Reviews and Comments

A fun book to read that gives a humorous spin on the "end of the world" type of story. The story starts with two supernatural characters, the angel, Aziraphale, and the demon, Crowley, meeting after Adam and Eve are evicted from the Garden of Eden. As the years past, they find they like each other and come to a gentlemen's agreement that sees them doing enough to please their respective authorities (Heaven and Hell), while keeping the peace between themselves.

But it comes to an end when Crowley find he has to deliver the anti-Christ to a devilish nunnery, where the anti-Christ is to be swapped with another baby and then raised in the ways of evil (or good) until he is ready to end the world. But things go wrong when the wrong babies were swapped (without Crowley's knowledge). Years later, just days before the end of the world is due, the mistake is discovered and now both Aziraphale and Crowley desperately hunt for the real anti-Christ in the hope of stopping him, for both have grown rather fond of the world as it is and there is no telling what an anti-Christ that wasn't 'raised properly' might do.

While that is happening, other supernatural events being to take place. The four horsemen of the Apocalypse begin to gather (with one being humorously replaced by another due to an advancement by mankind). A strange book, "The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch" is lost and found and shown, unlike other books filled with prophecies, to be actually able to predict the future: only as viewed by a witch from the past, so the descriptions of future events are rather unusual. It is also rather disorganized.

So things come to a climax when the anti-Christ gets revealed and all the characters converge on a nice little spot in England in order to ensure or prevent the end of the world from happening.

Written by two authors well known from their supernatural and humorous fiction, this is a fun book to read, filled with interesting characters and situations that should get quite a few chuckles out of the reader.

After reading the author's 'Dead Djinn' series, I decided to give this earlier novella by him a try. Turned out to be a good decision.

Set in an alternative world where the Union and Confederate US forces came to a truce in the US Civil War and New Orleans is a neutral independent city, the story involves a street girl who accidentally eavesdrops on Confederate Troops hoping to obtain the Black God's Drums as a weapon.

As the story progresses, we learn that the weapon was what set Haiti free: it is a regional power in the story. She approaches a Haitian airship captain with the information in exchange for joining her crew. Together, they discover other forces are also interested in the Black God's Drums, and they intend to use it on a major target. Only they, together with the forces of the local gods that inhabit them, can hope to save the day.

An exciting and fascinating alternative world history that hints at more to come, if the author continues to write in this world.

An interesting book to read to learn about the physics behind global warming. It combines a historical look at the science behind global warming with the physics and evidence for it. In closing, the book does not mince words and shows that the world is already changing, and we had better adapt to a changing world while working to reduce the effects of global warming.

Chapter One starts with a look at the Mekong River and the Delta it forms. Much of the Delta is nearly at sea level, and it is only the amount of water the Mekong River discharges that prevents seawater from inundating the Delta. But this may change when global warming occurs.

Chapter Two looks at the history of CO2 measurements. Starting with the measurements started at Mauna Loa Observatory in the 1950s and mixing on to ice core measurements, the current atmospheric concentration is shown to be at an unprecedented high, exceeding even levels recorded in Earth's history.

Chapter Three look at how carbon and carbon dioxide is recycled by the Earth both geologically and by living organisms and shows how humans are affecting the balance by digging up and releasing carbon that has been locked away geologically for millions of years.

Chapter Four takes a look at what keeps the Earth warm. Using some mathematics, it is shown that, without an atmosphere, the Earth's surface temperate would be below freezing. Adding an atmosphere, and doing some simplified calculations, it can be shown that the atmosphere helps retain heat, absorbing some energy that would be lost to space, and radiating it back to the surface.

Chapter Five looks at the work is scientists like John Tyndall (who determined which parts of the atmosphere helps to retain heat) and Svante August Arrhenius (who calculated the effects of increasing carbon dioxide would have on global temperatures) who helped to determine the effects humans would have on the Climate in the future.

