Category: Review (Page 78 of 133)

4 out of 5 stars

There are countless varieties of Orchid across the world and we are fortunate in the UK that we have around 50 odd species here. They vary from tiny example a few centimetres high to magnificent flower spikes that can reach much higher than the surrounding vegetation. They vary hugely, some are strongly perfumed, some smell rank and others are scented to attract a particular type of insect. The flowers are the thing that makes the orchid unique though, spectacular petals, mimicry of insects and gorgeous colours. They truly are a plant that are is rewarding to find and they seem to attract obsessive types (mostly men) who are utterly besotted with these beguiling plants. Jon Dunn is one of these who considers himself an addict.

To satisfy this addiction he decides to take himself on a mission to see all the species in the UK. This will take him from the Dorset coast, over the South Downs, up into Scotland and to the wild coastline of Western Ireland and back home to the very Northern Isles of our country. However, there is to this than the obsession of one man travelling backwards and forwards across the country in search of them. Some of these are really common, anyone with a small amount of research can find hundreds in the right location. Others though are much rarer, locations are often secret and frequently protected from those that seek to have these for themselves. As he ticks them off the list he tells the stories behind each one of these elusive and beautiful plants.

It is an enjoyable book about one slightly obsessed man’s quest to see and photograph every species of orchid in the UK and a brief sojourn to New York. It reminded me of The Orchid Hunter where Leif Bersweden undertakes a very similar pilgrimage to find the same plants. One to read if you have a general interest in plants and botany, and has a stunning cover. If there is one thing that lets the book down is that there are no photos. Thankfully they are available on Jon’s website here, and they are a stunning set of images.

5 out of 5 stars

Cohen can remember many things, the time when heroes didn’t need to worry about offending people or be concerned by the ruminations of anyone in the legal industry and he wasn’t that concerned about civilisation. The thing that he was struggling to remember though, was where he’d left his teeth.

However, that is not the important thing, Cohen and his Silver Horde, ancient heroes from all over the Disc are on a final quest to visit the Gods. They are returning to the Gods what was stolen by the first hero but with added interest, with the intention of obliterating their mountain home, Cori Celesti. So that their monumental quest can be immortalised and passed into lore, they have, shall we say, persuaded a bard to come along and create the saga.

The Wizards of the Unseen University are in a bit of a panic about this. Destroying Cori Celesti will cause the magic of Discworld to cease holding together the Disc and it will be curtain for everyone. Lord Vetinari recruits Leonard of Quirm, who sets about designing the Discworld’s second known spacecraft, The Kite. This is powered by dragons and will slingshot around the world and land in the home of the Gods. Leonard of Quirm, Captain Carrot Ironfoundersson, and a very reluctant Rincewind are to be the pilots of the craft and they are launched on their mission to say the world, except unbeknown to them, they have an extra passenger on board.

It this to be the end of the world as they know it, or will another hero save the day?

It has been a long while since I read a Pratchett book, and I forgot how much I love his writing. His managed to perfectly blend a carefully crafted plot, with humour, steampunk gadgets, and of course the librarian. Pratchett really was the comic fantasy master, and The Last Hero is as good as I’d expected. It is helped by the fantastic art by illustrator Paul Kidby turns the fine plot into this fantastic technicolour extravaganza.

3.5 out of 5 stars

War poetry has normally been set on the battlefield, the place where war and death were much more personal, tangible and raw. What Morgan has done here is to consider the position of those that were the hands-on people looking after the nuclear deterrent and considered how they felt about their role. For this, he has borrowed heavily from his father’s experience in the R. A. F. Airborne Nuclear Deterrent.

It is a long poem too, taking up the entire book, but he mixes prose and stanza to move between the different voices that he uses in the book. This change of pace in the various parts of the poem conveys many things, the pressure that the pilots were under as they carried their deadly cargo, the almost gallows humour that they had to not think about the consequences of them having to carry out the task they were employed to do as well as the secrecy of the task in hand.

