Category Archives: Book Notes

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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Timothy Snyder, ON TYRANNY (2017)

Posted on Wednesday 16 February 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: “Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century” and published in February 2017 by Tim Duggan Books. This is the third book I’ve read or reread recently with a numbered agenda, following the Zakaria book covered in previous post, and Harari’s … Continue reading →

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Fareed Zakaria, TEN LESSONS FOR A POST-PANDEMIC WORLD (2020)

Posted on Tuesday 15 February 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Here’s the next book with a numbered agenda up for summary (following Harari’s 21 Lessons). It came out in October 2020, with journalistic promptness just six or seven months after the beginning of the lockdown, though before vaccines became available … Continue reading →

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Harari Quotes from 21

Posted on Saturday 5 February 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Here are some longer quotes from Harari’s book, with some comments.

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Yuval Noah Harari, 21 LESSONS FOR THE 21ST CENTURY (post #2)

Posted on Friday 4 February 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Here’s my second concluding post about Harari’s third book. As usual, I find it hard to condense my notes too far, when the author has so many interesting things to say, especially in this second half. In the range of … Continue reading →

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