What Fred has been reading lately

See also: What Fred wants to read

Recently finished:

Feb 2014 Italo Calvino, Hermit in Paris (Vintage, 2004, ISBN 9780099286370)
Feb 2014 Alexander McCall Smith, The Uncommon Appeal of Clouds (Little Brown, 2012, ISBN 9781408704158) [quotes]
Jan 2014 Alexander McCall Smith, The Forgotten Affairs of Youth (Little Brown, 2011, ISBN 9781408703403)
Jan 2014 Alexander McCall Smith, The Charming Quirks of Others (Little Brown, 2010, ISBN 9781408702567) [quotes]
Jan 2014 Alexander McCall Smith, Bertie's Guide to Life and Mothers (Polygon Books, 2013, ISBN 9781846972539) [quotes]
Jan 2014 Alexander McCall Smith, Sunshine on Scotland Street (Polygon Books, 2012, ISBN 9781846972324) [quotes]
Jan 2014 Alexander McCall Smith, The Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon (Little Brown, 2013, ISBN 9781408704318) [quotes]
Jan 2014 Alexander McCall Smith, The Limpopo Academy of Private Detection (Little Brown, 2012, ISBN 9781408702604)
Jan 2014 Alexander McCall Smith, The Saturday Big Tent Wedding (Little Brown, 2011, ISBN 9781408702598) [quotes]
Jan 2014 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Captain Vorpatril's Alliance (Baen, 2012, ISBN 9781451638455) [quote]
Dec 2013 - Alexander McCall Smith, Bertie Plays the Blues (Polygon Books, 2011, ISBN 9781846971884) [quotes]
Dec 2013 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Importance of Being Seven
Dec 2013 - Joe Haldeman, Mindbridge (Orbit, 1977, ISBN 0860079325)
Nov 2013 - Greg Bellow, Saul Bellow's Heart (Bloomsbury, London, 2013, ISBN 9781408835487)
Oct 2013 - RichardDe Crespigny, QF32 (Pan McMillan, 2012, ISBN 9781742611174)
Sep 2013 - Piers Anthony, Race Against Time.
Sep 2013 - Robert Silverberg, Shadrach in the Furnace (Coronet Books, UK, 1981, ISBN 0340232358)
Jun 2013 - Sep 2013 George R. R. Martin: A Song of Ice and Fire books: A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, A Feast for Crows, A Dance with Dragons.
Apr 2013 - Daniel Pennac, School Blues (MacLehose, London, 2010, ISBN 9781906694647) [quotes]
Jan 2013 - Frank Chalk, It's Your Time You're Wasting: A Teacher's Tales of Classroom Hell (Random House Australia, 2008, ISBN 9781741666953) [quotes]
Jan 2013 - Greg Egan, The Eternal Flame (Orthogonal Trilogy book 2) (Gollancz, 2012, ISBN 9780575105720) [quotes]
Dec 2012 - Mem Fox, Reading Magic (Pan Macmillan, 2001, ISBN 0330362828)
Dec 2012 - Stanislaw Lem, The Cyberiad (Translated by Michael Kandel) (Harvest / Harcourt, 1985, ISBN 9780156027595)
Dec 2012 - Italo Calvino, Italian Folktales - Selected and Retold by Italo Calvino (Translated by George Martin) (Penguin Books, 1981, ISBN 9780140062359) [quotes]
Oct 2012 - Stephen Fry, Moab is My Washpot (London : Arrow Books, 2004, ISBN 9780091801618)
Sep 2012 - Terry Pratchett, Terry Pratchett presents Miss Felicity Beedle's The world of Poo (Doubleday, 2012, ISBN 9780857521217) -- not up to Pratchett's usual standard
Aug 2012 - A bit of a write-off for reading due to house moves & a family medical emergency.
Aug 2012 - Greg Egan, The Clockwork Rocket (Orthogonal Trilogy book 1) (Night Shade, 2011, ISBN 9780575095113)
Jul 2012 - Roman Krznaric, How to Find Fulfilling Work (MacMillan, 2012, ISBN 9781447202288)
Jul 2012 - Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (Bloomsbury, 2009, ISBN 9781608190867) [quotes]
Jun 2012 - Thomas A. Limoncelli, Time Management for System Administrators (O'Reilly, orig pub 2005, ebook ISBN 9780596105082) Highly recommended for anyone needing a touch of organisation in their lives.
Jun 2012 - Bertrand Russell, Nightmares of Eminent Persons, and Other Stories (Bodley Head, London, 1954, ISBN 7220000839)
Jun 2012 - Alom Shaha, The Young Atheist's Handbook (Scribe, Melbourne, 2012, ISBN 9781921844560)
May 2012 - Graham Farmelo, The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac (Faber and Faber, London, 2010, ISBN 9780571222865) [quotes]
Apr 2012 - John Viega, The Myths of Security (O'Reilly, 2009, ISBN 9780596523022).
Mar 2012 - Cassandra Clare, City of Fallen Angels (The Mortal Instruments - Book 4) (Walker Books).
Mar 2012 - Cassandra Clare, City of Glass (The Mortal Instruments - Book 3) (Walker Books, 2009, ISBN 9781406335286).
Jan 2012 - Cassandra Clare, City of Ashes (The Mortal Instruments - Book 2) (Walker Books, 2008, ISBN 9781406307634).
Jan 2012 - Cassandra Clare, City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments - Book 1) (Walker Books, 2007, ISBN 9781406307627).
