Reviews and Comments

Disappointing entry from Robert Harris. It's based on a true story of an affair between then Prime Minister Asquith and a socialite right at the precipice (ha!) of WWI. But nothing really happens. And I still don't know what the point of the cop was. Just no there there.

I had forgotten how good Wings were. I liked them when I was a kid but in a kid way. Reading this book made me rediscover their work, and reminded me of McCartney's genius. I also did not realize how big Wing got through the 1970s, until it pretty much crashed around the time McCartney got busted in Japan. After that, it was pretty much over for Wings and McCartney continued to work solo. Again, listening again to their records, though, the amount of freedom to explore is both a blessing and a curse as some pieces are great and others not so much. However, the diversity in sounds, the integration of the emerging genres and tech made the body of work very interesting. Reading this book will lead you to the inevitable conclusion that Wings is due to be rediscovered.

This book is for you. Fellini shooting Casanova, Pasolini shooting Salo. They're all here, following the meandering through life of a young British man. If you've ever read Pasolini's early novels, you will find the structure of this one very similar.

I'm surprised Wu, who's usually prescient, is behind on this. That or he underestimates how much power the tech platforms have already accumulated. Suggesting as a possible, partial solution that tech platforms should not be allowed to invest in AI is closing the barn doors after the horses have already escaped.

I don't care much for Doctorow's fiction but he has a knack to explain complicated things clearly. And this is true here, as he explains all the ways we got to our enshittified stated. As importantly, the last part of the book is dedicated to potential solutions. 4 stars instead of 5 because the idea that Trump might have an "anti-trust agenda" is laughable.

Lightning did not strike twice. As much as I loved Cultish (Montell's previous book), this one bored me. It's all over the place. There is not much that is new. The examples feel shoehorned. And way, way too many personal stories.

This is the first volume of the Penn Cage set. You can already see the different themes that you find in Iles's contemporary Southern gothic + thriller (the least interesting part of these books, to me, so far). Off to the next one.

This was my first book form this author. I only heard about him because he recently died. It was so good that I'm going back to all his previous work. It's contemporary Southern gothic, and quite a page turner.

There is no foolproof way to prevent cheating or the use of LLMs, but there are ways to try to limit their use. Luckily for us, they happen to also be good pedagogy. Some of this stuff is not new. But the book provides a new review of all the way we can try to counter cheating without turning into cops. I don't agree with everything but it's worth reading.