This is the first John Grisham book I’ve read. Someone I work with described him as an “Airport Author”, as he’s one the classic authors you always see in airports and train stations. This would make a good holiday book, easy to read and gripping enough to make you want to find out what’s going to happen next. There were a lot of random threads in the book that I felt didn’t really need to be there. Read more...

This is one of the “SF Masterworks” that I picked up based solely on being in the collection. Most of the ones I’ve read there have been worth reading. This is an interesting concept, and reminded a bit of Ted Chaing’s “Story of Your Life”. There were parts of the book that to be honest had me a bit confused, but overall it was an interesting classic SF story.

A great collection of short stories. Some of them are quite funny and imaginative. Definitely improved by hearing them narrated by Limmy. They did start to follow a formula after a while and the book may have been better by being reduced down. I would love to see some of them as sketches!

A hilarious but honest memoir of comedian Limmy. Although this book may interest people not familiar with him, it is the sort of biography where it helps to already know a bit about Limmy before reading it.

This is a classic, and so I came in with high expectations. Although I’ve never read an Oscar Wilde book before I’ve heard a lot about him. Unfortunately, this book did not impress me. Perhaps I had built it up too much in my head. Although the basic premise was wonderful, it ended up being quite a slog for me to get through. I didn’t really connect with any of the characters, and I felt the dialogue between them all was dreadfully pretentious and boring. Read more...

This is the third Ishiguro book I’ve read, and it’s quite obvious what his writing style is now. I’m surprised he isn’t called out more for the gimicky nature of his work. Not to say it’s bad, it’s really good and I enjoyed this book. The characters, as usual for Ishiguro, are immaculately done. I found them a lot easier to like than in “The Remains of the Day”. Although, I didn’t like it as much as “Never Let Me Go”, although that would be a hard one to beat. Read more...

I’ve not read any Chinese authors before, so I was excited to pick this up. I’d only heard good things about it from other people (including Obama’s quote on the front cover), but for me it just didn’t live up to the expectations. The story did start off strong and had me intrigued as to what was going on. It evolved in a way that felt different and original to a lot of other Sci-Fi I’ve read. Read more...

I picked this up as it was on sale on Audible, and I read “Never Let Me Go” last year and loved it. Unfortunately this one didn’t resonate with me in the same way. I felt the setting and characters were done well and believable. It almost felt like there was a good story going on, but the protagonist was doing their utmost to bore me to death before I could figure it out. Read more...

I decided to get this title from Audible, as it’s not out in paperback and I just find it annoying to hold a hardback. It’s also helped during these winter months when I’ve needed a bit more motivation to get out in the dark mornings for my walk. Having a story as enthralling as this has helped give me the motivation to go out each day! And it’s worked, I average 10,000 steps per day in January. Read more...

Wow! What an exciting story going through a real bit of video game history. Doom is just a bit before my time, and I didn’t realise the groundbreaking technology that ‘id software’ was responsable for. I have fond memories of playing ‘Wolfenstein 3D’ as a kid, but reading this book has given me a greater appreciation for the significance these games have in history. This book is coming up to being a few decades old, and makes reference about John Carracks wish for a ‘metaverse’. Read more...