Jan 2012 - Ka Wai Cheung, The Developer's Code (ebook beta version 3.0, Jan 2012, ISBN 9781934356791). A collection of 50 short essays. I highly recommended this book for both new and old (and, especially, for jaded) programmers. Website: www.thedeveloperscode.com

Dec 2011 - Dennis Bray, Wetware (Yale University Press, 2009, ISBN 9780300167849). An excellent overview of mechanisms of behaviour in single and multi-celled organisms. The book raised new perspectives for me and prompted a lot of questions. I have a keen popular-science interest, but no particular expertise, in biochemistry or biology. The author does a nice job of introducing concepts without getting bogged down in the finer points of chemistry, and is happy to point out where the scientific picture is well-understood (e.g. some energy pathways and regulatory mechanisms) and where it is not.
Dec 2011 - Jonathan Stroud, The Last Siege (Corgi, 2004, ISBN 9780552551465) [quotes]
Dec 2011 - Peter Watts, Blindsight (Tor Books, 2006, ISBN 0765312182). Released under creative commons licence and freely downloadable from http://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm. Refreshingly incomprehensible aliens, hard science fiction. The "notes and references" section at the end of the book is an interesting read in itself.
Nov 2011 - Simon Baron-Cohen, Zero Degrees of Empathy: a new theory of human cruelty (Allen Lane, London, 2011, ISBN 9780713997910)
Nov 2011 - Stephen Clarke, Talk to the Snail - Ten Commandments for Understanding the French (Bloomsbury, 2008, ISBN 9781596917439)
Nov 2011 - Michael Kirby, A Private Life: Fragments, Memories, Friends (Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 2011, ISBN 9781742376202))
Nov 2011 - Jonathan Stroud, The Ring of Solomon (Corgi, 2010, ISBN 9780385619165) [quotes]
Oct 2011 - Michael Brooks, Free Radicals - The Secret Anarchy of Science (ISBN 9781846684050, Profile Books, 2011) [quotes]
Oct 2011 - Jonathan Stroud, Ptolemy's Gate (Corgi, 2010, ISBN 9780552562805) [quotes]
Oct 2011 - Jonathan Stroud, The Golem's Eye (Corgi, 2010, ISBN 9780552562812) [quotes]
Oct 2011 - Jonathan Stroud, The Amulet of Samarkand (Corgi, 2010, ISBN 9780552562799) [quotes]
Sep 2011 - Sanjoy Mahajan, Street-Fighting Mathematics - The Art of Educated Guessing and Opportunistic Problem Solving (MIT Press, Mar 2010, ISBN 9780262514293). This book is has a Creative Commons edition which you can download from MIT Press at http://mitpress.mit.edu/books/full_pdfs/Street-Fighting_Mathematics.pdf
Sep 2011 - Torkel Franzén, Gödel's Theorem: An Incomplete Guide to Its Use and Abuse (A K Peters, ISBN 1568812388, 2005) Notes: p. 156-7 comments on Gödel discovering exponentiation can be defined in terms of addition & multiplication in PA. Typo p. 157 (axiom 2 has '=y' instead of 'x=y'). p.14 The particular problem case for the Collatz conjecture is the possibility of an unbounded sequence; detecting a looping sequence should be tractable
Sep 2011 - Nigel Frith, Asgard (Unicorn [Unwin Paperbacks], 1982, ISBN 0049232092) [quotes]
Aug 2011 - Italo Calvino, Numbers in the Dark and Other Stories (Translated by Tim Parks) (Penguin Classics, 2009, ISBN 9780141189741) [quotes]
Particularly liked Numbers in the Dark, A General in the Library, Good for Nothing, The Black Sheep, Conscience and The Flash.
Aug 2011 - Ellis Weiner & Barbara Davilman, Yiddish with Dick and Jane (Little Brown, NY, 2004)
Aug 2011 - Sian Beilock, Choke: What the secrets of the brain reveal about getting it right when you have to. (Melbourne University Press, 2011, ISBN 9780522853247)
Aug 2011 - Glen Chilton, The Curse of the Labrador Duck (Simon & Schuster, NY, 2009, ISBN 9781439102473) [quotes]
Aug 2011 - João Magueijo, Faster Than the Speed of Light (Arrow Books, 2004, ISBN 9780099428084)
Jul 2011 - Laura Lee, The Pocket Encylopedia of Aggravation (Black Dog & Leventhal, 2001, ISBN 1579122175) [quotes]
Jul 2011 - Terry Pratchett, I Shall Wear Midnight (Doubleday, 2010, ISBN 9780485611077) [quotes]
Jul 2011 - Terry Pratchett, Wintersmith (Doubleday, 2007, ISBN 9780385609845) [quotes]
Jul 2011 - Terry Pratchett, A Hatful of Sky (Corgi, 2005, ISBN 9780552551449) [quotes]
Jul 2011 - Terry Pratchett, The Wee Free Men (Doubleday, 2003)
Jun 2011 - Leonard Mlodinow, The Drunkard's Walk
Jun 2011 - Tim Wu, The Master Switch
May 2011 - H. Gilbert Welch, Lisa M. Schwartz, Steven Woloshin, Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick in the Pursuit of Health (Beacon Press Books, 2011, ISBN 9780807022009)
May 2011 - Edward R. Tufte, The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint: Pitching Out Corrupts Within
[I recommend it enthusiastically - it's a short (30 page), cogent and extremely readable book]
See also: The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation by Peter Norvig
May 2011 - Pamela Freeman, Ember and Ash (Castings Trilogy Book 4)
May 2011 - Attempted to read The Solitary Self: Darwin and the Selfish Gene by Mary Midgley, but gave up due to the slow, dense, opaque writing.
