The New Northern Rambler

2022-01-31

"Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law" by Mary Roach

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

ISBN: 9781324001843

This book is Ms. Roach's seventh, and it is just as delightfully informative and fun to read as all the others.

In Fuzz she investigates the world of interactions between humans and nature. Some of these are extremely funny, while others are rather tragic, and unfortunately it's usually nature that gets the fuzzy end of the lollipop, but not always.

She investigates human interactions with bears, elephants, leopards, macaques, cougars, trees, beans, birds and then goes on to look at what the human animal does to prevent their cousins from doing what they do naturally by digging into how to scare animals away, pest removal, and also gene manipulation.

Like her other books (Grunt, Gulp, Packing for Mars, Bonk, Spook, and Stiff - I'll leave it to you to figure out what they are about), the amount of research she does is absolutely incredible, and the detail that this produces on the page is astounding.

Looking forward to book #8!

2022-01-24

"Dome" by Michael Reeves and Steve Perry

Publisher: Berkley Books

ISBN: 0425095606

Dome is an extremely well written, and well plotted out novel. That tells the tale of a massive, mostly completed, mobile underwater city and it's inhabitants. Now while this might not seem too exciting, things do become very interesting early on in the book when a nuclear detonation/test is conducted in Asia that triggers a number of volcanic events throughout the world.

These "natural"" disasters trigger a number of political events that lead to a limited nuclear war between Vietnam and Laos, and when one shot misses its intended target and ends up in Cambodia they retaliate with banned bacteriological weapons, that have mutated and these spread to devastate the surface of the earth.

The characters in this novel are quite memorable, and you really get a feeling that they could be actual people, which at least in my books, is an excellent way of doing characterization.

The action is fast-paced, and the writing style very concise. The story is told from multiple perspectives at one time and this leads the reader to be even more involved in the actual story. Even though it was written 34 years ago the technology is not dated, and the science itself is sound. I was some somewhat sceptical with regard to the genetics / biological part of the science, but it sounded good, and this is not something I have studied my so it may very well be perfectly legitimate but I don't know.

Well worth the read, highly recommended.

2022-01-17

"Gender: Your Guide" by Lee Airton

Publisher: Adams Media

ISBN: 9781507209004

This was a very interesting book, that gave me a lot of useful information and explained a number of concepts that were to be honest a little confusing to me. In my own defence however a number of the ideas and concepts (for lack of a better word) that were presented in this book were ones that I have never been faced with, and therefore had never considered.

The writing was clear, but at times did tend to be a little too much to absorb at one time, so I believe this book could easily be expanded with more examples both of the difficulties the LGBTQ community comes across as well as solutions to those difficulties.

Highly recommended, especially to anyone who finds themselves dealing with young people and the struggles they have encountered, or possibly may encounter in the future.

2022-01-10

"The Bayern Agenda" by Dan Moren

Publisher: Angry Robot

ISBN: 9780857668202

It's been along time since I read a good spy novel, but this definitely made up for it. As Anthony Johnson commented on the cover "like John le Carré meets The Stainless Steel Rat ...", which aptly he describes this novel. For those not in the know John le Carré is the author of "Tinker, Taylor, Soldier, Spy" which is a novel about British intelligence. On the other hand "The Stainless Steel Rat" is a series by the late Harry Harrison that deals with the life of a professional criminal in the far future. Both are excellent authors and these series are definitely worth reading too.

However, back to the Bayern Agenda which deals with a cold war a few hundred years in the future and the clandestine operations of agents on both sides. So far there are only two books in the series, and I'm looking forward to reading the second one.

There is some political intrigue, some clandestine operations, a fair bit of humor which always makes for a good story. The world building seems to be very well taken care of, and even though the standard tropes of faster than light travel (via wormhole), anti-gravity generators etc. are used Mr. Moran's universe is consistent, and believable.

Looking forward to reading the second book in the series.

2022-01-03

"Fifty Animals that Changed the Course of History" by Eric Chaline

Publisher: Firefly Books

ISBN: 9781554078974

Fifty Animals is an interesting book that gives the readers some very interesting information on the animals that author choose. Some of the animals are or should be expected such as the horse, cow, sheep, goat, dog, cat, pig, cod, goat, herring, chicken, turkey, and other ones that are typically seen in relation of humans.

