A companion to the author’s work on the Manchester Ship Canal. This one is a bit lighter on the process of actually digging the canal, perhaps because it’s older and perhaps because there’s little more to say than that it was in fact dug, by hand.
3/5. Finished Saturday 25 July, 2020.
(Originally published on Goodreads.)
A fantastic narrative history, far broader in scope than might be expected from the sub-title, covering the extended campaigns in Spain and the Baltic as well as the familiar Latin Crusader States. That does make the coverage a little lighter, but Jones has covered much of the same ground form a different perspective in the (equally excellent) The Templars: The Rise and Spectacular Fall of God’s Holy Warriors.
5/5. Finished Thursday 23 July, 2020.
(Originally published on Goodreads.)
I thought I should record the journey I took to self-publishing a science book, in case anyone else decides they want to follow me on it.
If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to think, talk, and operate while on acid, I suspect that reading this book is the closest you’ll get to it without pharmacological intervention….
I decided to tread this after reading How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence, a far more studious and measured encounter with psychedelics. This, by contrast, is a full-on trip in its own right featuring the Merry Pranksters, the Hell’s Angels, the Grateful Dead, the Beatles (kind of), and what does sound like a pretty idyllic lifestyle amid the California woodlands.
The “electric Kool-Aid acid test” of the title is one such event, a happening in downtown LA at which the Pranksters provided the catering and spiked the punch – in fairness to them, not thinking anyone could possibly be surprised that this would happen as an event billed as an acid test. Mayhem predictably ensues.
The book is a showcase for what a superb writer Wolfe is. To be able to pull off a book that simultaneously makes sense while reading like a stream of consciousness is quite a feat. It’s a challenging read in spite of this, but full of colour and texture from an age now passed and probably beyond retrieval.
3/5. Finished Friday 10 July, 2020.
(Originally published on Goodreads.)