Book Reviews

I've been hitting the library a bit recently. Here's a couple of books I enjoyed.

Peeps by Scott Westerfeld: This is a cool take on the mythos of vampires, and it's educational as well. Yes, educational. I was referred to this book by Cory Doctorow of Boing Boing, and I think it pretty much lived up to his hype. It's a quick read, but dense with information on what the disease is and how it's being fought along with more information that most people ever want to know about parasites. I found it a little frustrating at times because the action was moving nicely, but I didn't feel like I was getting anything new. But the slow moments were few and far in between, and the attitude of the narrator made up for a lot of minor faults in my opinion. All in all, a pretty good book, especially if you like vampire stories.

Mimi and Toutou's Big Adventure: The Bizarre Battle of Lake Tanganyika by Giles Foden: Geoffrey Spicer-Simson was a career loser whose sometimes spectacular failures led to him being the oldest lieutenant commander in the Royal Navy at the start of WWI, stuck at a desk job in the heart of the Admiralty. But a shortage of officers gave him command of a possibly foolhardy mission into the heart of Africa to one of the largest lakes to sink a German ship with two oversized motorboats which had to be dragged from Cape Town to the lake. While this would make a pretty good tale just starting from those facts, when you add in the fact that Spicer had tons of tattoos and a liking for wearing skirts (not kilts, skirts) it becomes hilarious. This one got an unprecedented 20 out of 10 as a rating in Fortean Times, and while I wouldn't give it quite that much, it is a great book, and made all the moreso because it happens to be completely true. If you want a fun romp into the heart of Africa written in an intelligent and sensitive manner, definitely check this one out.