Reviews and Comments

Okay, so this started from an old Guardian article that I remembered saying our future is not going to be like how George Orwell imagined it, but more like how Neil Postman did.

This is not the book the article was talking about, but it is a book (co)authored by him that my father said we have in the house, so I ended up reading it! Even though it's pretty old it's a commentary on the education system that's (unfortunately) still relevant even today!

Did I say the second book in this series was good, better than the first? Well his one is even better! In fact, it ties all three stories together in a way that I never imagined! It's also a bit darker and more nuanced than the first two—all in a good way. Thanks @rhea@snipetteville.in for introducing me to this series!!

No connection to A Good Girl's Guide to Murder haha, although I read them at similar times. I heard about this book from somewhere (forgot where exactly). It's a good guide, although a bit dated; it was set in more innocent times when people still used Facebook and the browser monopoly of Chrome was yet to get into full swing. I hope someone comes up (or has already come up) with a modern-day version of this guide, since it's more necessary than ever now—especially since we have a lot of people online these days who have no clue about how to protect themselves, or why they should, and only half a clue about how their devices even work...

I read this after a longish gap from the first book, and tbh I was a bit sceptical about how good a sequel would be since the original case was already closed in the first book, so this could end up being more contrived...but it wasn't! I'd say it was better than the first book—more nuances and shades of grey, and Pip (the protagonists) herself also matures as she realises/sees that. There were also many common characters and refs to the first book so it wasn't disconnected at all!

Finally got my hands on this book at Blossom's! I've been wanting to read it ever since I watched the show. My mother made it into my "birthday present" which was a bit weird because it was a while away and also I was the one who found the book but anyway.

After reading this, I found that they've changed the storyline quite a bit in the movie. The general themes and spirit are still there though, so I'd still recommend watching (but maybe after reading the comic, if you can)!

Had a bit of a gap while reading this because I went on a trip in the middle 😛

I found the story okay, although there was a bit too much unexplained in the fantasy. Maybe that's just me; I tend to read s.f. where more things are explained, whereas in fantasy you often just go along with the story...

After finishing the smaller Beanworld collection, it wasn't enough so I dived in and started the entire omnibus!

I had never heard of this series before, but discovered it in Mike Carey's recommendations of "The Best Fantasy Graphic Novels":

fivebooks.com/best-books/best-fantasy-graphic-novels-mike-carey/

It certainly lives up to its promise! It's not fantasy in the sense of swords and dragons; rather it's set in a different ecological world entirely. It's a fun story, but also loaded with deep themes like the cycle of life and how even seeming adversaries are all necessary parts of the ecosystem 🍃

Decided to read it after reading an interview of the author in the MIT Press Reader:

thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-collapse-is-coming-will-humanity-adapt/

The ideas in this are great, the central one being that Darwin's idea was not "survival of the fittest" as is commonly believed but the less catchy "survival of the good enough to survive without being killed, while maybe by accident happening to be able to do the same even when conditions change". The book itself seemed a bit boring and repetitive to me though, but that might be because I'm already familiar with the general arc of human evolution so everything described there didn't teach me anything new. I'd say the interview is more fun and humorous than the book, so it was good I started with that and was primed to pick on the same themes in the book itself 🧠

I had read this a cople of years back (during the pandemic) but seemed to have forgotten a lot of it, so I read it again today! I remember reviewing it in Snipette after the earlier reading 🖋️

A book set in the context of the Sri Lankan civil war, recommended to me by @ravi@toot.io. I'll wait to read it until I have my hands on his hard copy 😉

I picked this up expecting to just have a fun time reading an old computer manual. But then I realised that:

(a) it's written by Frank Herbert—yes, THE Frank Herbert who wrote Dune!

(b) it's not just instruction manual but also a guide on how to think about computers, including busting myths about computers being too complicated; myths which businessmen have intentionally perpetuated to prevent the common public from getting to interested (you get the idea)

(c) being written by Frank Herbert, it's of course got a lot of philosophy and interesting anecdotes and metaphors

(d) because of all that it's not at all outdated and most of it is still relevant today!

Maybe I should sit down one day and properly learn BASIC...

Stumbled upon this author via a Guardian article about phones making music inaccessible to children! (Alderman was quoted there because she'd written an article about the danger of overdigitalisation in general).

www.theguardian.com/music/article/2024/may/22/phone-kids-losing-their-love-for-music

It's a fun read, the disturbing thing being all this would be pretty run-of-the-mill if the genders were flipped. As it stands, there is a certain schadenfreude in watching things play out ;)

I won't spoil it by saying more but oncce I started reading the prologue/preface/whatever that was it left me intrigued!

Finished reading this in one sitting! A great introduction to the economy, not least because it references Mary Shelley's Frankenstein ;)

Actually, it references a lot of other well-known texts as well, such as the Iliad, the legend of icarus, and the story of Faust and the Devil. And then explains how the economy works through the lens of those stories! I was hooked in the beginning when Varoufakis tries to answer his daughter's question of "Why do we have inequality?" and realises a better way to answer that may be with another question: Why didn't the Aborigines in Australia invade England?

Finally got around to reading this—and what a read! Those who think of Frankenstein's monster as just an evil creature created by man should definitely read this to get the full nuanced view. Thanks to @rhea@snipetteville.in for going on about Shelley till I eventually picked up her book!