Books

Delving into the past is a risky proposition at the best of times. We may think we remember what lurks there and how it might affect us when we take a metaphorical shovel to long-buried memories and feelings, but the truth is our minds have a funny way of distorting Continue Reading

One of the truly exhilarating things about plunging into a book by Blake Crouch is that you know you are going to be treated to a wildly imaginative, enormously clever, fast-paced but emotionally-resonant take on a pivotal issue of the day. It takes a great deal of skill to hold Continue Reading

It’s hard to say when it happened but somewhere along the way, people have lost their ability to empathise. Rather than putting themselves in someone else’s shoes and trying to understand what drove or drives them to act in a certain way, people too often condemn and decry, letting fear Continue Reading

By any idealistic measure, childhood is supposed to be an untouched idyll, a place of innocence and untrammelled happiness where the sun shines, the birds sing and anything wonderful is possible. 11-year-old Tippy Chan, however, inhabits a wholly different world in The Nancys, one where the bounteous escapism of youth Continue Reading

We are an idealistic species. It may not look that way at times, most times if we’re honest with ourselves, with war, poverty, disease, brutality and avaricious criminality the seemingly obvious defining marks of what it means to be human; dig down a little further, however, and it becomes clear Continue Reading

Is humanity its own worst enemy? History is littered with example after bloody example that would suggest we are, and then some, the holders of daggers to our throats that are briefly raised only to be plunged in again and again, as we cut off our existential nose to spite Continue Reading

In his 1953 novel The Go-Between, L. P. Hartley rather sagely observes, and no doubt from a position of much lived, wisdom-gathering experience, that “The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” As opening lines go they don’t get much better, not simply because of the poetic Continue Reading

If you’re convinced that Terminator‘s Skynet and the dire warnings of Elon Musk are all there is to be the coming AI revolution, then reading M. G. Wheaton’s Emily Eternal may play a pivotal role in changing your mind. Or, at least, easing your fears a little (after stoking them Continue Reading

One of the most arresting scenes in the 1939 classic film The Wizard of Oz, based on the magically-imaginative books of prolific author L. Frank Baum, is when Toto, Dorothy’s plucky terrier, pulls back the curtain shielding the titular wizard from view and exposing his intimidating spectacle as nothing more Continue Reading

The interior is a place that most of us know only too well. Whether it’s mental health issues, loss and grief, regrets, hope and dreams, or simply dismay at the way a colleague or family member has treated us, our natural inclination seems to be to tuck them far away Continue Reading