Category: Review
You need these reviews in your life.
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A Short History of Nearly Everything
A rare DNF for the Neilos Reading Machine. Made it to page 92 and tapped out, just couldn’t keep my eyes open. This is a good book, and I feel it is worthy of a review despite my not being able to get through it. Bill Bryson is a bestselling travel author who, back in… Read more
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Analog Science Fiction and Fact Sept/Oct 2024
From an editorial review: The September/October 2024 issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact delivers a robust balance of rigorous, hard sci-fi worldbuilding, procedural mysteries, and thoughtful examinations of near-future sociology. Edited by Trevor Quachri, this double issue continues the magazine’s long-standing tradition of grounding speculative concepts in plausible scientific realities while expanding its narrative boundaries. Could… Read more
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Conrad’s Fate
Overview and Context This was, as one editorial review put it, a wild romp! Conrad’s Fate is a young adult fantasy novel by Diana Wynne Jones, published in 2005. It is the fifth chronological novel in the acclaimed Chrestomanci series, though it serves as a prequel to the events of The Magicians of Caprona and… Read more
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Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang
Overview This is a masterpiece. You are likely thinking, “Neilos says things like that in a lot of his reviews.” That’s true, but rather than saying, “no this time I really mean it” I will say that the reason is I read a lot of great books. Not all of them, what fun would that… Read more
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R is for Rocket
Overview: This was amazing. Overview with more than three words: Published in 1962 by Doubleday (and subsequently as the version I read, a popular Bantam paperback), R is for Rocket serves as a curated introduction to the lyrical prose and speculative imagination of Ray Bradbury. While many of the seventeen stories had appeared in earlier… Read more
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The Skin Map
Well, this was not good. Not good at all. I’m not going to pan it and trash it, the author writes fairly well but this book was all over the (skin) map and was a real slog to get through. Remember, I’ve been through Life of Johnson and Decline and Fall so when I say… Read more
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Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha
I want just one Irish author to write in a style other than stream of consciousness, even just once. James Joyce kicked it off with Portrait of the Artist, then Sam Beckett carried the ball with Murphy and various other novels, and now Roddy Doyle has entered the chat. I did not like this book,… Read more
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The October Country
Ray Bradbury’s The October Country, first published in 1955, serves as a definitive cornerstone of American gothic and macabre literature. This collection contains nineteen stories, most of which were revised from his earlier work in Dark Carnival. The anthology captures Bradbury’s transition from the visceral pulp horror of the 1940s to the more psychological, poetic prose that… Read more
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Shadow Show
Review: I loved this book. Like any anthology some of the stories I liked better than others, but I can attest that all were excellent. Edited by Sam Weller and Mort Castle, Shadow Show isn’t just a tribute; it’s a vibrant, eclectic laboratory where some of the biggest names in modern fiction attempt to capture… Read more
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The King in Yellow
Review: I picked this book at random from my bookshelf, always a good way to get out of any reading ruts we tend to fall into. So, how to describe this. First published in 1895, The King in Yellow is a work of weird fiction and horror. First off let me say weird fiction is an actual… Read more