In Boxers, we see the origins of the Chinese Boxer rebellion through the eyes of Bao, who becomes one of its leaders. Bao grows up in rural China at the end of the 19th Century. He lives for the spring every year when travelling troups perform operas, full of drama, excitement and ancient stories of heroes and gods. The stories stay with him throughout the rest of the year when he performs his chores and is teased by his older brothers. His life changes irrevocably the day one […]
What’s invisible to me are the hours I’ve lost reading this thing.
Damn me and my inability to put books aside! I have finally, after almost a month, finished Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man. I didn’t like it. But, I find it crazy difficult to stop reading a book and so I finished it. Plus I couldn’t continue over the next few paragraphs to bitch and moan about it on Cannonball if I didn’t really finish it. That would be cheating. Invisible Man was recently banned by a school district in my home state (NC) and for that […]
Monks and Spies in Tudor England
Okay, I’ll confess I read this trilogy out of order, and–worse–I reviewed them out of order, but I still highly recommend them if, like me, you’re an afficionado of good historical mysteries. Even more so since I just learned that this “trilogy” is about to have a sequel. Anyway… In this third novel, it is now 1584 and our hero Giordano Bruno is being stalked by someone through the streets of London. He has made a lot of enemies in Parris’ previous two books, and […]
Dark Love Letter
“To know what a person has done, and to know who a person is, are very different things.” I have had a bit of luck with first time authors of late, and Hannah Kent is no exception. Her debut work, Burial Rites, is a gripping novel- all mood and emotion. It’s a story gaining speed like a stone rolling downhill, for there is only one way to go. Ms. Kent writes in Burial Rites about the last instance of capital punishment in Iceland. But I […]
A superb layperson’s guide to DNA and genetics, told with a smile and charm.
It starts with a papercut. The book that is, not the origin of life. Rutherford starts by breaking down exactly what happens when you cut your finger in a jaw-dropping three-page extravaganza of cells, electrical signals and scintillating prose that puts you in a state of awe. Awesome is a word that is regularly overused, but one that really does apply here when we are talking about such astounding ideas and realisations, with this minute level of detail illustrating just how finely tuned every little aspect of […]
A historical romance with a lot of stealing and scheming
3.5 stars Philip Astonley, youngest son of the Viscount Felkoner, also known as the Falcon to a select few (which is surprising to me as it’s not exactly a secret identity very different from his family name), is hired by the wealthy and powerful Marquess of Hedgrave to steal a sandalwood statue and bring it from India to England. He can barely believe his luck when he discovers that the statue is given as a gift to Miss Amanda Davencourt as a farewell gift from […]
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