Category Archives: Book Notes

David Wallace-Wells, THE UNINHABITABLE EARTH, post 2

Posted on Wednesday 13 April 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Resuming my summary outline from yesterday’s post.

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David Wallace-Wells, THE UNINHABITABLE EARTH, post 1

Posted on Tuesday 12 April 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Opening lines: It is worse, much worse, than you think. The slowness of climate change is a fairy tale, perhaps as pernicious as the one that says it isn’t happening at all, and comes to us bundled with several others … Continue reading →

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Carl Sagan, PALE BLUE DOT (1994), post 2

Posted on Wednesday 6 April 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

I posted about my favorite two parts of this book a week ago, in this post, and today will post a complete outline of the book based on my notes as I read, somewhat edited and slimmed down.

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Carl Sagan, PALE BLUE DOT (1994), post 1

Posted on Wednesday 30 March 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

This was one of Carl Sagan’s last books, published in 1994 (by Random House) just two years before his death in 1996. It’s subtitled “A Vision of the Human Future in Space,” though on the inside flap it’s referred to … Continue reading →

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Rolf Dobelli, STOP READING THE NEWS

Posted on Friday 25 March 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Published in German, 2019, in English, 2020, by Sceptre. This is a short book on an idea that seems counter-intuitive. But I love counter-intuitive ideas, those that challenge my provisional conclusions about the world, especially if a book on such … Continue reading →

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Arthur C. Clarke, RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA (1973)

Posted on Sunday 13 March 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

This was Clarke’s first novel after “returning” to writing novels following the break of nearly a decade collaborating with Stanley Kubrick on the book and film 2001: A Space Odyssey. (His previous major novel had been A Fall of Moondust … Continue reading →

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Daniel Keyes: FLOWERS FOR ALGERNON (1966)

Posted on Friday 11 March 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Here’s the next part of the batch of brief reviews of SF novels that I began last week. I’m now thinking, though, that with more substantial books like this one I’ll just cover one book per post — back to … Continue reading →

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SF Impressions: Chambers, Kowal, McGuire

Posted on Friday 4 March 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

As I mentioned early last week, I think I’ll start posting short reviews, or impressions, of recent SF novels I’ve read, every month or two, in groups. This is supposedly a blog mostly about science fiction, after all! These won’t … Continue reading →

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David Deutsch, THE FABRIC OF REALITY

Posted on Wednesday 2 March 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: The Science of Parallel Universes—and Its Implications. Published Aug. 1997 by Allen Lane, Penguin Press. 390pp, of which 24pp are bibliography and index. Here is a book that took me a year and a half to read, but was … Continue reading →

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Phil Plait, BAD ASTRONOMY (the book)

Posted on Thursday 24 February 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled, “Misconceptions and Misuses Revealed, from Astrology to the Moon Landing ‘Hoax’” Published in trade paperback by John Wiley & Sons, 2002.

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