A personal review of books, the only link between them is that there is NO LINK!
by Steven Runciman ISBN: 978-0-141-98550-3 First published 1951 270 pages Cover illustration: Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris Publisher: Penguin Random House, UK 5/5 Stars A drama and narrative that reads like fiction but is based on closely researched historical fact. Runciman brings to life the major players with detailed character analyses; Baldwin I of Boulogne, Raymond Count… Continue reading A History of The Crusades: The First Crusade
by Philip Pullman ISBN: 978-1407-153-30-8 First published 2000 522 pages Cover illustration: Unknown Publisher: Scholastic UK 5/5 Stars A book that has no end to its ambition. A children's book that deals with life, death, and the destruction of GOD. Following on from The Subtle Knife and before that the Northern Lights, each book is… Continue reading The Amber Spyglass
by Ernest Hemingway ISBN: 978-0-09-991010-7 First published 1929 293 pages Cover illustration: Unknown Publisher: Penguin Random House 5/5 Stars A part-fictionalized version of the Italian defeat at Caporetto. Part-auto-biography, part fiction, the writing is always lucid and always exact. Hemingway's prose has a sing-a-long quality, which he directly intended. The paragraphs can be long or short,… Continue reading A Farewell To Arms
by Philip Pullman ISBN: 978-1-407154-18-3 First published 1997 325 pages Cover illustration: Unknown Inside illustrations: Philip Pullman Publisher: Scholastic 5/5 Stars Fantastic, fast-moving fantasy adventure story, set in this world and 2 others - like it but different. The second in a trilogy, it reads easily and the plot flows freely. Balloonists, witches, Oxford gardens… Continue reading The Subtle Knife
by M.T.Anderson ISBN: 978-0-7636-9100-4 First published 2015 383 pages Cover illustrations by Kikuo Johnson Publisher: Candlewick Press 4/5 Stars A horror story. A real-life horror story. A horror that, for residents, seemed to have no end. Leningrad was left to starve intentionally during World War 2. This is the longest siege in the history of… Continue reading Symphony for the City of the Dead
by Elena Ferrante ISBN: 9-781925-240009 First published 2012 331 pages Cover design by W.H.Chong Translated by Ann Goldstein Publisher: Text Publishing 6/5 Stars A remarkable journey into the lives of two friends. An electric account, all the more fascinating because it deals with the intricate minutiae of growing up. Spots? Shoe sizes? periods? 'Orrible teachers?… Continue reading My Brilliant Friend
by Alastair Reynolds ISBN: 978-0-575-09054-5 First published 2016 425 pages Cover design & illustration: blacksheep-uk.com 3/5 Stars This is a great rip-roaring space yarn. The concepts introduced here are mind-boggling and truly awesome. However, although it doesn't say on the cover - it is a young adult book and reads as such. The story is… Continue reading Revenger
by Stanislaw Lem ISBN: 978-0-241-31278-0 First published 1971 129 pages Cover illustration: Hayley Warnham 4/5 Stars An impressive and believable vision of the future. The future is chemically driven and chemically possessed. A new form of government is created, we live in the first chemocracy. Ijon Tichy has been 'saved' from a riot in Costa Rica,… Continue reading The Futurological Congress
by Andy Mulligan ISBN: 978-1-909-53113-0 First published 2010 211 pages Cover photography : Getty Images 4/5 stars A fantastic rip-roaring 'boys-own' tale, about life at a mile-wide trash site in the Philippines. The smells and sounds of living on a garbage site are given life. Do you know what a 'Stupp' is? Have you ever… Continue reading Trash
by Jane Harper ISBN: 978-1-74354-909-4 First published 2017 380 pages Cover design: MDCN Creative 3/5 Stars A very good, easy holiday read. Jane Harper's second published novel. Do you like outward bound retreats? Imagine going with the boss? Imagine going with the boss whilst simultaneously preparing to turn Crown witness and testify against them. Imagine… Continue reading Force of Nature
