Imagine if Raymond Chandler wrote near-future science fiction. That pretty much sums up this book. A detective who helps the police but is not a part of the police, with incredible fighting skills and a…Read more…

This is a very strange and deeply unpleasant book about a young man who knew no love growing up in 18th century France, has a virtual super-power in his sense of smell, and becomes a…Read more…

An observation: If the first book in a series is called “Agent Seventeen”, wouldn’t the sequel be called something like “Agent Eighteen”? A minor quibble. The important thing to note is that the second in…Read more…

As this book received the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger award in 2023, I thought I’d give it a go. It is a very silly book. Agent Seventeen — whose real name we never learn —…Read more…

If you’re like me, most of what you know about ancient Rome comes from repeated viewings of Ridley Scott’s Gladiator. Maybe even seeing Stanley Kubrick’s Spartacus. I never received a “classical” education when I grew…Read more…

This a wonderful book. No, really. I was a bit concerned as I don’t always enjoy anthologies, and the only author names I recognised were F. Scott Fitzgerald, Zelda Fitzerald, and Dorothy Parker. But that…Read more…

I recently saw (again) the film, starring Michael Caine and the late Donald Sutherland, and this awakened in me an interest in reading the original book. There were a couple of pleasant surprises. For one…Read more…

This thoroughly-researched, engaging book is full of stories that I didn’t know, showing the vast extent of disinformation campaigns over the last century or so — and not only done by the Russians. Rid has…Read more…

Rachel Collinson knows a lot about how non-profit organisations and charities can improve their fundraising and campaigning — but she only shares some of it in this short book. This is understandable because she earns…Read more…

This is an early book by Stephen King and when I read that it was his take on Bram Stoker’s Dracula, I thought — why not? But it’s not King’s best effort (he improved as…Read more…

This very short book has some real gems in it. Some quite famous authors and historians explain not only why they read but also why they buy books, and why they write. And while so…Read more…

Anne Applebaum is a first-rate historian, a very good writer and a campaigner for human rights and democracy. And this is a very good and important book. But — while its description of the evils…Read more…

This book, the 4th in the Cassie Raven series, is as good as the others, which is saying a lot. Cassie is a twenty-something mortuary technician in Camden, a neighbourhood in north London. Her “special…Read more…

This book combines two things that I enjoy reading about very much: magic and espionage. And it does a good job with both — especially the magic. (One of the authors worked closely with Derren…Read more…

In this well-written and fascinating short book, Roberto Garvía focusses almost entirely on Esperanto’s rivals among the other “international auxiliary languages”. There are two of these that matter Volapük and Ido, both long-forgotten except by…Read more…