Reading List

Still love the world building and hate everything else. Not going to finish this series.

Fun premise, cool world building. Characters sometimes didn't do what you would expect or behave inconsistently. I hate infinitely capable bad guys who are always 10 steps ahead of the good guys.

Great biography. I only knew limited things about von Neumann, but it's incredible how many fields he was influential in. The last true polymath.

Not exactly what I was expecting. More ethnographic on the people of Madagascar than on any kind of Libertalia or proto-anarcho-organising.

Short stories on submarining in the cold war. Loved it.

Lewis is a hack. This might as well be a love letter to SBF. Irresponsible misrepresentation of a scam artist and industry. I had low expectations and this somehow was worse than I expected.

Really hard to read this. Friedman's intellectualism is so void of rigour I struggled to take away something thought provoking.

One of the worst books I've ever read. I DNF'd around 30% through. I can't understand how this has such good critical acclaim.

Pierce course corrected alot on the things that didn't work in Dark Ages (the inner eye, the parasite thing, etc).

Overall, this has me now again excited for the final book in the series. The world of Red Rising is so much fun, even if it is pretty stupid.

Haven't read a solid cyberpunk novel in a long time, and I ultimately ended up really liking this. Noir detective with cyberpunk overtones. Pretty faithfully represented by the TV first season.

Not as bad as I was expecting it to be. A collection of anecdotes and things that Daigo has learned through his career as a professional fighting game player.

I'd suggest a younger me could have benefitted from this, but I don't think I would have had the maturity yet to understand much of his points.

Graeber's best book I've read so far, so many things that I didn't know how to articulate myself written in this book.

The Utopia of Rules laments the modern bureaucractic construction, but doesn't do much in the way of providing any alternatives; I suspect Graeber would suggest reading anarchist literature for solutions.

Fairly dry book for most of it, with just enough interesting things about forgeries and art history to keep me interested.

Trying to come away with a lesson, and with most things thinking about the situation from a critical point of view. Always be willing to question your priors. Be careful when things look too good to be true.

Really poor second showing in a series I was pretty excited about. I was struggling to finish by about 70% of the way through.

The first book did a good job setting up the characters, the world, etc. And this book does exactly... nothing with them.

It also commits so many tropes that I nearly quit on that basis alone.

• Mustache twirling villains that repeatedly show up and always manage to get away.
• Unambiguously good and bad sides.
• Making characters so ultra-strong and intimidating and then having to make EVEN MORE ultra strong and intimidating characters so there's an actual threat.

Cool series start. Lots of potential from the characters to the world-building.

Not a good book. Was expecting more based on the recommendations (and the Hugo Award) but it was underwhelming.

No character building, the characters are literally NPCs. The plot is a weird love letter to... Hollywood producers? There's no real sci-fi and the core conceit is a time paradox that (admittedly with self-awareness) is just handwaved away.

Re-read from decades ago. The new movie inspired me to come back to it, and I enjoyed it way more than I expected to.

Such a great book. Better than The Martian in basically every way. Only towards the very end did I think it was dragging on a bit.

One of my favourite hard sci-fi books in ages.

As a finale to the series, overall I found it pretty disappointing. The book feels like all the problems of the other books, but without the best bits.

The first half really dragged on without any direction and the characters just felt like they were bouncing from one vignette to the next.

The second half kickstarts a plot, but on the whole it just doesn't feel engaging or interesting the way the other books did.

Lots of interesting takes in this book. There are some areas where I think he classes decisions as irrational (e.g. around risk taking on EV for single events) when they are actually rational in risk-weighted terms (i.e. some sharpe ratio type of measure).

Things that may be irrational in an iterated scenario may be perfectly rational in a once-offscenario (e.g. accepting $90 guaranteed instead of a 95% chance of $100). The second is a better trade if you can make it repeatedly, but by risk ratio the first is a better trade once-off.

See above.

See above.

See above.

Obvious shame that I'm reading 40k novels. This is what the pandemic has done to me.