Apr 2011 - N. David Merin Boojums all the Way Through: Communicating science in a prosaic age (Cambridge University Press)
Apr 2011 - Leonard Susskind, The Black Hole War
Apr 2011 - Richard Wiseman, 59 Seconds (Pan Books, 2010, ISBN 9780330511605) [quotes]
Apr 2011 - Evelyn Fox Keller, The Mirage of a Space Between Nature and Nurture (Duke University Press, London, 2010. ISBN 9780822347316). Excellent thesis, but start at Chapter 3 if you're in a hurry.
Apr 2011 - Italo Calvino, Our Ancestors - Three novels:The Cloven Viscount; Baron in the trees; The non-existent knight. (Vintage, London, 1998. ISBN 009943086)
Apr 2011 - John Brockman (Ed.), This Will Change Everything (Harper Perennial, 2010 ISBN 9780061899676)
This book is contains the responses to the annual Edge.org question to prominent thinkers. The questions and responses are viewable online at www.edge.org - the question and answers corresponding to this book can be viewed at: http://www.edge.org/q2009/q09_index.html
Mar 2011 - Joel Best, Stat-spotting : a field guide to identifying dubious data (University of California Press, 2008 ISBN 9780520257467)
Mar 2011 - John Derbyshire, Unknown Quantity: A Real and Imaginary History of Algebra (Atlantic Books, London, 2008 ISBN 9781843545705)
Mar 2011 - Richard Wiseman, Quirkology: The Curious Science of Everyday Lives
Feb 2011 - David G. Wells, The Penguin Book of Curious and Interesting Mathematics
Feb 2011 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Cryoburn
Jan 2011 - Tatsu Takeuchi, An illustrated Guide to Relativity (Cambridge Univeritsy Press, 2010)
Jan 2011 - Alaa Al Aswany, The Yacoubian Building (Harper, New York, 2007 ISBN 9780060878139)
Jan 2011 - Frank Close, Nothing: A Very Short Introduction (formerly published as The Void)
Dec 2010 - Brian Cox & Jeff Forshaw - Why Does E=mc²? (Da Capo Press, 2010, ISBN 978-0-306-81876-9)
Dec 2010 - Andrew Bell, John Swenson-Wright, Karin Tybjerg (eds) Evidence (Essays on the nature of evidence, based on the Darwin College series of public lectures) (Cambridge University Press, 2008, ISBN 978-0-521-71019-0)
Dec 2010 - William Poundstone - How would you move Mount Fuji? (Little, Brown & Co, 2003, ISBN 0-316-77849-4)
Nov 2010 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Double Comfort Safari Club
Nov 2010 - Joel Spolsky, More Joel on Software (Apress, 2008, ISBN 978-1-4302-0987-4)
Nov 2010 - Joel Spolsky, Smart & Gets Things Done (Apress, 2007, ISBN 978-1-59059-838-2)
Nov 2010 - David Bohm, The Special Theory of Relativity [1965]
Nov 2010 - Chris McManus, Right Hand, Left Hand : the Origins of Asymmetry in Brains, Bodies, atoms and Cultures (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2002, ISBN 0-297-64597-8) [quotes]
Nov 2010 - Torbjörn Lunndmark, Tales of Hi and Bye: Greeting and Parting Rituals Around the World (Cambridge University Press, 2009, ISBN 978-0-521-11754-8) [quotes]
Nov 2010 - Nick Pollotta & James Clay, That Darn Squid God (Double Dragon Press, 2007, ISBN 978-1-55404-519-8) [quotes]
Nov 2010 - Pamela Freeman, Full Circle (Castings Trilogy Book 3)
Oct 2010 - Pamela Freeman, Deep Water (Castings Trilogy Book 2)
Oct 2010 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Lost Art of Gratitude
Oct 2010 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Comforts of a Muddy Saturday (US Title), The Comforts Saturdays (UK Title), [quotes]
Sep 2010 - Pamela Freeman, Blood Ties (Castings Trilogy Book 1)
Sep 2010 - Richard Feynman, The Character of Physical Law
Aug 2010 - William Dunham, The Mathematical Universe [quotes]
Jul 2010 - Steve Fallon, Home with Alice - A Journey in Gaelic Ireland
Jul 2010 - Bruce Schechter, My Brain is Open - The Mathematical Journeys of Paul Erdős [quotes]
Jul 2010 - Mark Ronan, Symmetry and the Monster : One of the Greatest Quests of Mathematics
Jun 2010 - Charles Petzold, The Annotated Turing
Jun 2010 - John D. Barrow, Cosmic Imagery : Key Images in the History of Science
Jun 2010 - Alexander McCall Smith, Tea Time for the Traditionally Built
May 2010 - Harry Harrison & Marvin Minsky, The Turing Option [quotes]
May 2010 - James O'Loghlin, Um- : A Complete Guide to Public Speaking
Apr 2010 - [Too busy stitching an artwork (200 hours) during April to read!]
