Category: Book Review

A Tale of Two Surgeons

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A Tale of two Surgeons It’s always interesting when you get two books with the same title covering similar ground. Here we have the tale of two Star Surgeons, both books exploring the idea of medical care with non-human patients. Star Surgeon (1963) by James White and Star Surgeon (1959) by Alan E. Nourse. James White’s Star Surgeon is the second book in his 12 book Sector General series, although they link chronologically they can be read individually. Alan E. Nourse’s Star Surgeon is a stand alone Juvenile Science Fiction…

Black Fire by Sonni Cooper

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The Vulcan with the Jewel Earring As always I believe that we all judge books by their covers, otherwise why bother with one? The cover of Black Fire is a gorgeous painting of Kirk and Spock by the renowned fantasy artist Boris Vallejo. Once past the cover it starts with a glowing introduction from Theodore Sturgeon, this could be seen as a misstep as if you get someone with his reputation saying how good your book is it does put expectations very high. Sonni Cooper was once the publicist for…

Artemis by Andy Weir

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A Fun Crime Caper in a Hostile Environment Andy Weir’s rise to prominence with The Martian (2011) is well known, he started by serialising it on his website and then released a kindle version which shot to the top of the Kindle charts. This attracted the attention of publishers with whom he then managed to get a publishing deal with. Following up the success of The Martian was never going to be easy, and reading comments on Artemis has shown a mixed response. I congratulate Andy Weir of trying to…

City by Clifford D. Simak

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Picture of a book shop with words Book review over it along with the cover of City by Clifford Simak

A Lamentation to Mankind City is a Post Apocalyptic novel, don’t let anyone tell you any different. The Apocalypse may not be a large single world changing even but the slow isolation of Humanity, but it’s still an Apocalypse. It was written during and Post Second World War when the most destructive forces man had ever seen were used in anger. In this edition of the book there is a Foreword by Clifford Simak in which he states: ‘I, personally, was not so struck with the massive destructiveness of the…

All the Weyrs of Pern by Anne McCaffrey

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A Solid addition to the Dragonriders Series Anne McCaffrey was inspired in part to write Science Fiction due to some of the ways women were portrayed in the genre. She was the first woman writer to win the coveted Hugo award and one of the female pioneers within the genre. After the original trilogy McCaffrey was encouraged by her publisher to write the Harperhall trilogy aimed at younger readers. To all purposes after the end of The White Dragon it feels like this is where the story was originally going…