The action sequences are silly, but I do enjoy the political machinations.

Some interesting bits, but like many things written by anthropologists, quite a long bow drawn from few examples. Interesting, but I'm not sure I take much more away from it than that.

Fun view of "greed"-era Wall Street.

Stormlight Chronicles are just dragging on. Over a thousand pages, but I just didn't care about anything until about halfway through.

SBC for the end of the year. Such a terrible book. I couldn't tell if it was parody or not.

Not the greatest "conclusion" to me. Pretty dumb to setup the mystery for yet another book.

Same as Alloy. Fun to read, fun characters, but too much like a screenplay in some spots.

Good combination of Sherlock and action. Fun read.

Haven't spent enough time reading le Carre before. Keen to try reading some spy novels. This one is more of a "Sherlock Holmes" vibe, but a good start. So many mid-century idiosyncrasies.

Ultimately unsatisfying. A lot of stories about precision engineering, but never enough meat to keep me interested. I went into the book hoping to get a richer understanding of, e.g. "how was the first screw made" and was ultimately disappointed.

I'd resisted these books for years, thinking they were just fan-fiction-style garbage. I couldn't have been more wrong. This is one of my favourite fantasy books I've read in ages. Interesting ton, and I ultimately love low-magic worlds so much. Pretty keen to read more in the series.

Interesting to read about some of the lesser known, abbreviated, histories (e.g. Finland). Too much US-centric views at the end, and ultimately an unsatisfying description of how technology makes us more polarised - i.e. very "boomer" centric.

Shitty Book Club for February. I am ashamed to have read this and now my audible account is filled with Star Wars novel recommendations...

Not sure why, but I wasn't able to really get into this as much as the previous books in the series. The ending was okay, but the book felt like it dragged on for awhile.

SBC for December. Actually really good. The best shitty book we've read.

More of the same from Pullman. Starting to get a bit edgy. Still love the world building, but I wish he'd get on with the story.

Pretty "privilege" tone deaf. It's tiring to read about how hard women have it in the professional workspace from someone who has been gifted as much opportunity and luck as Sandberg.

The book also avoids the most problematic issue women face in the workplace (sexual harassment) for the majority of the book.

"Disappointed" is perhaps too strong of a word, but I did struggle to finish this one. Ultimately, I still love the world building and setting, but the plot and the characters felt cheap and unearned this time.

Lysander is just magically amazing and perfect in every way, despite a decade of isolation and opposing men and women who were hardened veterens of a decades long war. Oh and apparently he's psychic? So I guess that's a thing. Nevermind besting Darrow - literally the most formidible fighter in the solar system - in single combat by "tricking" him with a hidden razor. Really? Darrow, king of combat by deceit, bested by a trick from someone who's been in combat for less than a week?

The abomination comes out of nowhere and brings down the entire republic by bribing a single politician.

The ascomanni appear as a deus ex machina from the kuiper belt to put even further pressure on the republic. And, of course, they're magically super powerful despite having been isolated in deep spaces for centuries.

I'll still read the final book, but this one has really pushed the bar down. Bad guys were invincible because they needed to be for the plot.

Took me quite awhile to get into the flow in this book. The beginning is very slow and there's lots of distractions and world building. However, the middle of the book and the core plot are incredible. Slake Moths are such great "bad guys" and never felt tedious or contrived.

I wish that the book had either expanded more on some of the other non-prime characters (the mayor, the crime boss, etc) or dropped them entirely, since ultimately they didn't add much to the book.

Preparing for some work training.

Read this many years ago while in Africa on the recommendation of Scott Muc. Remember liking it, but I don't think all the short stories had been released at that point.

This time, I loved it. Great world building especially. The ending was a bit too "clean" for me, but it's possible the sequels expand enough to fix this.

'Shitty bookclub' for July. I could barely finish it. Complete garbage from start to finish. I still skipped the songs.