Mar 2010 - Martin Amis, The Moronic Inferno [and Other Visits to America] [quotes]
Feb 2010 - Philip Pullman, His Dark Materials series: Northern Lights, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass
Feb 2010 - Lois McMaster Bujold, The Sharing Knife series: Vol 4 - Horizon
Jan 2010 - Lois McMaster Bujold, The Sharing Knife series: Vol 1 - Beguilement, Vol 2 - Legacy, Vol 3 - Passage
Jan 2010 - Norman Lindsay, The Magic Pudding: Being The Adventures of Bunyip Bluegum and his friends Bill Barnacle and Sam Sawnoff
Dec 2009 - Alan Coren, Chocolate and Cuckoo Clocks
Oct 2009 - Iain McCalman, The Seven Ordeals of Count Cagliostro [quotes]
Aug 2009 - Iain M. Banks, Against a Dark Background [quotes]
Aug 2009 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Unbearable Lightness of Scones [quotes]
Aug 2009 - Alexander McCall Smith, The World According to Bertie [quotes]
Jul 2009 - Alexander McCall Smith, Love Over Scotland [quotes]
Jul 2009 - Kurt Vonnegut, Palm Sunday: An Autobiographical Collage
Jul 2009 - Alexander McCall Smith, Espresso Tales [quotes]
Jul 2009 - Alexander McCall Smith, 44 Scotland Street [quotes]
May 2009 - Nicolas Slonimsky, Lexicon of Muscal Invective (2nd Edn.)
Apr 2009 - Greg Egan, Incandescence
Apr 2009 - Idan Ben-Barak, Small Wonders: How Microbes Rule Our World [quotes]
Mar 2009 - Albert Einstein, Relativity: The Special and the General Theory [quotes]
Mar 2009 - Lee Smolin, The trouble with physics : the rise of string theory, the fall of a science, and what comes next
Feb 2009 - Georgette Heyer, Frederica
Nov 2008 - Matt Pagett, What Shat That? : The Pocket Guide to Poop Identity
Nov 2008 - Robert Rankin, The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse
Nov 2008 - Chown, Marcus, Felicity Frobisher and the Three-headed Alderbaran Dust Devil
Sep 2008 - Raymond Sumllyan's short story Planet Without Laughter
(as mentioned in Donald E. Knuth, Things a Computer Scientist Rarely Talks About)
Sep 2008 - Donald E. Knuth, Things a Computer Scientist Rarely Talks About
Aug 2008 - George Monbiot, Bring on the Apocalypse
Jul 2008 - Stanislav Andreski, Social sciences as sorcery
Jul 2008 - Started to read, but quickly abandoned, Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich (I highly recommend the appendix, but that was written by someone else)
Jun 2008 - Stephen Pinker, The Stuff of Thought
May 2008 - Clifford D. Simak, Strangers in the Universe [Short Stories] [quotes]
May 2008 - Robert Tralins, Android Armageddon [quotes]
May 2008 - Julian Burnside, Watching Brief : Reflections on Human Rights, Law and Justice
May 2008 - Alan H. Cromer, Connected Knowledge : Science, Philosophy, and Education
May 2008 - Sudhir Venkatesh, Gang Leader for a Day
May 2008 - Victor Borge, My Favorite Intermissions in Music
Apr 2008 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Miracle at Speedy Motors [quotes]
Apr 2008 - Leonard Mlodinow, Euclid's Window - The Story of Geometry from Parallel Lines to Hyperspace [quotes]
Mar 2008 - Victor Borge, My Favorite Comedies in Music
Mar 2008 - Tom Holt, Faust Among Equals [quotes]
Mar 2008 - Tom Holt, You don't Have to be Evil to Work Here, But it Helps [quotes]
Feb 2008 - Tom Holt, Earth, Air, Fire and Custard [quotes]
Feb 2008 - Tom Holt, In Your Dreams [quotes]
Feb 2008 - Tom Holt, The Portable Door [quotes]
Jan 2008 - Umberto Eco, Mouse or Rat? : Translation as Negotiation
Jan 2008 - Patrick Hughes & George Brecht, Vicious circles and infinity : a panoply of paradoxes
Jan 2008 - Stanislaw M. Ulam, Adventures of a Mathematician [quotes]
Jan 2008 - Alan H. Cromer, Uncommon Sense: the heretical nature of science
Jan 2008 - Paul R. Halmos, Selecta -- Expository Writing
Jan 2008 - Norman E. Steenrod, Paul R. Halmos, et al., How to Write Mathematics [quotes]
Jan 2008 - Travis Taylor, The Quantum Connection
Jan 2008 - Travis Taylor, Warp Speed
Dec 2007 - C. Northcote Parkinson, Parkinson's law, or, The pursuit of progress
Dec 2007 - Eric Abrahamson & David H. Freedman, A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder [quotes]
Dec 2007 - Randall Garrett, Unwise Child [quotes]
Dec 2007 - Terry Pratchett, Making Money [quotes]
Nov 2007 - Karl Kruszelnicki, Dr. Karl's collection of great Australian facts & firsts [quotes]
Nov 2007 - Sheila E Anderson, The quotable musician : from Bach to Tupac [quotes]
Nov 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Careful Use of Compliments [quotes]
Nov 2007 - Hugh Lunn, Lost for Words
Nov 2007 - Clifford D Simak, Out of Their Minds
Nov 2007 - Doris Piserchia, Spaceling
Impressions: One of her earlier and (for me) more appealing novels. Good story, likeable protagonist.
Oct 2007 - Doris Piserchia, Doomtime
Impressions: Very imaginative. The protagonist and his philosophical connundrums remind me of A Billion Days of Earth, another novel by Piserchia.
Oct 2007 - Doris Piserchia, The Deadly Sky
Impressions: Odd, mildly annoying characters, but imaginative.
Favourite & most Bulwer-Lyttonish paragraph:
Above me the mountain waited as it has since the day I was born, and perhaps long before that, a huge and patient escarpment full of mystery. There was about it more than one enigma. Always I ascended it but, more significantly, sooner or later I always descended it.
