Review: Sell Us The Rope, by Stephen May
A new novel about the congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party of 1907? Starring Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin and Rosa Luxemburg? What’s not to like? And the book’s premise — that Stalin was a…
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Israel: From protest to politics
I was recently invited by some Israeli leftists to participate in a discussion about what’s happening with the protest movement that is currently confronting the Netanyahu government. The title they gave to the discussion was…
Review: Pines, by Blake Crouch
I’ve been reading a lot of books by Blake Crouch, some I liked more than others. Pines is the first of the “Wayward Pines” trilogy, a series of books inspired by the television series “Twin…
Review: The Future of an Illusion, by Sigmund Freud
In 1927 Sigmund Freud was 71 years old and in failing health when he wrote this short book about religion. The title is a misnomer — there is hardly anything about the future here at…
Review: Patriots, by Peter Morgan
As I sometimes do, I saw this play recently and decided to read the text later. It was a very good play — and it is a superb text. This is the story of Russian…
Review: Upgrade, by Blake Crouch
I loved Dark Matter, I liked Recursion, and I had high hopes for this book too. But I was disappointed. While the other books by Blake Crouch were about theoretical physics (in a sense), with…
Azerbaijan: Labour activists targeted as new unions emerge
In places where existing trade unions fail to organise workers, new unions will often emerge to fill the gap. And those new unions will sometimes be the subject of state repression as a result. This…
Review: Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch
Blake Crouch seems to make a habit of taking great ideas for science fiction novels, going as far as he can with the idea — and then going further. Much further. So this book, which…
Review: Fast This Way: Burn Fat, Heal Inflammation and Eat Like the High-Performing Human You Were Meant to Be, by Dave Asprey
I could be nasty and summarise this book in one sentence: fast for 16 hours a day and make sure to drink Dave Asprey’s Bulletproof Coffee. Because it gets a little bit annoying (more than…
Review: Recursion by Blake Crouch
“False Memory Syndrome” sounds like a real thing, and it is. It is also the starting point for this outstanding thriller which is part time travel, part love story. It is a book, above all,…