Book Reviews

First published 1959.  Sphere, paperback, 1984, pp 330, c.135,000 words. This is a clash-of-cultures book, which is Masters usual territory, but this is a clash between Americans and Spaniards in the 1950s and not the British and Indians during...

First published 1973.  Picador, paperback, 2022, translated by Howard Curtis, 2021, pp 165 (+13pp afterword by André Aciman), c.55,000 words (main text). Set largely in Rome, this book is, as much as anything, a love letter to that city in all...

First published 2000.  Faber, paperback, 2000, pp 368, c.120,000 words. This is Ishiguro’s fifth novel, appearing eighteen years after his first.  That slow pace is reflected in the quality of the writing and is both an advantage and a disadvantage. ...

First published 2021.  Penguin, paperback, 2022, pp 478, c.120,000 words. Warning: this review contains some minor plot spoilers, and as many have said, this excellent book is best first read completely cold.  Don’t even read the blurb on...

First published 1977.  Fontana, paperback, 1988, pp 338, c.110,000 words. Unusually for Innes this book has no sea voyages, with only one very brief scene involving a raft on a lake.  It is a book set in the heart of East Africa – big game...

First published 2021.  Penguin, paperback, 2022, pp 310 (including 80 pages of notes and index), c.83,000 words (main text). Kate Darling studied economics and law before teaching and researching the legal and ethical implications of technology. ...

First published 1959.  Hodder and Stoughton, paperback, 2005, pp 223, c.83,000 words. This book opened the field of military science fiction.  It may not have been the first, but it was the first to be highly successful.  The story opens...

First published 1943.  Penguin, paperback, 1979, translated by Richard and Clara Winston, 1960, pp 519, c.190,000 words. I first read this long ago, and it made a big impression on me, so I was greatly looking forward to rereading it.  The...

First published 1977.  Panther, paperback, 1979, pp 316, c.105,000 words. Classified as Science Fiction in 1979, the book has a cover showing a spaceship glowing as it dashes across a starry background.  Today it would be on the Fantasy shelves,...

First published 1946.  Unwin, paperback, 1981, pp 842 (including index of pp 51), c.390,000 words (main text). This is a heavyweight book, and not just its length but also in terms of scope and the concentration required to follow what is being...