At night he matches its motions to

the pulse of an atomic clock

where forward change is marked and set

by nuclear decay,

each measure to show how far we’ve come

how far we’ve still to go

It is a powerful poem, and it reminded me of the dread that I used to feel with the cold war in the early 1980s and the horrific promise of Mutually Assured Destruction that was almost palpable in the air at the time. I really liked the mix of styles throughout the book, it made it much more readable and fitted well with what he was doing by coming from different perspectives. This is the first of Morgan’s poetry books that I had read and I will definitely be reading more.

4.5 out of 5 stars

A  man dressed in a drab grey suit standing in a street corner in the middle of Moscow looking like the other citizens passing him by would have been almost unnoticeable, but because he was holding a plastic bag from the British supermarket, Safeway, for the people looking out for him he stood out like a beacon. He was not a regular Soviet citizen, he was a senior KGB officer and he had just activated his escape plan. He now had to hope that his signal had been noticed by those who needed to see it and not by those that were hunting for him.

In the world of smoke and mirrors that constitutes the fragmented world of the intelligence agencies, the truth is often stranger than fiction and often way beyond that. No one would have thought that pillars of the establishment would have spied for the Russians, but when Philby and his cohorts defected it was realised that your background was not a passport to trust. The same logic could have been applied to Oleg Gordievsky. His father and brother were KGB officers and staunch supporters of the regime but he carried a secret that not even his KGB wife knew. For the past eleven years, he had been a spy for MI6.

In this book, Macintyre takes us right through Gordievsky’s life, from his earliest days in the KGB, his realisation that the regime that he worked for did not suit his growing liberal outlook the horror he experience when he was there when the Berlin Wall went up. He has his first contact with MI6 in the early 1970s when he was based in Denmark. For MI6 it seemed too good to be true and they took a while to realise that he was not going to be a double agent, but he was for real and had a genuine and personal reason for passing on the information that he did. As he rose in the rank he managed to get a posting to the UK, ideal for MI6 as they could meet him under much more relaxed circumstances. That was until he was recalled to Moscow suddenly, he knew he had been betrayed, but he didn’t know just by who or how much.

MI6 knew that things were not right and set about implementing the escape plan that they had codenamed Pimlico to snatch Gordievsky right from under the noses of the KGB and spirit him across the border to freedom.

The book is pieced together from a series of interviews that Macintyre has completed with the people involved in his unique case. The actual files concerning Gordievsky are still secret and I guess that they will remain that way for a long time. It reads like an actual spy thriller most of the time, including a stunning ending as they try to get him out of the Soviet Union. Gordievsky is still alive and well and living under an assumed name somewhere in the home counties. Given the reach of the FSB, his home is under 24-hour surveillance. One countries spy is another countries traitor, but from the accounts in here, it could be said that he helped stop nuclear war and bring about the demise of the totalitarian state. Another stunning book from Macintyre

3.5 out of 5 stars

Before 2008 the record for cycling 18,000 miles stood at 276 days and 19 hours. Then Mark Beaumont smashed it by completing the same distance in a staggering 194 days and 17 hours. He managed this unsupported and had 30kg of equipment, clothing and camping gear on his bike. Since then he has cycled the length of the American and African continents, climbed the odd mountain and tried to row across an ocean. Since then various people had beaten his record and it stood at 123 days and 43 minutes set by the New Zealander Andrew Nicholson for his unsupported circumnavigation in 2015.

