just finished alastair reynolds take on the third dr. who, john pertwee in his novel 'the harvest of time' and as i have come to expect from alastair the narrative is excellent, he not only captures the time, he captures the energy of the john pertwee years, you can almost feel the cheesy bbc sets and the authentic dialogue between the characters, above all he writes a great story and i must confess i enjoyed reading it.
however the front cover is questionable, whoever approved the phallic looking space ship needs a good talking to, it really is distracting and ridiculous.
i'm about to start joesaphine maccarthy's trilogy of books she wrote on magic, and i must say the idea of a christian writing an introduction was puzzling as he certainly didn't seem to hold magic in high regard at all, but he was very generous towards josephine and as i began to read her book i can see she is actually quite likeable and writes with a certain accurate authenticity which i like.
she starts by writing off all magical skools which i thought was excellent but at the same time suggests getting a basic understanding from them which is also practical and useful.
i like she describes magic as a hybrid between spirituality and science.