finished reading The Trouble with Peace 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
A cynical take on the deep power of finance & capitalism in an age of rapid industrialisation. Numerous players (pawns) strive for 'power' with varying degrees of cunning & strategy. Provides his usual hefty dose of backstabbing and dry wit, and a touch less graphic violence.
finished reading The Deluge 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌗
A US-centric view of the coming two decades as the climate and social cohesion rapidly break down. Amplifies the worst of current political & economic trends to create a truly terrifying but not-impossible dystopia. Told from a rich variety of perspectives, though compresses the pace of climate change improbably (I hope!). Intense, scary & draining.
finished reading Isaac and the Egg 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
The mind goes to extreme lengths to protect itself from sudden loss & crippling grief. Everyone needs a good egg to help put the pieces back together again. Touching & distinctive.
finished reading Little Men 🌕🌕🌗🌑🌑
A series of cloyingly moralistic tales from Jo's school of wayward boys, where love & kindness are all that's needed to create fine upstanding gentlemen.
finished reading Small Things Like These 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
A penetrating snapshot of Irish life under the suffocating weight of Catholic dominance. But true moral strength cannot be suppressed, and every small act erodes that edifice. Beautifully crafted.
finished reading Young Mungo 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌗
Similar premise to his first book: gay boy with alcoholic mother in Glasgow. But different enough and also superbly executed. Full of precisely drawn, skin-crawling characters & behaviour, from the psychopathic but protective brother, the deadly Protestant vs Catholic brawls, and the slimey alcoholic older male ""role models"". Such an unattractive cover!
finished reading Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
Late-stage capitalism has given way to cloud-based fiefs, and we are the serfs. I need convincing on some of the detail (e.g. how effective are they at manipulating our desires?), but mostly agree with his main argument. Pairs well with Cory Doctorow's #enshittification ideas (@pluralistic).
finished reading Far Sector 🌕🌕🌕🌗🌑
An interstellar justice-bringer (a Green Lantern) is called to help a planet that hasn't seen crime in generations due to the use of an emotion-suppressing gene therapy. But that order starts to unravel as she tries to get a handle on the situation, her own emotionality proving invaluable. Brilliant dynamic artwork.
finished reading Foundryside 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
Crafts a novel world from steampunkish magic controlled by an oligarchy of aristocratic families. Pleasing allegory for capitalism and AI.
finished reading My Family and Other Animals 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
An English family decamps to the Greek island of Corfu, and manages to make the place madder than it was already. Hilarious vignettes of the family's exploits interspersed with stunning descriptions of the author's observations of the natural world. The encounter between the gecko and the mantis is unparalleled.
Reading time 4 days, 76 pages/day
finished reading Resurrection in a Bucket: The Rich and Fertile Story of Compost 🌕🌕🌕🌗🌑
An enthusiastic dive into the compost pile. The history of the organic movement was particularly interesting, while the anecdotes of compost in social life were well-chosen and quite funny. As Danny Rojas would say, "Compost is life!"
#BookReview #Books #Bookstodon #compost #gardening #GardeningAu
finished reading Harrow the Ninth 🌕🌕🌕🌑🌑
Our favourite necromancer has risen to the ranks of the most powerful, who are rather Machiavellian but disconcertingly human. In the process though, she has lost her marbles, and we are left without any certainty as to what the hell is going on, and doubts undermine our memory of the first book. Which is mostly bearable because it eventually unravels, only to be frustrated by an unwelcome dumping of unresolved head-scratchers which demands some re-reading. More serious than the first book, without the swagger.
finished reading Living Democracy: An ecological manifesto for the end of the world as we know it 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
"It's the end of the world as we know it, but it doesn't have to be the end of the world." Provides an overview of the roots of the polycrisis (mostly separation & domination) and sketches out the shape of what must replace it: a grassroots democracy inspired by the systemic interdependency of ecology. Both reformism & revolution will just support the current, malignant system. Not much of it was new to me, but it provides a solid framework for many disparate ideas. Take the power back! (Disclaimers: I read this while low on brain juice, and Millie is thanked for her feedback in the acknowledgements.)
#BookReview #Books #Bookstodon #NonFiction #Democracy #Biomimicry
finished reading Scythe 🌕🌕🌕🌑🌑
A future where AI has created the perfect world without war, illness or death, and a select group keeps the population in check via 'gleaning'. Great premise but occasionally feels like a parody of itself and missed the opportunity for thought-provoking world building. Not much characterisation.
finished reading When the Pelican Laughed 🌕🌕🌕🌗🌑
Autobiography of an Indigenous woman who was taken from her family & country as a teenager and 'cared for' (i.e. exploited) by the Aborigines Department. She lived a life full of hard work and undeserved prejudice with grace & strength. Simply told but surprisingly engaging.
#BookReview #Books #Bookstodon #Autobiography #IndigenousLiterature
finished reading Legends & Lattes 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑
A lovely little story about an ex-adventurer who turns her orcish hand to opening a coffee shop. Everyone is nice except for the odd dickhead who provides narrative tension. Imagine the Discworld with hygge instead of satire.
finished reading Jasper Jones 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌗
A murder mystery & coming-of-age story, with hefty lashes of abuse & racism, set in a small country town, 1960s Australia. Dark stuff, but leavened with teen romance and hilariously on-point best-mate banter (Jeffrey Lu is a legit superhero).