Oct 2007 - D. E. Elis, A Thousand Ages
Oct 2007 - Peter F. Hamilton, Judas Unchained
Oct 2007 - Peter F. Hamilton, Pandora's Star
Sep 2007 - Neal Stephenson, Cryptonomicon [quotes]
Aug 2007 - Duncan McGeary, Ice Towers (sequel to Snowcastles)
Aug 2007 - Joseph Mazue, Euclid in the Rainforest
Aug 2007 - Darrell T. Langart [Pseudonym of Randall T. Garrett], Anything You Can Do ...
Jul 2007 - Greg Bear, The Serpent Mage
Jul 2007 - Greg Bear, The Infinity Concerto
Jul 2007 - Doris Piserchia, The Spinner
Impressions: The monster attacking the city is more believable and attractive than many of the human protagonists.
Jul 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Good Husband of Zebra Drive [quotes]
Jul 2007 - Karla Jennings, The Devouring Fungus: Tales of the Computer Age
Jul 2007 - Nury Vittachi, The Amazing Life of Dead Eric [quotes]
Jul 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (7) - The River Wall
Jul 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (6) - Return to Eddarta
Jul 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (5) - The Search for Kä
Jul 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (4) - The Well of Darkness
Jun 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (3) - The Bronze of Eddarta
Jun 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (2) - The Glass of Dyskornis
Jun 2007 - Randall Garrett and Vicki Ann Heydron, The Gandalara Cycle (1) - The Steel of Raithskar
Jun 2007 - Doris Piserchia, The Fluger.
Impressions: Not a bad story, but ends abruptly. To paraphrase: "... and then the monster died. The end."
Jun 2007 - Doris Piserchia, A Billion Days of Earth.
Impressions: The monster carries out philosophical discussions, convincing its victims to surrender to absorbtion.
Jun 2007 - Eat the Rich
Jun 2007 - Ross Gittons, Gittinomics
Jun 2007 - Duncan McGeary, Snowcastles
May 2007 - Kaz Cooke, Get a Grip
May 2007 - Nury Vittachi, The Feng Shui Detective's Casebook [quotes]
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Right Attitude to Rain [quotes]
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, Friends, Lovers, Chocolate [quotes]
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Sunday Philosophy Club [quotes]
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Girl Who Married a Lion [quotes]
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances [quotes]
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs [quotes]
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, Portuguese Irregular Verbs [quotes]
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, Blue Shoes and Happiness
May 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, In the Company of Cheerful Ladies [quotes]
Apr 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Full Cupboard of Life [quotes]
Apr 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The Kalahari Typing School for Men [quotes]
Apr 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, Morality for Beautiful Girls [quotes]
Apr 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, Tears of the Giraffe [quotes]
Apr 2007 - Alexander McCall Smith, The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency [quotes]
Apr 2007 - Sam Harris, Letter to a Chistian Nation
Apr 2007 - The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Edited by Andrew Lang (Dover 1969, republication of 1898 Longmans edition)
Mar 2007 - Sheridan's Plays, edited by Cecil Price [quotes]
Mar 2007 - Piers Anthony, Hasan
Mar 2007 - Glen Baxter, The Billiard Table Murders [quotes]
Mar 2007 - Mukhtar Mai, In the Name of Honour
Mar 2007 - Mack Reynolds, Earth Unaware
Feb 2007 - Kit Pedler and Gerry Davis, Mutant 59: The Plastic Eater
Feb 2007 - John Gardner, Grendel [quotes]
Feb 2007 - Started but couldn't bring myself to finish: Cheeky - confessions of a Ferret salesman / The Men Who Stare at Goats.
Jan 2007 - Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion
Jan 2007 - David Ellyard, Who Invented What When?
Jan 2007 - Ursula K. Le Guin, Dancing at the edge of the world: thoughts on words, women, places
Jan 2007 - Peter Manning, Us and Them
Dec 2006 - Murray Gell-Mann, The Quark and the Jaguar
Dec 2006 - Tom Robbins, Villa Incognito [quotes]
Nov 2006 - Robyn Williams, Unintelligent Design
Nov 2006 - Jonathan Biggins, Satire -- or Sedition? [quotes]
Nov 2006 - Steven Pinker, Words and Rules
Oct 2006 - Lemony Snicket, The End
Oct 2006 - Nury Vittachi, The Shanghai Union of Industrial Mystics [quotes]
Oct 2006 - Ramsay Wood, Kalila and Dimna: Selected Tales of Bidpai
Sep 2006 - Nury Vittachi, The Feng Shui Detective Goes South
Sep 2006 - Bruce Sterling, Visionary in Residence (a collection of stories)
Aug 2006 - Nury Vittachi, The Feng Shui Detective [quotes]
Aug 2006 - Ursula Synge, Kalevala - Haroic Tales from Finland
Jul 2006 - Teri Perl, Math Equals: Biographies of Women Mathematicians [quotes]
Hiatus -- many books read, but website not updated