On the other hand there are some that most people would expect unless they gave it a lot of thought such as spiny dye-murex, bald eagle, cochineal, seal, rabbit, chimpanzee, lion, seal, and oyster. And there are others that are quite unexpected such as cobra, louse, dodo, schistosome, leech, rat flea, Darwin's finches.

The book is quite well written, and an easy read and is suitable for younger readers. The only criticism I have is that lack of citations as it does tend to make me curious about some of the information that was presented. There are sections entitled "Further Reading" and "Useful Websites" but none of these entries are linked to the individual animal entries.

2021-12-27

"Saucer" by Stephen Coonts

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffen

ISBN: 0312283423

Saucer tells the tale of a seismic survey team in the central Sahara who find an actual flying saucer entombed in the side of a sandstone cliff.

The story's protagonist is Rip Cantrell an engineering student who is working on the team as part of a summer job, when he first spots a bright flash of light being reflected off the skin of the saucer which had become slightly uncovered. After uncovering the saucer over a number of days, they engage the services of an archaeologist who is at a dig a short distance away. They determine that it had been there for some 140,000 years, and this is just the beginning of their adventures.

Much to their dismay their discovery is soon found out by the United States Airforce, an Australian billionaire, and the Libyan military. All of whom claim ownership, or at least intend on keeping the saucer for their own.

This book is a fast paced read, that is written as if it could really have happened (at least when you ignore the anti-gravity technology, and a couple of other science fiction tropes). There is significant amount of political intrigue and corruption, that sets the stage for an interesting story, and gives it the link to world events in the first part of the 21st century.

A good read. There is a sequel to this book which I will review in the future.

2021-12-20

"The 99% Invisible City: A Field Guide to the Hidden World of Everyday Design" by Roman Mars and Kurt Kohlstedt

This is an extremely interesting book that examines the hidden stories behind some rather common things that are found in your typical city. The format of the book divides the topic into six areas focusing on inconspicuous, conspicuous, infrastructure, architecture, geography and urbanism. Within each of the larger topics there are discussion on a number of different subjects. Some of these are utility codes, wireless towers, love locks, civic monuments, traffic lights, inflatable figures, roadways, technology, modern elevators, door locks, the layout of streets and roads, street trees, and grassroots gardening to name but a few of the over 125 topics.

I picked this book up after watching Mars' TED Talk primarily out of curiosity, but found it to be a very interesting read. The majority of his examples come from the United States, but he does look at things in other countries as well. For people who like trivia, or compete in quiz tournaments this could be an interesting book to read. As a writer, I found it quite interesting, and think it would make wonderful source material especially for those who write mysteries and need a source of information they can use for obscure clues.

Roman Mars is the host of 99% Invisible a popular podcast that explores these same types of things. While Kurt Kohlstedt is the digital director of the podcast and an architect.

An excellent book.

2021-12-13

"Barefoot in Baker Street" by Charlotte Anne Walters

Publisher: MX Publishing

ISBN: 9781780920139

Barefoot on Baker Street tells the story of a young girl by the name of Red who escapes from a London workhouse at 13. She is forced into a life of crime as a means of survival. The story follows her life journey, and is written as a memoir that is found a number of years after she dies.

The story takes place at the same time as the Arthur Conan Doyle Sherlock Holmes stories, and includes events from a number of the publish canon. Including "The Blue Carbuncle", "The Empty House", "The Sign of Four", "The Final Solution", "The Man with the Twisted Lip", and glimpses of a number of others.

I found it be an enjoyable read, and one that I think fills in a lot of the backstory to Sherlock Holmes that has never been mentioned (to the best of my knowledge) but is very much in tune with what I believe Conan Doyle would've written.

I found Ms. Walters' Moriarity to be quite interesting, and unlike what a number of other writers have done by portraying him as essentially a sociopath or worse. Her portrayal of him as an autistic savant I found to be very interesting and believable. We also learned a great deal about Dr. John Watson, and his private life that I believe once again Conan Doyle would approve of.

Highly recommended, but it can be rather hard to find.