Tag Archives: historical fiction

Neal Stephenson’s The System Of The World

Posted on 5th March 2024 by Gary Whitehouse

… I think it’s clear why science fiction offers scope for people who want to explore the … great dramas of ancient history but don’t want to write historical fiction. Because if you have an enormous galactic empire, you can … Continue reading →

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Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana’s Pretty Boy Floyd, Michael Wallis’s Pretty Boy, and Jeffery S. King’s The Life and Death of Pretty Boy Floyd

Posted on 3rd November 2023 by Diverse Voices

Craig Clarke wrote this review. “There’s no excuse for dressing like trash in this line of work.” – Charles Arthur Floyd in McMurtry and Ossana’s Pretty Boy Floyd When did criminals become our national heroes? Names like Bonnie and Clyde, … Continue reading →

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Neal Stephenson’s The Confusion

Posted on 29th October 2023 by Gary Whitehouse

“When a thing such as wax, or gold, or silver, turns liquid from heat, we say that it has fused,” Eliza said to her son, “and when such liquids run together and mix, we say they are con-fused.” “Papa says … Continue reading →

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Joanne Leedom-Ackerman’s Burning Distance

Posted on 24th September 2023 by Warner Holme

Joanne Leedom-Ackerman’s Burning Distance is a new volume from an experienced and multi-talented hand. Sold as a thriller, and dealing with events surrounding, before and shortly after the original Gulf War there is little in the way of avoiding calling … Continue reading →

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Lindsey Davis’ Fatal Legacy

Posted on 24th September 2023 by Warner Holme

Fatal Legacy is the latest in Lindsey Davis’ Flavia Albia series. Once again featuring our lead working as a private investigator of sorts, the book starts as one of the lower stakes cases she has encountered. However, like many such … Continue reading →

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Rebecca Cantrell’s A Night of Long Knives, and David Downing’s Stettin Station

Posted on 10th September 2023 by Donna Bird

The advance readers’ copies of both of these novels arrived in the Green Man mailroom at about the same time. I have read and reviewed earlier installments in both series. Both are suspenseful tales of the lives of journalists living … Continue reading →

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Nicholas Griffin’s Dizzy City

Posted on 25th July 2023 by Donna Bird

This book arrived in the Green Man mailroom some time ago as an uncorrected proof. The brownies put it into my review pile I think because I’ve reviewed other books about people who arrive in New York City and find … Continue reading →

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Neal Stephenson’s Quicksilver

Posted on 1st June 2023 by Gary Whitehouse

Ordinarily, when you read about the great discoveries of the Enlightenment and the lives of the men who made them, you get quite a sterile view of those lives. In Wikipedia’s entry on Isaac Newton, for instance: “In June 1661, … Continue reading →

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Anita Amirrezvani’s The Blood of Flowers

Posted on 11th November 2022 by Donna Bird

Toward the end of The Blood of Flowers, the unnamed narrator and main character says, “All our labors were in service of beauty, but sometimes it seemed as if every thread in a carpet had been dipped in the blood … Continue reading →

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Rosemary Sutcliff’s Sword at Sunset

Posted on 4th July 2022 by Diverse Voices

Eric Eller wrote this review. Many authors have reinvented the legend of King Arthur, but the gritty realism and emotional power of Rosemary Sutcliff’s writing places Sword at Sunset in a place of its own. Sutcliff was the first author … Continue reading →

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