Fun book for the first half. I love Lyra's world and how Pullman does steampunk-but-not-wanky. Sadly, everything after the flood happens is a bit tedious. Trope-y inexplicably invincible bad guy. Drags on for a very long time, and ultimately has a pretty unsatisfying ending.

Wanted some epic fantasy for the year. First half is really great. The politiking, romance and world building are fantastic.

After the main conceit of the plot is revealed, though, the book just speeds into hyperdrive and misses a lot from it.

Overall good, but I think it would have benefited from being a series instead of a single novel.

'Shitty bookclub' for January.

'Shitty bookclub' for February. You know a book is going to be good when it's not even written by an author, but by a company...

'Shitty bookclub' for December. What the fuck did I just read? How was this nominated for a Hugo award? I think this review on Amazon just about sums it up...

"It's a small wonder why this amazing story was nominated. It explores the deeply convoluted aspects of love between human and and another sentient species of unexpected origin. The title does not do the text justice, as Tingle pulls off a difficult subject with style and aplomb, taking his place with ease among the greatest of sci-fi authors."

Some thought provoking essays. Plenty of "outrage culture", some of which seems more sensible than others. The bad essays really took the momentum out of reading it from the good essays, but overall was good.

Some great nuggets of humour, but ultimately the fact that Thurston has to be so over the top in order to ensure the reader understands the sarcasm hurts the book.

Pretty humdrum ending to the current story arc. Not much world building or mystery, really, and not even an especially spectacular magical crescendo. Ultimatly none of how Chorley was able to be a super villain was explained, and so left the reader feeling unsatisfied.

Shitty bookclub for November. My inner goddess is roaring about how terrible this book is. Racist, sex negative, emotionally manipulative, mysoginistic, and just plain bad. At least the sequels get all soap-opera-y ridiculous. The plot in this went nowhere.

Meh. Not great.

It really does seem to be the lot of Discworld books that they are either very hit or very miss. This one falling in the latter category.

Really great, classic Pratchett. Whimsical and adventurous in just the right amounts.

Stellar conclusion. One of the best endings to any fantasy series ever.

Good middle book. Didn't lul too much, kept me interested the whole time.

Better than I was expecting. An uninspiring start, but gets interesting after that. Can see how Sanderson's style has evolved. Love the heist story.

Somehow even better than the first book. I can't wait for the final book to be released.

This has to be the best fantasy book I've read for a long time. I love to have found an Aussie fantasy author that is really great. The plot, the characters, the world building, all the times when I thought there'd be a horrible cliche and then there wasn't. This book really has it all.

Absolutely terrible ending. The reveal is just so dumb. Aside from the fact that the author hasn't published since 2013, and therefore is unlikely to ever(???) publish again; I will definitely not be reading any further books in the series.

Sequel to 'Lies of Locke Lamora'. Pretty much the same review.

Pretty good fantasy/heist novel. The world building is second to none.

'Shitty bookclub' for March. Not as terrible as you might think. None of the story or motivations made any sense, most of the aliens were trite and contrived, and the action scenes were boring.

Starts off good. Interesting story, and the writing is great. Quickly becomes tedious. Lots of journeying from here-to-there and uninteresting characters. I won't be reading the remaining books.

'Shitty bookclub' book for February. See above.

'Shitty bookclub' book for February. Well and truly one of the whitest books I've ever read. I'm pretty sure that a characters cries on average once every other page.

Way different feel than the previous trilogy. I really like that Darrow became a bad guy and really demonstrated he has flaws.

There's still quite a lot of exposition and handholding, but on the whole it's so much darker and gritter than the last books. I'm keen to see where the series goes.

First book in 'shitty bookclub'. So bad. Reads like a D&D campaign, which I suppose shouldn't be a surprise. I remember them being so much more "adult" when I was younger.

Ends on a cliffhanger, and not as interesting as the previous few. Duarte is a shit bad guy.

Much better than the second book. Less filler, just enough world building, and a few good twists.