Feb 2006 - Suad Amiry, Sharon and my Mother-in-Law [quotes]
Feb 2006 - Jack Seward, More About the Japanese [quotes]
Jan 2006 - Gary Katzenstein, Funny Business - An Outsider's Year in Japan [quotes]
Jan 2006 - Esther Friesner (editor), The Chick is in the Mail [quotes]
Dec 2005 - Elizabeth Goudge, The Little White Horse [quotes]
Dec 2005 - Geoffrey Robertson, The Tyrranicide Brief
Nov 2005 - Roger Law, Still Spitting at Sixty [quotes]
Nov 2005 - Richard McClelland, Stirring the Possum
Nov 2005 - Bill Bryson, A Walk in the Woods [quotes]
Oct 2005 - Steven Weinberg, Facing Up: Science and Its Cultural Adversaries [quotes]
Oct 2005 - Eoin Colfer, Artemis Fowl - The Opal Conspiracy
Oct 2005 - Jack Seward, Japanese in Action: An Unorthodox Approach to the Spoken Language and the People Who Speak It [quotes]
Sep 2005 - Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash [quotes]
Sep 2005 - The Wit and Wisdom of O-sung and Han-um [quotes]
Sep 2005 - Ken Follet, The Pillars of the Earth
Aug 2005 - Alec Guinness, My Name Escapes Me - The Diary of a Retiring Actor [quotes]
Aug 2005 - Keith Tutt, The Scientist, the Madman, the Thief and their lightbulb [AKA The Search for Free Energy]
Jul 2005 - Farid id-Din Attar, The Conference of the Birds
Jul 2005 - Iain M. Banks, The Algebraist [quotes]
Jun 2005 - Mungo MacCallum, How to be a Megalomaniac [quotes]
May 2005 - Stephen Fry, Rescuing the Spectacled Bear [quotes]
May 2005 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Paladin of Souls [quotes]
Apr 2005 - Lois McMaster Bujold, The Curse of Chalion [quotes]
Mar 2005 - Terry Pratchett, Going Postal
Mar 2005 - Kate Burridge, Weeds in the Garden of Words
Mar 2005 - Kate Burridge, Blooming English
Feb 2005 - Francis Wheen, How Mumbo-jumbo conquered the world
Feb 2005 - Mardy Grothe, Oxymoronica
Jan 2005 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 11 - The Grim Grotto [quotes]
Dec 2004 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 10 - The Slippery Slope [quotes]
Dec 2004 - Terry Pratchett, The Wee Free Men
Dec 2004 - Philip Howard, New Words for Old [quotes]
Nov 2004 - Lynne Minion, Hello Missus: A Girl's Own Guide to Foreign Affairs [quotes]
Nov 2004 - Robin Williams, The Non-Designer's Design Book
Nov 2004 - Irshad Manji, The Trouble with Islam
Oct 2004 - George Negus, The World From Islam
Oct 2004 - Bill Bryson, The Lost Continent [quotes]
Sep 2004 - Bill Bryson, Neither Here Nor There [quotes]
Sep 2004 - G. H. Hardy, A Mathematician's Apology [quotes]
Sep 2004 - Julian May, Sagittarius Whorl
Sep 2004 - Julian May, Orion Arm [quotes]
Aug 2004 - Julian May, Perseus Spur [quotes]
Aug 2004 - Carl Sagan, Broca's Brain
Aug 2004 - Julian May, Magnificat
Jul 2004 - Julian May, Diamond Mask
Jul 2004 - Julian May, Jack the Bodiless [quotes]
Jul 2004 - Julian May, Intervention
Jul 2004 - Julian May, The Adversary
Jun 2004 - Julian May, The Non-Born King
Jun 2004 - Bill Bryson, Troublesome Words [quotes]
Jun 2004 - Julian May, The Golden Torc [quote]
Jun 2004 - Julian May, The Many-Coloured Land
May 2004 - William Goldman, The Princess Bride
Mar-May 2004 - Wu Cheng'en (Translated by W.J.F. Jenner), Journey to the West - 4 Volumes
Mar 2004 - Neal Stephenson, Zodiac [quotes]
Feb 2004 - Bill McGuire, A Guide to the End of the World: Everything You Never Wanted to Know [quotes]
Feb 2004 - Clive James, The Crystal Bucket [quotes]
Feb 2004 - Indries Shah, Tales of the Dervishes [quotes]
Feb 2004 - Indries Shah, Special Illumination: The Sufi Use of Humour [quotes]
Jan 2004 - Carl Zimmer, Parasite Rex [quotes]
Jan 2004 - Philip Howard, Words Fail Me [quotes]
Dec 2003 - Samuel Anthony Barnett, Science: Myth or Magic? [quotes]
Dec 2003 - Isaiah Berlin, The Hedgehog and the Fox: An Essay on Tolstoy's View of History
Dec 2003 - Richard Woolcott, The hot seat : reflections on diplomacy from Stalin's death to the Bali bombings [quotes]
Dec 2003 - Luis d'Antin van Rooten, Van Rooten's Book of Improbable Saints: An Irreverent Hagiography
Dec 2003 - Luis d'Antin van Rooten, Mots d'heures: gousses, rames; the d'Antin manuscript
Nov 2003 - Peter Moore, No Shitting in the Toilet [quotes]
Nov 2003 - Olivia Judson, Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation: The Definitive Guide to the Evolutionary Biology of Sex [quotes]
Nov 2003 - Chester Porter, Walking on water: a life in the law [quotes]
Nov 2003 - Arnold Silcock (ed.), Verse and Worse
Nov 2003 - Bill Bryson, Made In America [quotes]
Nov 2003 - Luis d'Antin van Rooten, The Floriculturist's Vade-Mecum of Exotic and Recondite Plants, Shrubs and Grasses and One Malignant Parasite
Oct 2003 - Peter Moore, The Wrong Way Home [quotes]
Oct 2003 - Peter Moore, The Full Montezuma [quotes]
Sep 2003 - Raymond Smullyan, 5000 B.C. and Other Philosophical Fantasies
Sep 2003 - David Marr & Marian Wilkinson, Dark Victory
Sep 2003 - Greg Egan, Distress
Sep 2003 - Greg Egan, Schild's Ladder [quotes]
Sep 2003 - Peter Moore, Swahili for the Broken-Hearted [quotes]