However, Mark had plans to take the record back again, big plans. Inspired by the Jules Vern story, Around the World in 80 days, he calculated that he could cycle the required 18,000 miles with the appropriate allowances for transfers between the continents by doing a staggering 240 miles per day. Every day. To do this though he needed a large team of people and an even larger amount of sponsorship. As he started putting out the feelers for those wanting to support him. As people begun to support him in this monumental challenge, he began to form a team, however, he knew he needed to get the miles in with training for this epic ride. He decided to cycle around the coast of the UK to get a feel for the mileage. He called it The Leg Stretcher, and he would travel 3500 miles heading off clockwise from London. It took him 14.5 days…

After a few minor finance hiccups, with people stepping in to help ensure that he could do it. He began his journey at the Arc de Triomphe as he did all those years before. His route around the world would take him all across Eurasia, then Australia and New Zealand. From there he would head to America and Canada before arriving back in Europe for the final jaunt back to Paris. Not only was this a relentless physical journey, but he would suffer setbacks, accidents, low points and ache continuously. He would also see amazing sights and be lifted by the people who rode with him on his relentless schedule or who took the time to show that their support.

It wouldn’t be much of a spoiler to say that he completed the challenge, there wouldn’t be a book if he hadn’t.  He managed to obliterate the record for the second time in his life coming in 45 days faster with a new record of 78 days, 14 hours and 40 minutes. It is a stunning achievement for endurance cycling and to show the limits of human endurance, but this sort of achievement can really only be done with teams of support crew to enable him to cycle 240 miles in one day. I think that he can safely say that the record will be his for the foreseeable future. Not totally sure it is a travel book though as he is going so fast around the world that the human interaction that you’d get from a travel book really isn’t there. This is another really enjoyable book from Beaumont and if you have read his others then this should be on your reading list.

4 out of 5 stars

The perfect review for this book on Silence would be:

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Sadly the modern world isn’t like that. We are bombarded by a cacophony of sounds and noise all day long. Our phones squeak for attention every few minutes, the noise from traffic on a road is constant over the course of a day, even most modern kitchen appliances make lots of unnecessary beeps even when you turn them on and off now days. Is there anywhere that could be described as silent on our planet? Even in a meadow on an almost still day, there will be the buzz of bees and the sound of grass moving.

Erling Kagge once spent almost two months walking solo in Antarctica with a broken radio and whilst I can imagine that this wasn’t silent given the way that the winds can howl across that landscape. The lack of radio meant that he was far away from the human generated din of the world. This time alone with the sounds of his internal voices and the natural world gave him time to think about how silence could benefit other people as well as him.

The result of that walk became the contents of this book. In here he explores various elements of silence for example, how it has almost disappeared from modern life in Western cultures and how the absence of noise looms large in our fears. But if you take the time to search it out, you can find silence in all sort of places; places where you enjoy the total absence of any of the noise of the modern world. As there is always some noise somewhere, Kagge argues that this is a skill that we need to relearn for our own calm and for meditative purposes. I really enjoyed this book as it gave me lots to think about with respect to the noise that I encounter every day. As a small aside, it is a beautifully produced book too with lots of pictures of a polar landscape.

3 out of 5 stars

The narrator of the book is currently expecting her second child, with her partner, Johannes. This second time around in her life is causing her to contemplate the relationships that she had with her late grandmother and her mother, as well as the effects of having a second child will have on the bond she has with her daughter. To better comprehend the complexity of being a parent and a child at the same time she spends time in the Wellcome Trust library reading various books. Whilst she is in the library she discovers and reads the works of Wilhelm Röntgen, and the X-Rays he discovered, and about Anna Freud, daughter of the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud’s and John Hunter, the pioneer of modern surgery.

There was a lot that I liked about this book; the recollection of her childhood with her grandmother and the time that she spent there and her looking after her mother at the end of her life and how she sees her kinship developing with her own children make for fascinating reading. She has a beautiful way of writing too, it is sparse and yet eloquent.
However, I thought that the wandering off into the realms of Freud and the other medical practitioners really didn’t fit with the rest of the story for me. I get the psychoanalyst link to Freud with her grandmother, but it distracted from the story. Greengrass is definitely an author to watch though.