Excellent ending to the series.

Finally a reveal! Can't wait for the next book.

Bit of a filler book. No real advancement of the bigger storyline, but still good overall. Hopeful that the latest novel is better.

See above. Series continues to be good.

See above. Series continues to be good.

As good as the first. The bigger mystery is interesting, and the fact that the main character isn't some super prodigy is encouraging.

Harry Potter meets Hot Fuzz. Fun read, though a bit scattered.

Very similar to the "Rum, Rebels and Ratbags" podcast series. Because of that, I didn't really learn much new. Funny enough, in a Bill-Bryson-y sort of way. Looking forward to the next one.

So. Much. Filler. Great ending to the series, though. Happily eschews either a melancholy or save-the-princess ending.

So much filler.

Much more gripping and action-packed than the first book. Far too much filler for me. Lots of moving from one location to another location and not much happenning in between.

Finally got around the reading this, despite its popularity. Extremely well written, unsurprisingly. Still very sad, and doesn't offer much hope. I suspect it was written for a white audience that's already aware of its message.

Intro to numpy/pandas. Learned a few things, but not as useful as I'd hoped.

Lovely writing, though a bit slow to grab my attention. Great characters, with complex motivations, and just enough mystery.

So much boring filler, but the action and overall story are enough to keep it moving forward. I can't believe the third book is going to be even longer.

The start is a bit rocky. Really annoyed to find out that the books are split into two parts each (book one is actually two physical books!?).

The characters have really started to grow on me. The world is interesting, and the magic/mysticism is present but not the focus of the storytelling.

Can't stand the interludes. Can't stand the flashbacks.

Straying perilously close to boring-middle-book territory, but the ending and political intrigue are enough to carry it. I shouldn't have started a series that's not concluded. The wait for the remaining books is going to be painful.

Series continues to get better.

Action is starting to get a bit contrived, but I'm too deep on the series now to stop. At least ghost-Miller is no more.

Series continues to get better.

Much better than the first book. Way less cheesy, much more interesting story telling. I'm back into the series.

Really well written and cleverly laid out. Good short read, and with some unexpectadly fun stories.

Good, but not particularly fantastic. Much more interesting than the book, but the plot moves along almost too fast. The main characters are paper thin, and largely unlikeable.

The sci-fi component is interesting, though. Good world building.

Terrible book. All the worst things about the social sciences and pop science rolled into a repetitive package.

Solid ending to the series. Drawn out at the beginning, but eventually goes back to the style of the first book; action and plotting.

The ending was "bittersweet" enough that the whole story didn't feel tied together with a bow. Definitely the best sci-fi I've read in awhile. Here's hoping for a television adaptation.

Way too many rollercoasters throughout the book and not enough, proper, character development. In the second book of the series, Brown expands the scope of the battle to the solar system but the relationships between characters continues to defy reasoning.

While Darrow's powers of invincibility in Red Rising bordered on parody, the double-double-double-double crossings going on throughout the story of Golden Son became tiresome.

Riveting in the style of Hunger Games, but without as much ridiculous teenage angst. One of the best sci-fi books I've read in the last several years.

Both the world building, and the science are expanded on just enough to give the world some mystery. The characters, by and large, make rational decisions and have really human problems. Can't wait to finish the rest of the series.

Still a fun, easy, read. The ending was really disappointing.

Much better than the first book. Couldn't put it down. Dark and confusing towards the second half.

Fun, easy reading with a clever mix of sci-fi and fantasy. Traditional story where everything goes just as necessary for the " good guys ". Read it pretty quick, so it can't have been that bad.

Lots of small interesting bits tied together with tedium. Worth finishing, but the core message was repeated way too often.

A re-read after many years. Remains as I remember: a brilliant first half, and a totally uninspired ending.

A re-read after many years. Absolutely fascinating how much Neal got right, but also the things that he missed. Hopefully not a prescient view of the future of governance.