Sep 2003 - Samuel Anthony Barnett, The Story of Rats [quotes]
Sep 2003 - J. M. Barrie, The Admirable Crichton [quotes]
Aug 2003 - Greg Egan, Quarrantine. [quotes]
Aug 2003 - John D. Barrow, Pi in the Sky. [quotes]
Aug 2003 - Bill Bryson, Bill Bryson's African Diary. [quotes]
Aug 2003 - Steven Weinberg, Dreams of a Final Theory. [quotes]
Aug 2003 - Bill Bryson, Notes from a Big Country. [quotes]
Aug 2003 - Tim Winton, A Minimum of Two. [quotes]
Jul 2003 - John D. Barrow, The Artful Universe. [quotes]
Jul 2003 - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
Jul 2003 - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. [quote]
July 2003 - P. G. Wodehouse, The World of Jeeves [quotes]
June 2003 - Hans Magnus Enzensberger, The Number Devil [quotes]
June 2003 - Stuart Kauffman, At Home In The Universe - The Search for Laws of Complexity [quotes]
June 2003 - Jorge Luis Borges & Adolfo Bioy Casares, Extraordinary Tales [quotes]
June 2003 - Ruth Park, Poor Man's Orange [quotes]
June 2003 - Ruth Park, The Harp in the South [quotes]
June 2003 - Anton Chekhov, The Comic Stories [quotes]
May 2003 - Jorge Luis Borges, The Book of Imaginary Beings [quotes]
May 2003 - Ruth Park, Missus [quotes]
May 2003 - Dava Sobel, Longitude [quotes]
May 2003 - John Train, Even More Remarkable Names [quotes]
May 2003 - John Train, Remarkable Names of Real People [quotes]
May 2003 - Tom Baker, Who on Earth is Tom Baker? [quotes]
May 2003 - Pamela Stephenson, Billy [A biography of comedian Billy Connelly] [quotes]
Apr 2003 - Bruce Dessau, Rowan Atkinson [A biography of actor Rowan Atkinson] [quotes]
Apr 2003 - Armistead Maupin, The Night Listener
Apr 2003 - Jane Yolen, Briar Rose
Apr 2003 - Alida Baxter, Amazing Grace [quotes]
Apr 2003 - Bill Bryson, Mother Tongue [quotes]
Mar 2003 - L.E. Modesitt, Jr., The Death of Chaos
Mar 2003 - Prajuab Thirabutana, Little Things [Novel of village life in north-east Thailand. Fontana, 1971]
Mar 2003 - Jeffrey D. Kooistra, Dykstra's War [SF - heroics]
Feb 2003 - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Return of the King
Jan 2003 - John Spong, Here I Stand [quotes]
Jan 2003 - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers
Dec 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Diplomatic Immunity
Dec 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, A Civil Campaign [quote]
Dec 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Komarr [quotes]
Dec 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Memory
Dec 2002 - Esther Friesner (editor), Did You Say 'Chicks'?! [quotes]
Dec 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Mirror Dance [quotes]
Nov 2002 - L.E. Modesitt, Jr., The Order War
Nov 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Brothers in Arms [quotes]
Nov 2002 - Hal Hellman, Great Feuds in Medicine
Nov 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, The Borders of Infinity
Nov 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Cetaganda [quotes]
Oct 2002 - Esther Friesner (editor), Chicks in Chainmail [quotes]
Oct 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, The Vor Game [quotes]
Oct 2002 - John D. Barrow, Impossibility - The Limits of Science and the Science of Limits [quotes]
Oct 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, The Warriors's Apprentice [quote]
Oct 2002 - R. A. MacAvoy, The Third Eagle [quote]
Oct 2002 - Chris Bunch, The Empire Stone
Oct 2002 - Michael Shea, Spin Doctor [quotes]
Oct 2002 - Alida Baxter, Don't hang up, Sophie -- It's God [quotes]
Oct 2002 - Roslyn Taylor, Bring On The Dancing Men & Other Verses
Oct 2002 - Morris Kline, Mathematics - The Loss of Certainty
Sep 2002 - Alida Baxter, Up To My Neck [quotes]
Sep 2002 - Eli Maor, Trigonometric Delights [quotes]
Sep 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Barrayar
Sep 2002 - Edmund Blair Bolles, Galileo's Commandment - 2500 Years of Great Science Writing [quotes]
Sep 2002 - Hal Hellman, Great Feuds in Science [quotes]
Sep 2002 - Lois McMaster Bujold, Cordelia's Honor
Aug 2002 - L.E. Modesitt, Jr., The Magic Engineer
Aug 2002 - Daniel Solow, How to Read and Do Proofs
Aug 2002 - Nigel Balchin, How to Run a Basoon Factory
Aug 2002 - Charles Seife, Zero - The Biography of a Dangerous Idea [quotes]
Aug 2002 - John D. Barrow, The Book of Nothing [quotes]
Jul 2002 - Robert Kaplan, The Nothing That Is - A Natural History of Zero [quotes]
Jul 2002 - L.E. Modesitt, Jr., The Towers of the Sunset
Jul 2002 - Michael White, Leonardo, The First Scientist [quotes]
Jul 2002 - Lemony Snicket, Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Biography [quotes]
Jul 2002 - Simon Singh, Fermat's Enigma [quotes]
Jul 2002 - James P. Hogan, Paths to Otherwhere
Jul 2002 - L.E. Modesitt, Jr., The Magic of Recluse [quotes]
Jun 2002 - Stephen Jay Gould, The Lying Stones of Marakech [quotes]
Jun 2002 - Eoin Colfer, Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident
Jun 2002 - Kathleen Stewart, Louis: a normal novel