This is one of the books longlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize. For more details about the other books on the list and to find out more about the prize click here

4 out of 5 stars

Monisha Rajesh’s family had moved over from India a while ago, but in 1991 they decided that they wanted to move back. Heading to Madras, they lasted two years before concluding they preferred the cold climate of the UK over rats and severed body parts. Twenty years later, she has the urge to return once again to India, but how to see it. An idea forms based on Jules Verne’s classic Around the world in 80 Days and she starts researching the railways of India hoping to find 80 separate train journey’s that would take her around the country and help her to re-discover it. But first, she needed a companion for her adventure. Fortunately, she knew a photographer who had some spare time and he agreed to come with her.

Her journey would take her across India from top to bottom, and right into the far reaches of the country. She passes through well-known cities like Mumbai and Delhi to places that are only known to the locals. Each journey was different and a challenge to all the senses from the sleekest sleeper trains to the carriages where she shared space with the mass of humanity each on their own personal journey. Herr companion, Passepartout, though turned out to be a radical atheist who was continually challenged and assaulted by the cacophony of sights and sounds in this deeply devout country.

A romantic evening haze hung over the treetops that sped past. I soon realised that this was a layer of filth on the window…

I thought that this was a really enjoyable account of a series of trip backwards and forwards around the subcontinent of India. Rajesh conveys the character of the country really well from the people that she meets on the trains as well as being able to draw on her dual cultural identity to understand the context of what she is seeing. Mixed with this is a blend of historical and personal anecdotes and written in a warm and conversational style. It is also a warning to choose your travelling companions wisely too…

3 out of 5 stars

A copy of this was provided free of charge from the publisher in return for an honest review.

Work is a four letter work according to my long retired father. He is lucky to have left the world of work when he did, before the advent of 24 / 7 emails and messaging, constant stress and the relentless pace that we have today. Work can be a positive thing but it feels at the moment that there is no relief from it. The view from the treadmill of the people burning themselves out, seeing those that are choosing not to do anything is not always the best encouragement.

From his position as a psychoanalyst, Cohen looks at the four faces of inertia – the burnout, the slob, the daydreamer and the slacker. Using these generic themes he looks at four people, Andy Warhol, Orson Welles, Emily Dickinson and David Foster Wallace, who have shown strong signs of these types of inactivity. From these specific profiles, he poses the questions on how we might live a different and more contented life in the modern world.

There were several parts of this that I liked, in particular, the mini-biographies of the four people he uses to expand on the points he was making. However, I did find that he asked a lot of questions, but it felt like the answers were a little lacking as to how we set about unwinding our own personal addictions to the workplace. It would have been good to have methods to mitigate the effects that overwork has on our health and society. It did make for an interesting read though.

There are a large number of people who only go outside if they have to, moving between house and car, car and office and almost never take the time to walk away from the asphalt, away from the modern technology and rediscover the wild. The evidence is starting to grow too that this is an essential part of our psyche and how spending just a short amount of time outdoors has significant short and long term benefits.

With the aim of encouraging people to head outdoors, Simon Bares has selected twenty-three different simple steps that anyone can do for almost no budget or a very small one. Example of the ideas that he suggests are always taking a plastic bag with you as the best way to start to see wildlife is to sit still and to sit still for a long time, it is not easy doing so with a wet bum. The same logic applies to getting waterproof trousers to make it more comfortable when out and about in inclement weathers. He will suggest when it is in your interest to spend some money. For example, investing in a bat detector or buying a decent set of binoculars will pay dividends. He recommends buying the best you can afford with sound advice on what to get depending on the sorts of things that you are wanting to look at.

The best thing about this book is that it is peppered with advice about the inexpensive ways to see wildlife. Taking time to slow down and let it come to you rather than crashing through the undergrowth and scaring it away. Also, sage wisdom is taking the time to celebrate everything that you see. You should get the same pleasure as you would seeing a red admiral as you would a purple emperor, Barnes argues.

The most important thing that you can do though is to invest time in getting outdoors and seeing what is around in your local area. For those that can’t do that, then put out bird feeders and put plants in your garden that attract insects. Start off simply and build up. You do not need to be an expert, just a change in attitude and the wild world can be yours.