Eco is brilliant, and I think this is one of his most enthralling novels since Foucault's Pendulum. As in that book, conspiracies abound — freemasons, jesuits, that sort of thing — though this time in nineteenth century Europe. How …

This novel was leant to me by Nor who was recommended it by another friend. In a sort of rambling travelogue, Sebald ruminates on thoughts and stories that were triggered by wandering round on the Suffolk coastline — Lowestoft, Southwol …

This is very much a literary novel. Whatever that means. I suppose what it means is that it is written in an elegant if somewhat pretentious style and that it works on multiple levels, although it might be the case that one would need to have experi …

Sauter looks at DDoS actions to think through if they can be ethically justified — and concludes that they can, but only if they aren’t very effective. Actually her argument is rather more subtle than this, and she also makes what I thi …

Last weekend I was down in Brighton visiting friends. They took me to a wonderful place called Middle Farm, home to the National Cider and Perry collection — a cider shed housing hundreds of lovely ciders and perrys. …

At present, Nor and I are enjoying a couple of days in the hippy Mecca of the southwestern United Kingdom. I refer of course to Glastonbury, with its mysterious tor rising in the mists of Avalon, its purveyors of superstitious nick-nacks and its many oc …

A collection of various stuff that Stephenson has written including some very cyberpunk short stories, essays from Wired and a couple of interviews. The largest piece, Mother Earth, mother board is the utterly enthralling story of undersea cables, …

A genuinely disturbing account of the mendacity of French and British politicians and how they bullied, lied and backstabbed their way through 50 years of imperialism in the Middle Eas …

Here’s all the books that I read in 2015, by month. On the each month’s page there’s quick review or synopsis of each book that I read in that month. …

This was another cider that I acquired at Milletts Farm — a sort of strange family-friendly theme-farm/garden centre/petting zoo near Frilford, Oxfordshire where Nor used to go as a kid. We went there a few months back. I reviewed …