First published 2024. Fairlight paperback, 2024, pp 251, c.37,000 words. If you are of the school of thought that all men are bastards then you may well love this book, if not, well that aspect becomes rather tedious. My notes include for p115 ‘another horrible man’, p117 ‘truly horrible’, p136 ‘another shit man’, p153 ‘another […]
Dancing in the Shallows — Clare Reddaway Read More »
First published 1981. Futura paperback, 1983, pp 430, c.115,000 words. The opening of this book reminded me of the Jody Foster film Maverick, where a group of gamblers are heading to a big tournament. However this story doesn’t have the sharp wit of that film. Somehow the book doesn’t quite work: the excitement is remote,
Dream Park — Larry Niven and Steven Barnes Read More »
First published 2022. Amazon paperback, 2022, pp 220, c.52,000 words. Straight forward thrillers are rare these days, so it was a real pleasure to come across this well written yarn. The basic form is out of the Shute/Innes/Bagley/Lyle/Kyle/etc. mould: take a competent but unexceptional man and place him in an extraordinary situation, then pile on
Small War — Colwell Hopper Read More »
First published 1990. Alison and Busby paperback, 1992, pp 192, c.62,000 words. A British family buys a rundown property in rural France as a holiday home. It has been done before: Peter Mayle’s A Year in Provence springs to mind which was published just a year before this. Indeed this does have quite a lot
House in the Sunflowers, A — Ruth Silvestre Read More »
First published 1971. Panther paperback, 1978, pp 188, c.63,000 words. It seems strange now, but there were real fears about the consequences if the population explosion that happened after the second world war continued. Science Fiction writers of the golden age of the 1950s to the 1970s frequently addressed this issue with stories of gross
World Inside, The — Robert Silverberg Read More »
First published 2004. Arrow paperback, 2006, pp 254, c.62,000 words. The great travel writer Patrick Leigh Fermor stands hovering in the background of this journey round the Mediterranean. Like in Fermor’s most read works, it is based on the travels of a very young man, written from the perspective of his much older self. It
Mediterranean Winter — Robert D. Kaplan Read More »
First published 2019. SilverWood Books paperback, 2019, pp 340, c.115,000 words. This is a modern murder mystery story, somewhere between Ian Rankin’s Rebus novels and ITV’s Midsomer Murders. It features a police detective, John Lincoln; a disaffected loner with a lot in common with John Rebus. Both are middle aged and have a troubled relationships
Price of Silence, The — Nikki Copleston Read More »
First published 1975. New English Library paperback, 19797, pp 157, c.52,000 words. This is the third part of six books all set in the same future, one where, centuries ago, the people of ‘Old Earth’ spread through the galaxy, seeding it with technology for faster-than-light travel, but for which the current inhabitants have lost the
Under a Calculating Star — John Morressy Read More »
First published 1966. Harper Collins paperback, 2017, pp 307, c. 101,000 words. This is a highly entertaining mid-twentieth century thriller. It has the usual protagonist of a man out of his element facing danger – in this case the man is a meteorologist, and the twin dangers he is facing are a hurricane and a
Wyatt’s Hurricane — Desmond Bagley Read More »
First published 1998. Granta paperback, 1999, pp 503, c.150,000 words (main text). Right towards the end, Fleming compares the UK’s exploration of the gaps in the map of the globe during the early nineteenth century, the topic of this book, to the USA’s space programme in the late twentieth century. In both cases, huge expenditures
Barrow’s Boys — Fergus Fleming Read More »