Terrible, nonsensicle, plot. Stupid characters. None of the humour of David's previous books makes it through. Just a terrible book from start to finish.

Less focus on the anthropology and psychology than I would have expected. Way too much time discussing communal treatment of PTSD, and PTSD in general. Generally disappointing.

Best book of the series, and I remain impressed that all the loose ends managed to get tied up. I love the different descriptions between the Zoku and the Sobernost.

Perfect ending. Can't wait for more from Rajaniemi.

After many years, reading a London story feels like returning home. The vibrancy and vivid detail that he uses to describe the settings is gripping.

Still a book that inspires me.

So much exposition! This book has so many pointless storylines that could have been completely omitted without affecting the outcome.

The ending of the series was excellent, and didn't fall into the happy-ever-after trope that one might think.

The romance is just as cringe-worthy as real, actual, adolescent romance.

Better than the first book, though the gap between reading them made the jargon often confusing. The play on " Arabian Nights " was fun, but ultimately the most unsatisfying part of the book.

The series really strikes me as, unfortunately, needing a second read to fully appreciate all that's going on.

Same as The Golden Compass.

Much slower than the first book, but the story progresses and the world building never feels overbearing. Ultimately the story was only enough to whet my appetite for the third book, and I was left unsatisfied.

Haven't read this for a decade. Strong beginning and middle, and a very weak ending. Excellent audio book production.

Finally! Some original fantasy that doesn't involve thousands of pages of world-building snoozefests. More than anything the series reminds me of the Avatar series; part magic, part coming of age, and part political intrigue and mystery. Weaving all three plots together was a satisfying, and mostly unexpected, twist.

The best adventure book I've read in ages, with the exception of an ending that fizzles out (one can hardly blame the author for the history, but the ending still felt rather abrupt).

The accounts of interaction with Native Americans/First Nations is deepling interesting, as was imagining the wearwithall that must have been required to survive either the overland trek or the sea voyage.

More Pratchett. Forgettable. The Australian humour was fun at first, but quickly gets old.

Gibsonian sci-fi. Lots of jargon and slang. I loved the weapons concepts, and the "twist" at the end was unexpected. I'm not sure I'm inspired to read the remaining books in the trilogy, but I should follow up with more from the author.

The underlying message of; "hard work and perserverence are the biggest predictors of success" is something that ultimately is difficult to argue with.

The book fails to address the difference between extreme performers, do some of them really just outwork the others? The interlude about smarter, intentional practice, was particularly infuriating since the unstated premise is that knowing how to do so isn't a problem in its own right.

Eventually, the number of anecdata and interviews with successful individuals becomes tiresome. The core take away was the goal setting approach that Duckworth advocates for — Maintain high-level goals and validate them with mid-level goals.

Beautiful writing, and a very interesting parallel set of stories. The beginning of the fair thread, in particular, was incredibly interesting.

Even the murder "mystery" was excellent, though it certainly made me grateful for modern policing.

For the life of my I cannot figure out why this book got such rave reviews. I could not imagine a more boring book about pirates.

It took over a year to finish, but finally happened. One of the saddest and most uncomfortable things I've ever read. Glory, honour, pride are irrelevant. The war of the anyman is pointless trauma and meaningless sacrifice. Where Catch-22 treated it with humour, Remarque treats it with brutal realism.

Lots of "nerdy" pop culture references that don't really click with me. Quick and easy read, though. Interesting concept, but the hero's journey and the bad guy really felt forced.

Too much binging on Pratchett at this point, I think. Not really a fan of this one. Didn't feel as magical or interesting as the first books in the watch thread.

The Watch thread definitely coming into it's own. Just as good as the last (better?) and will keep me going.

Phonetic spelling got much better in this book, and the political overtones (herein: racism/discrimination) come to the forefront. The characters continue to flesh themselves out, both Vimes and Carrot being the most interesting.

Better than the first, definitely carrying on with the Watch thread. How had I not read Pratchett before? I really see how it's classic.

