Well….it’s been a little while, hasn’t it? I’m not a great fan of New Year resolutions. When I make them, I tend to break them so fast the electronic ink hasn’t dried. And also having ADHD means I tend to have terrible expectations of what I can get done in a day. Even if I… Read More Happy New Year
My rating: 5 of 5 stars This is a beautifully written novel by the erudite Nicholas Graham. Set in Biblical times, this is absolutely not a book that staunchly evangelical Christians are going to enjoy but everyone else will. There is much that you will recognise from the Gospel stories and, of course, many of… Read More Book review: The Judas Case by Nicholas Graham
My rating: 4 of 5 stars Jeremy Williams is one of the top writers on climate change. His book, The Economics of Arrival, written with Katherine Trebeck, is arguably one of the best modern books tackling climate change and economics. His website – The Earthbound Report – is recognised as one of the best on… Read More Book Review: Climate Change Is Racist: Race, Privilege and the Struggle for Climate Justice by Jeremy Williams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars This is my first Graham Greene book – not by choice but by virtue of the book having sat on my shelf for many, many years. I’d never heard of it before, unlike greater classics such as ‘Our Man in Havana’, ‘Brighton Rock’, ‘The Honorary Consul’ and, of course,… Read More Book Review: The Comedians by Graham Greene
My rating: 4 of 5 stars James Felton is one of those writers who don’t just call a spade a spade: they call it a fecking great shovel. And when I say ‘fecking’, that’s not the word he’s really using, obviously. It’s a close cousin. He uses it a lot. Combine this with the actual… Read More Book Review: You Don’t Want to Know – The grisly, jaw-dropping and most macabre moments from history, nature and beyond by James Felton
My rating: 5 of 5 stars The anonymous ‘Secret Barrister’ is back with another hard-hitting and surprisingly emotional roller-coaster ride of a book about exactly what’s going wrong in law. In the first book, the author looked at the legal system and demonstrated all but unequivocally that government under-funding and distinctly iffy traditions (don’t ever… Read More Book Review: Fake Law – The Truth About Justice in an Age of Lies by The Secret Barrister
My rating: 5 of 5 stars The dual combination of being both short and one of those books which appears on more or less every ‘Must Read’ list meant I finally picked up this slender volume recently. Having seen the book quoted innumerable times in various forms across social media, I took a little time… Read More Book Review: The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran
My rating: 4 of 5 stars Everything you could want to know about astrophysics – and way, way more…(no, really) It is difficult to go wrong with a book on this subject written by these three authors, all at the top of their respective trees. Tyson et al do a good job of applying Feynman… Read More Book Review: Welcome to the Universe – An Astrophysical Tour by Neil deGrasse Tyson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars Bought on a whim while at the British Museum, I picked up this little gem in the hope that I might glean some useful simple analogies and explanations to use with my science students. I wasn’t disappointed. Jeff Stewart is as funny as he is well informed. Dealing with… Read More Book Review: Why Balloons Rise and Apples Fall – The Laws That Make the World Work by Jeff Stewart
Well, so far in my journey to put you off writing, I’ve told you why you shouldn’t be a writer and then went on to tell you there’s no money in it. If you’re still here, well done. Clearly optimism in the face of reality is strong in you – you might just make it… Read More A Brief Guide to Writing: 4 – Budgeting income as a writer
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