Jun 2002 - Po Bronson, The first $20 million is always the hardest
May 2002 - Blaise Pascal, Pensees [Thoughts] [quotes]
May 2002 - Terry Pratchett, The Light Fantastic [quotes]
May 2002 - Terry Pratchett, The Colour of Magic
May 2002 - Clifton Fadiman & John S. Major - The New Lifetime Reading Plan [quote]
May 2002 - S. A. Wakefield - The Complete Adventures of Bottersnikes and Gumbles
May 2002 - Justin Fleming, Barbarism to Verdict - A History of the Common Law [quote]
Apr 2002 - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
Apr 2002 - Kaz Cooke, The Crocodile Club
Apr 2002 - Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
Mar 2002 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 8 - The Hostile Hospital
Mar 2002 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 7 - The Vile Village
Mar 2002 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 6 - The Ersatz Elevator
Mar 2002 - Terry Pratchett, The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents
Mar 2002 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 4 - The Miserable Mill
Feb 2002 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 5 - The Austere Academy
Feb 2002 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 3 - The Wide Window
Feb 2002 - Clive James, May Week was in June [quotes]
Feb 2002 - Sydney Perkowitz, Universal Foam
Feb 2002 - George MacDonald, At the Back of the North Wind
Jan 2002 - Scott Capurro, Fowl Play [quotes]
Jan 2002 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 2 - The Reptile Room
Jan 2001 - Robert Silverberg, Ringing the Changes
Jan 2001 - Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, A Backward Place
Dec 2001 - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 1 - The Bad Beginning
Dec 2001 - Denis Guedj, The Parrot's Theorem
Dec 2001 - George MacDonald, The Princess and the Goblin / The Princess and Curdie
Dec 2001 - Mary Renault, The Last of the Wine
Dec 2001 - Jean Aitchison, Language Change: Progress or Decay? [quotes]
Dec 2001 - John Mortimer, Rumpole for the Defence [quotes]
Nov 2001 - Clive James, Flying Visits - Postcards from the Observer 1976-83 [quotes]
Nov 2001 - John Kolness & Tim Halle - The Absolute Last Chance Diet Book [quotes]
Nov 2001 - Iain M. Banks, Look to Windward
Nov 2001 - Kenneth Cook, Wombat Revenge [quotes]
Nov 2001 - Martin Gardner, Gardner's Whys and Wherefores
Nov 2001 - Iain M. Banks, The State of the Art [quotes]
Oct 2001 - John Maddox, What Remains to be Discovered
Oct 2001 - Martin Gardner, The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener [quotes]
Oct 2001 - Ralph Milne Farley, The Radio Beasts, originally published in Argosy All-Story Weekly, 1925. [quotes]
Oct 2001 - Eric Idle, The Road to Mars [quotes]
Sep 2001 - Denise Little (Ed.), Twice Upon a Time [quotes]
Sep 2001 - Alistair Cockburn, Writing Effective Use Cases
Sep 2001 - Pamela Sargent (Ed.), More Women of Wonder [quote]
Sep 2001 - John Mortimer, The Trials of Rumpole [quote]
Sep 2001 - David Wells, Penguin Book of Curious and Interesting Mathematics [quotes]
Sep 2001 - Iain M. Banks, Excession
Sep 2001 - Richard Hill, Kill the Hundredth Monkey
Aug 2001 - Lucius Shepard, Barnacle Bill the Spacer and other stories
Aug 2001 - Iain M. Banks, Feersum Endjinn
Aug 2001 - John Emsley, The Shocking History of Phosphorus [quote]
Aug 2001 - Eoin Colfer, Artemis Fowl
July 2001 - Kim Sterelny, Dawkins vs. Gould [quote]
July 2001 - The Most of S. J. Perelman.
July 2001 - Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World
May-July 2001 - John Marsden's teen fiction series 1 - Tomorrow, When the War Began / 2 - The Dead of the Night / 3 - The Third Day, the Frost / 4 - Darkness, Be My Friend / 5 - Burning for Revenge / 6 - The Night is for Hunting / 7 - The Other Side of Dawn [quotes]
May 2001 - Geoffrey Robertson, Does Dracula Have AIDS?
Apr 2001 - James Gleick, Faster [quotes]
Apr 2001 - The World of S. J. Perelman. [quotes]
Apr 2001 - Michael Faraday, a biography by L. Pearce Williams.
Mar 2001 - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. [quote]
Mar 2001 - Paul Hoffman, The Man Who Loved Only Numbers: The Story of Paul Erdős and the Search for Mathematical Truth
Feb 2001 - Clifford A. Pickover, Strange Brains and Genius - The Secret Life of Eccentric Scientists and Madmen. [quotes]
Feb 2001 - Colin C. Adams, The Knot Book - An Elementary Introduction to the Mathematical Theory of Knots.
Feb 2001 - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Philopher's Stone. [quote] Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. [quote] Harry Potter and the Prisonser of Azkaban. [quote]
Feb 2001 - James Gleick, Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman. [quotes]
Jan 2001 - David Deutsch, The Fabric of Reality.
Jan 2001 - Adrian Woolfson, Life Without Genes.
Dec 2000/Jan 2001 - David Wingrove, Chung Kuo series. [quote]

	This page last changed: 11 Feb 2005
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