Clever, and funny. Fantastic writing. The phonentic spelling got tedius, and led to a lot of confusion. The lack of chapters and constant switching of settings was hard to follow in an e-book where the separation wasn't clear enough.

Good enough to keep me reading the Discoworld series for at least a few more books in the night's watch thread.

As detailed and well written as most Krakauer, but lacking in focus. Lots of meandering around the pschye of the nation post-9/11 and of the Bush administrations criminality.

The way the army handled Tillman's death was, of course, literally criminal. However, I struggled to find meaning in searching out his real cause of death. After all, he was killed — like so many others — in an unjust war, in a foreign land, following orders he didn't believe in. No matter what the reason, he remains dead.

At times, eye-rolling-ly contrived. The characters portrayed in the book are far too larger than life to be accurately represented. Much of the book felt like padding to get to page-count. The best bits were about the history of pirates, but they were few and far between.

Fascinating look at homicide in under-represented communities of South L.A. Frustratingly long winded at times, though the main story thread was gripping. One of the most thought provoking theses is that over-policing blacks (and other poor/minorities) for minor crimes, while simultaneously under-policing for serious crimes such as murder is partially what led to fear and hatred of the LAPD amongst these communities.

The epilogue seemed divorced from the narrative of the rest of the book. That is to say, murder rates are dropping precipitously in South L.A. even without drastic change in policy. This is ascribed to better social security and health care, but that seems too simple to me.

While the convergent storylines were clever, and didn't feel forced or unnatural as often happens, they also were ultimately banal and predictable. The post-apocolypse society wasn't fleshed out or particularly believable either.

The rest of the novel was a bore. Rich people doing rich people things. Oh no.

Less satire and more memoir than expected. The navel gazing was a bit much at times.

The beginning set a brilliant tone, but the ending left something to be desired. Nevertheless, the best book on race that I've read in a long while.

A humanising look at one of the right-wing monsters of the post-9/11 era. Breivik's life is explored from beginning to end, engagingly written and darkly fascinating.

One of the most interesting books of the year, to be sure. One of the most interesting things to take away from this is how little the extreme right's message has changed over the years - Women are objects, brown people are fine as long as they don't mix with whites or " white culture ", men should be men and other toxic masculinity tropes.

I can't help but be left wondering how much impact the slaughter of so many soon-to-be politicos has had on Norway's future. Has Breivik's attack had a similar effect as Yitzhak Rabin's assassination did in Israel?

Definitely one to recommend.

Some really interesting history about the pig, especially the role it played in westward expansion and exploration. By the end, though, the book was dragging on and had gotten quite repetitive.

Interesting view from some Wall Street insiders about how technology has changed trading in the modern era.

I was unimpressed with much of the description of technologists and their ethics, capabilities and responsibilities. Describing shipping proprietary code owned by your employer offsite against both criminal law and contractual obligations as something many Wall Street techies did can be viewed either as a gross misunderstanding or a depressing view into vocational ethics.

The total lack of input from the side of HFT throughout the book is a bit deafening, especially since the deeper an understanding Brad Katsuyama and IEX get of HFT firms, the more they realise that the bigger banks are the ones enabling many of the more complicated trading strategies that favour HFT. Despite this, HFT remains the villain throughout.

Beautiful novel. I loved all of the characters and the writing was superb. The comedy style reminded me of the style in Catch-22, though certainly less dark towards the end. The book drags on a bit towards the end, but ultimately wraps itself up nicely. Will be looking at more books by Jonasson.

Amazing! I've never been so engaged with a book about the history of mathematics. Dolnick spreads the context of the age of discovery over every one of the unique personalities involved. From Kepler & Brahe to Newton & Leibniz, the transition from the classical world to the modern one is told in fascinating detail.

Not only does Dolnick describe the how and why, but delves deeply into their relationships and interactions. Has there ever been a group so vain and so righteous in that vanity than the early Royal Society?

