Latest book you've read

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson.

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I’ve just finished “The Dark Archive” by Genevieve Cogman, which is the seventh book in the “Invisible Library” series. (Start at the beginning if you want to read these, or you’ll be utterly lost.)

There are multiple worlds, many (all? I can’t remember redface) of which which are versions of Earth, but at different time periods and with other variations. Chief of these is the level of order or chaos in a given world. High-order worlds are suited to the Dragons (who take an almost human form for their interactions with other species), while high-chaos worlds are favoured by the Fae. Humans are found everywhere.

The Library exists to maintain the balance between and within worlds, which it does by acquiring certain books from each world - by buying, trading or stealing. The job is not made any easier by the mutual distrust and hatred which exists between Dragons and Fae. Irene Winters is a Librarian who has managed to work with both species, and is now the Library’s representative in an inter-species peace initiative.

Being a Librarian is not a career for the faint-hearted. In this instalment, Irene and her friends are being targeted by an unknown assassin. Is it because of her connection to the peace treaty? A personal grudge against her? Or is it one of her friends who is the real target and she just happens to be in the way?

I really enjoy these books for the unusual setting of multiple worlds and the way these have been imagined. I also like the Language - a special language used only by Librarians which has a kind of magic power, but to use it requires well-thought-out, clear instructions. It’s exactly the kind of magic language which befits librarians. smile

The books are well-written, with a nice touch of humour. It’s hard to know how to describe them, as they’re unlike anything else I’ve read. Fantasy steam-punk thrillers, maybe.

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I’ve just finished “Elevator Pitch” by Linwood Barclay. I always enjoy his stuff, and it was nice to see that, for this book at least, he’d dropped the formulaic “main character does something completely unexpected or has unexpected secret” that seems to be in most of his books. A good read, someone is sabotaging elevators in New York.

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I’ve just finished “The Snowdonia Killings” by Simon McCleave, an enjoyable story set in North Wales, although we do have the cliches of a cop moving from the big city to the country with personal problems, and another cop with a drinking problem. A good enough story, I’ll look out for more of his as it turns out there are quite a few.

Interesting thing - the day after I started reading it, I suddenly start seeing posts from the author on Facebook. I didn’t buy the book online - I bought it from a car boot sale, I think - and hadn’t mentioned it online either. Spooky.

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Do you have Alexa and had you talked about it within her "ear"shot?

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No, I don’t have anything like that. Phone isn’t online, so it couldn’t have tracked me to the car boot sale and put me near to someone who posted that they’d just sold the book, either.

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I finished Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness.
Book by Bruce Rosenblum and Fred Kuttner

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The little dictionary of fashion. it’s really awesome book for improving our fashion style.

I’ve been re-reading the Percy Jackson and the Olympians book series and I’m on the second book now, Sea of Monsters. It was nice to relieve my teenage mythology-driven years.

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I’ve just finished “Not Dark Yet”, the latest DCI Banks novel by Peter Robinson, very much enjoyed it. I think it follows on quite quickly from the previous one, but it’s ages since I read that and I can’t properly remember. Very good though, as always.

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I’ve just finished “In Stitches”, written by Accident and Emergency doctor Nick Edwards, a description of life as a hospital doctor in the National Health Service here in the UK. It’s pretty entertaining, lots of anecdotes, though it gets a bit too political for my liking and is sometimes a bit repetitive - there’s no need to keep banging on about the four-hour treatment target, we get it, you don’t like it. A decent read though.

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I’m a slow reader. About two years ago I decided to read the Bible. I’ve read the whole new testament and now I’m through the half of the old testament. I wasn’t expecting the stories to be so interesting and involving for me, especially in regards to the old testament. However, there’s much content per the amount of words so it takes me much longer to read than usual books. Probably it’ll be half a year or so before I finish it all.

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I’ve just finished “Knife Edge” by Simon Mayo. A terror organisation seems to be targeting a press organisation, a couple of their journalists are trying to find out why while trying to stay alive. A good read, enjoyed it.

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Have you read “This is going to hurt” by Adam Kay. Very good.

I think I’ve heard of it, but I don’t think I’ve read it. I’ll keep a look out for it.

It’s both funny and poignant.

I’m not sure you class this as “read”, but I’m currently reading ‘How the Word is Passed’ by Clint Smith. It covers the author’s journey around a number of plantations, monuments and landmarks involved with slavery in the US. It looks at the history of the people held as slaves, as well as the attitudes of those who held them in that condition. The author’s style of prose is disarming in way, to the point where you could almost be reading a fictional account of what took place, mainly due to the detail in which the author’s travel around these places is described; the people, places, documents etc. This is well worth a read.

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I’ve just finished the book “The richest man in Babylon”

I’ve just finished “The Einstein Pursuit” by Chris Kuzneski. It was OK, probably would make a decent enough action film if you weren’t bothered about the story line too much. Someone is killing or capturing the world’s top scientists and a couple of people are trying to stop them, with a small amount of help from Interpol.

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I’ve just finished “Find you first” by Linwood Barclay. A rich man learns that he has a terminal illness and wants to find the children he may have through a fertility clinic donation years before. A good read, and away from his formula of having a massive twists quite early on.

Prior to that I read “Win” by Harlan Coben. Featuring the old sidekick from the Myron Bolitar books, Win looks into an incident from his family history and finds a bit more than he was expecting. Another good book, and a while since I’ve read any by this author.

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