by Paul Kalanithi ISBN: 978-1-847-92367-7 First published 12th January 2016 225 pages Cover design: Liz Cosgrove 5/5 stars What makes a medic tick? What drives a surgeon? In this case a neuro-surgeon slash neuro-scientist. What drives him? Paul Kalinithi explains he was driven to understand death. To meet death and save life. To confront death… Continue reading When Breath Becomes Air
By C.S.Lewis ISBN: n/a First published 1954 188 pages Cover design: Stephen Lavis Illustrated by Pauline Baynes 5/5 Stars Fabulous fantasy tale of Shasta and his talking horse Bree. This is a tale of mistaken identity, a fabulous battle, duplicity and lies, courage and despair. It ranges from the desert to the mountains, across 3… Continue reading The Horse and his Boy
How to become the person you've always wanted to be. by Steve Chandler ISBN: 978-1-63265-090-0 First published 1997 234 pages Cover design Howard Grossman 5/5 Stars An incredibly motivating book. Spirit. Spirit guides this book. It turns difficult situations into a game. It sees fun and life everywhere. It takes the distressed and downhearted… Continue reading Reinventing Yourself
by Muriel Spark ISBN: 978-0-241-95677-9 First published 1961 128 pages Cover design: Sarah Watts 4/5 Stars A wonderful book with a wonderful comedic creation of Miss Jean Brodie. Together with her 'girls', Monica Douglas, Rose Stanley, Eunice Gardiner, Sandy Stranger, Jenny Gray and Mary Macgregor, Miss Brodie teaches them about art, love, history, the classics… Continue reading The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
A Graphic Guide by J.P.McEvoy and Oscar Zarate ISBN: 978-184046850-2 First published 1996 173 pages Cover design: Edward Bettison 4/5 Stars For 25 years at the beginning of the 20th century, a most remarkable set of scientists developed what would become known as Quantum Theory. Einstein, Pauli, Dirac, Schrödinger, Planck, Born, Curie, Bohr, De Broglie,… Continue reading Introducing Quantum Theory
An Inspector Maigret novel by Georges Simenon ISBN: 978-0-241-24016-8 First published 1950 180 pages Cover design: Alceu Chiesorin Nunes Cover photo: Harry Gruyaert / Magnum Photos Translated by Howard Curtis 3/5 Stars A wonderfully easy read by Georges Simenon. Georges was born in Belgium in 1903 and died in Lausanne, Switzerland in 1989. Maigret is… Continue reading Madam Maigret’s Friend
Politics and Influence in Organisations by Jeffrey Pfeffer ISBN: 0-87584-440-5 First published 1992 345 pages Cover design: Not credited 4/5 Stars How to be successful in organisations? Jeffrey Pfeffer shows us how politics and influence are vital in achieving our goals within organisations. He considers the building of coalitions towards action, and that action can… Continue reading Managing with Power
by Tove Jansson (translation by Elizabeth Portch) ISBN: 978-0-14-030286-8 First published 1946 158 pages Illustrations: Tove Jansson 5/5 Stars Moomintroll, Snufkin, Sniff and the Muskrat head off to the Observatory to find when the giant comet in the sky will land on Moomin Valley. Love and friendship abound in this wonderful children's book. On the… Continue reading Comet in Moominland
A Memoir by Anh Do ISBN: 978-1-74237-238-9 First published 2010 232 pages Cover design: Phil Campbell 4/5 Stars A warm and insightful autobiography by Anh Doh. Throughout the whole book Anh's exuberance wins out. Whether it is recounting his violent father, or his impoverished upbringing, or his encounters (few and far between) with racists and… Continue reading The HAPPIEST Refugee
Travels in the Southern Peloponnese by Patrick Leigh Fermor ISBN: 978-0-7195-6691-2 First published 1958 310 pages Cover design: John Craxton 4/5 Stars Ostensibly a travelogue of the Mani peninsula at the tip of the Southern Peloponnese, it is actually a homage to the lost age of Byzantium, and all Greek culture through the ages. Patrick… Continue reading MANI
by Neal Stephenson ISBN: 978-0-241-95318-1 First published 1992 440 pages Cover design: David Wilson 6/5 Stars A great start to the Eclectic Book Review site. 6 stars out of 5. Neal Stephenson creates a lifelike world after the demise of the USA and the resultant rise of the 'Burbs and other enclaves (The MAFIA, Greater… Continue reading Snow Crash
The Eclectic Book Review 