A much more politically-centric continuation of the first book. Largely I felt that Suarez didn't tackle the hard questions, leaving the reader to suspend a substantial amount of disbelief to arrive at the distributed utopia created by a machine AI gone wild.

Ultimately I felt that the augmented reality & gamification ideas were fun, but derivative.

The series as a whole was fun, and engaging enough, but ultimately lacked substance.

Surprising and twisting thriller. The book starts off as your standard who-done-it thriller with a hard-boiled detective. Eventually it departs from that and turns into more of a sci-fi-cum-political story in the vein of Doctorow.

Some sections drag on, and the " Bad Guys " seem unflinchingly successful or foiled only by a new technological (literal) Deus Ex Machina.

Film noír cyber punk, what's not to like? Slightly longer than I thought necessary, and more than a little formulaic, nevertheless "-" a guilty pleasure.

The premise of digitised humans, where the limiting factor is cost, paints a world where only the rich can be both immortal and all powerful.

The sex scenes were written for 14 year olds, and the hand to hand combat references to karate and other Japanesisms were eye-roll inducing. The who-done-it and raw grit of the story, while predictable, did the genre justice in the future-tech world.

A thought provoking foray into the pleasures and sorrows of the military. Fick, as an ivy-league liberal, is convinced by the ROTC recruiter to try a 10-week summer intro to the Marines (pre-September 11th). In this he gets the itch of comraderie and challenge.

One quote from the recruiter, in response to a comment from a student about how having ROTC on campus went against the morals of the school (paraphrased) "- It's good that the ROTC is on campus because the university needs to liberalize the military"

The middle of the book is largely a recounting of the 2002 invasion of Iraq from the perspective of a ground soldier, and from a bloodthirsty American public. Ultimately I found this part of the book too procedural, and found my interest waning.

As the book progresses towards the end, Fick becomes more and more conservative. By the end (once he's finished his 4-year stint) he's alienated his friends and family. They're unable to understand his perspective, and he theirs.

Typical Bill Bryson wit can't rescue a topic that is relatively devoid of factual information. The book can basically be summarized as "- We don't know much".

I appreciate that the book did a good job of addressing some of the more pernicious of Shakespearean myths (he was multiple persons, he was Lord Byron, etc). Some of the history of London itself was interesting, and especially with respect to what I know about Elizabethan society, some time was spend not just on the court and the nobles, but on daily life.

Overall, not a disappointment, but not the best of Bill's work.

Interesting story, that takes until about halfway through to really come together. I love the play with languages and the broader themes feel very much like the The Foundation series.

The inner monologue of Justice of Toren made him the most sympathetic character in the book. So many of the other characters left me wondering about their motivations. Like a William Gibson novel, the depth of the vernacular left me confused for large portions "-" especially when talking about gender.

(see - A Game of Thrones)

(see - A Game of Thrones)

Julian is such an inspired thinker. Both the interview and his polemic against Eric Schmidt as commentary of the aftermath is particularly insightful. The footnotes were often such a distraction that I had a hard time following the thought train.

Assange's insights into Namecoin and Bitcoin were especially interesting. I wish I would have read this interview years ago. Where was this when I was a kid?

The first time I've read a “work” book and not just learned something, but enjoyed the ride. Obviously a parable, but well written enough that I didn't care. Has inspired me to read “The Toyota Way” and perhaps pursue more thinking about manufacturing approaches.

(see - A Game of Thrones)

(see - A Game of Thrones)

What's to say here that hasn't already been written. ASOIAF is a fantasy epic, mostly readable series, and after spending a bunch more time understanding the lore and history of Westeros is even more interesting. The books start to slow as they get deeper into world building, but the eschewing of fantasy tropes keeps them engaging enough to continue.

Pretty awesome. A self-aware novelisation (/s) of “The Last Starfighter” with a twist of Star Trek. The writing, as with Ready Player One, was informal and funny.

