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The World According to Jeremy Clarkson

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Like On Cars, this book is a collection of Clarkson's newspaper articles. These articles are relatively recent though (post 2001), and cover a much smaller span. This book focuses on things other than cars, and Clarkson's opinions range from sensible and thoughtful to outright weird. I read this book during a series of take offs and landings of flights when they wouldn't let me use my e-book reader, and that worked well. I wouldn't want to sit down to read this entire book front to back. [isbn: 9781856132626]

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The Diamond Age

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I loved this book. I think its going on my list of all time favorites. The first half of the book is better than the second, but I think that might be because young Nell resonated much more strongly with me than older Nell. I read this book because it came up at a scientific conference where I went to a presentation about 3D fabrication, and its now entirely clear why the presenter thought this was relevant, given 3D nanotech fabrication plays a strong part in this book. Excellent read.

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Old Twentieth

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This is actually a relatively simple story, but padded out with a series of historical interludes. These are presented as when the main character is exploring a VR world, but most of them don't directly further the plot. However, they also don't make the story drag along, and are some of the most entertaining parts of the story. Relatively light reading, like The Coming and Marsbound. I enjoyed it.

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Their Finest Hour

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This book is a disappointment. I was excited about another Bolo book, but this one is all republished stories I'd previously read: Combat Unit (Keith Laumer): appeared in The Compleat Bolo. Lost Legion (S. M. Stirling): appeared in Bolos 1: Honor of the Regiment. A Time to Kill (David Weber): appeared in Bolos 4: Last Stand. Operation Desert Fox (Mercedes Lackey and Larry Dixon): appeared in

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Solomon’s Gold

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This is book six of the Baroque Cycle, following on from Quicksilver, King of the Vagabonds, Odalisque, Bonanza, and The Juncto (the last two of which are referred to as The Confusion when read together as a single volume). I'm glad that I accidentally read Longitude before this book, as in this work Daniel is a proponent of the lunar distance method, which was one of the main contenders to win the Longitude Prize. Lord Ravenscar proposed the prize in the book, which is a nice plot element. He of course wants to win the prize as well. This book is much faster moving than most of the previous (except perhaps for King of the Vagabonds and Bonanza). Its a good read, and I can see how all of the previous setup is starting to pay off. [isbn: 0060750863;0060895284]

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Asimov’s Aurora

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This is the third and final book in the iBook Asimov Robots spinoff series. The first two were Asimov's Mirage and Asimov's Chimera. Like the second one, this is better than the first and has a nice flow to the plot line. The story also is easier to believe than those used in previous spinoffs such as the Robot City and Robots and Aliens series. Weirdly, this is the first of the books in those spinoff series to really use sex as a plot element. The other books haven't been celibate, but they also haven't been as in your face as this one. That was probably the weakest part of the book, because those parts felt clumsy and extraneous.

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Mona Lisa Overdrive

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This is the book which wraps up the Sprawl series (Burning Chrome, Neuromancer and Count Zero). Its a great book, with several separate story lines which are beautifully molded together by the end of the book. It also wraps up the confusing elements of the various other stories nicely. I really enjoyed it.

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Longitude

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This is the story of John Harrison, the inventor of modern accurate clocks. Its an interesting read, and very engaging for a non-fiction book. I think this is helped by the conversational style of the book, and the fact that its not terribly long. A good read. [isbn: 1857025717]

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Space Soldiers

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This is a collection of short stories about soldiers in space. Its not the strongest such collection I have read -- Battlefields Beyond Tomorrow, Body Armor 2002 and Dogs of War are all better. The Gardens of Saturn (Paul J McAuley): veterans with jacked up nervous systems encounter genetically engineered people in deep space. Soldiers Home (William Barton): veterans and other castoffs from conflict struggle to find meaning in continued existence. Legacies (Tom Purdom): a not particularly interesting story about the psychological impact of losing a parent to war. Oh, except we don't really talk about the impact. We talk about the bureaucracy around getting permission to treat. Dull. Moon Duel (Fritz Leiber): an interesting concept (interstellar criminals abandoned on the moon). A bit dated, but ok apart from that. Saviour (Robert Reed): another good concept, but I don't think this story is particularly well written. Galactic North (Alastair Reynolds): a relativistic chase across deep space with a confusing terraforming gone wrong subplot. Masque of the Red Shift (Fred Saberhagen): this is the second Berserker story I've read (the other is "What Do You Want Me To Do To Prove Im Human Stop" from Battlefields Beyond Tomorrow. It was ok,…

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