. The premise is that someone has been shooting paparazzi in Russia, the US and now Britain. So the British ask the Russians and Americans to supply someone for a tri-partite investigation. The case is solved…
Notice: Trying to access array offset on value of type bool in /var/www/html/themself/wp-content/themes/mesocolumn/lib/functions/theme-functions.php on line 502
Book Review: Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie
Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie My rating: 5 of 5 stars A refreshing take on space opera, and a fascinating main character (a self-aware spaceship AI that inhabits multiple bodies simultaneously). We are introduced to the main character, who is a spaceship AI in multiple bodies, through the events of an annexation of a world. We see things from multiple points of view which all represent the same character. Through this story, told as flashbacks from another sequence, we find out about how the Radch works, and the values that empire has. The scenes are well written and avoid grand expositions, instead there is a gradual burn towards the climax. One of the interesting features, which I liked, was that in the Radch language there is no gender pronoun, everyone is 'her/she'. This is used to indicate when the speech…
Book Review: Equoid by Charles Stross
Equoid by Charles Stross My rating: 5 of 5 stars My daughter has just brought home a sparkly unicorn, and I am very This is a Laundry files short story featuring Bob Howard. In this outing Bob has to deal with a report from a well qualified DEFRA vet who harbours suspicions of a potential outbreak of Equoids. The file Bob is given as briefing contains the letters of one HP Lovecraft that tell of HPL's own experience of contact with an Equoid outbreak. This is a highly entertaining story that provides a twist on unicorns and gives them an interesting life cycle which is truly horrific. It also has some laugh out loud points too. UPDATE: this has been nominated for a 2014 Hugo Award, which is well deserved. One of the best I read in 2013. View all…
Book Review – Fortunately the Milk by Neil Gaiman
This is an unusual book review in that it is also an event review as well. I took my son (the day before his 8th birthday) to see Neil Gaiman and friends read Fortunately the on stage at Westminster Central Hall. It was an awesome evening, we arrived to find the place literally surrounded by Neil Gaiman fans, as the queue went all the way round the building. The general entertainment was every bit as good as the main event. We both laughed a lot at the introductory piece by Andrew O'Neill who really worked to warm us all up. He did a good line in geeky jokes, I particularly liked his line on Magneto on a Lilo. The boy almost wet himself at that and then got terribly excited when Andrew had half the hall stamping their feet and the…