The 80's trivia/pop-culture was a bit much, this time around though. In Ready Player One it felt like it was taking a bit of the piss, but here it feels forced.

Filled with irrational people and their problems. The way the story unfolded was well executed, but the “twist” felt forced.

The characterisation of alcoholism was, I think, the best part of the book, and Rachel's character kept me the most engaged. Definitely an improbable amount of fucked-up people in such a small vicinity of one another, though. The epilogue felt as if the book had to have a happy ending.

Completely forgettable.

Charming story, and a very interesting concept. Throughout the book the only character that I didn't think was a total jerk was Bee (the girl writing). Bernadette was a prima donna, too focused on herself and judgemental of others. The dad, out of nowhere, went from foundation solid to off the rails crazy.

All of the other women were catty and gossipy, complete stereotypes. Only once in the book did Bee finally recognise the privilege that she was born into.

I loved the way the characters were explored, and the ending was about as good as it possibly could have been.

Strong beginning, but wavers heavily towards the end. The message that “normal” people have the opportunity to be great, all they have to do is pay attention was paper thin. The romance coming together at the end was cheesy.

However, being set in Sydney there was lots of interesting Australian-isms. Zusak, just like in The Book Thief, wrote engagingly. I didn't really put the book down once I started, but felt unsatisfied at the end.

A psychological thriller throughout. The first half or so was extremely good, the explanation of the living planet and the confusion oozes through the pages.

As the book procedes, though, it shifts its gaze increasingly towards its navel. Pontificating on all kinds of probably-philosophical-but-ultimately-boring existentialism. Should have powered through the final half, but found it extremely difficult. Not as clear a sci-fi statement on the real world as most classics.

Fantastic story. I couldn't believe how much I enjoyed it. The era when sports meant heart and not dollars is sadly past. The back drop of the depression along with the coming tide of WWII cast against west coast blue collar workers was fantastic.

It's hard not to be inspired by the story of Joe Rantz and the other boys. It's hard not to be jealous of the kind of comradery shown by the crew.

Grippingly written. Not a book to be put down.

Excellent twist, kept mostly hidden until the end (though at the point the reader is surely starting to guess).

Moriarty himself describes Holmes as bumbling and childish never really a rival at all shattering quite a lot of the illusion. Especially since... if he was really all that brilliant - How did Devoreaux start to take over across the pond to begin with?

Overall, a good book but disappointing following on the heals of the first. Here's hoping Horowitz makes a return to the Holmesian style in the next edition.

Interesting take on the classic survival story. Mark Watney is a bit of a campy character. Too much “lol'ing”. The survival bits are fascinating, and the maths is cool. However, it dragged on a bit longer than was necessary - and at every turn something going wrong was tiresome. None of the other characters were ever really explored (perhaps that was the point).

Overall, it was a page turner. I finished it fast, unable to put it down.

Brilliant new and riveting Holmes story. Nothing not to like other than it ended. I'm hopeful that Horwitz's other Holmes books are as good.

The twist of how things connected at the end was unexpected, including the wife-cum-killer and the husband pedophile. Watson's internal narrative set the stage brilliantly. The only thing that could have been added was more of an insight into Holmes himself. But maybe that's the charm of the Sherlock stories?

Very dense. Scott mentioned that he thought it was crazy-super-dense even for Gibson, but I thought Neuromancer was harder to get a grasp on. I really like the idea of the past being a communicable place that rich plutocrats from the future pillage. I thought the tech was mostly unimaginative, but maybe that's my cynicism.

The “romance” between Flynn and Netherton was boring. Most of the characters were underdeveloped. The ending happened too abruptly (And then… everything worked out happily ever after!), and the mystery and motivations of the bad guys was completely undeveloped.

A disappointing end to a great trilogy. The mystery of Area X continued without any real answers that were forthcoming. At the same time, the character development stalled completely.

By the end, not much had really happened. There were many more story threads than in the other two books, but only Saul's (the lighthouse keeper) resonated in any way, and then only a bit.