Chapter Six looks at the topic of 'radiative forcing', which is the increase in the amount of thermal energy being retained by the atmosphere due to the increase in Carbon Dioxide. This increase is due to the increase in the range of wavelengths of infrared energy being absorbed, but also by the increase in height before the energy is released into space by the atmosphere, which means even more of the atmosphere is retaining heat.

Chapter Seven brings things to the present, by stating what climate scientists are already saying through climate simulations: that global temperatures are rising and at a rate that matches climate simulations. The simulation results can also be verified by comparing them to temperatures in the past inferred through ice cores and found to be in agreement.

Chapter Eight looks at current conditions and shows that even if we were to stop all emissions now, some effects of global warming will continue and parts of the world will still continue to warm for centuries. Also shown is how as we delay making reductions in emissions, the amount of emissions that need to be reduced each year to meet targets get bigger.

Chapter Nine looks at what might be in store for the world when major sources of ice like Greenland and the Antarctic start to melt. While current sea level rise may be in the centimetre range for now, data from ice cores and other sources show that when large amounts of carbon dioxide was present or absent in the atmosphere, the sea level can change by meters in just centuries based on data from the Mediterranean and Red seas.

Chapter Ten looks at whether it is possible to detect global warming from daily weather. As it turns out, it may be possible from a study. The study also shows that tropical countries are the first to feel the effects of rising temperatures, even though their carbon dioxide contributions are among the smallest.

Chapter Eleven looks at uncertainties in global warming over possible tipping points that may affect glaciers, weather patterns, corals and forests.

Chapter Twelve returns to the Mekong Delta featured in Chapter One. Only now, using the information presented in the other chapters, the author shows that global warming will have a devastating impact on the area, displacing millions of people and submerging a huge rice producing area. Other visual areas and cities around the world are also briefly mentioned. And this is probably the world we have to prepare to live in.

A better than average issue with some interesting stories. Those that I enjoyed are by Michael Swanwick, Yukimi Ogawa, Lauren Ring, Phoenix Alexander, Lisa Lacey Liscoumb, Paula Keane, Rowan Wren and Tato Navarrete Díaz.

• "Whatever Happened to the Boy Who Fell into the Lake?" by Rob Costello: a dark fantasy take of an abused boy who lives with his father after his mother vanished. Yet, he feels echoes of his mother, and it is only with the discovery of an old fairy tale does he understand the connection between himself, his mother and the sea.

• "Dreadnought" by Michael Swanwick: a man who cares for nothing but living his own life in his own way. But an apparently crazed priest keeps harassing him, along with a man with a name like Cthulhu, who appears to be waiting for a sign that evil would take over the land.

• "Her Garden, the Size of Her Palm" by Yukimi Ogawa: a girl gets a job helping an old lady tend her garden and collect samples of life for her. Only, the samples are from different worlds accessible from her garden. But the job is tough, and she might decide to take another job.

• "Tulip Fever" by Bo Balder: in a future where global warming has flooded the world, a girl with 'immunity' to ingested microplastics ekes or a living on a floating platform. But visitors fun a land give her an opportunity to leave her current life, but not if it means abandoning the others on the platform.

• "(emet)" by Lauren Ring: an interesting story that looks at a programmer whose is starting to get second thoughts while working on an image surveillance program. Her own skills at crafting living Jewish golems and programming would combine to provide a way for her to protect people who may be harmed by her own work.

• "Cat Ladies" by L.X. Beckett: in a future where global warming has dispersed people, one person works as a law officer in a mobile village, going to make enough to return to get family. But her latest investigation may involve turning in friends who have misused resources for a greater good involving cats.

• "The Penitent" by Phoenix Alexander: a tale of a being born as a kitten full of malice. But in a twist, it knows it should not be evil and returns again and again to try to put right what it has done wrong.

• "And for My Next Trick, I Have Disappeared" by Chimedum Ohaegbu: a fantastical tale of a person somehow caught in a bus and slowly having her emotions and thoughts consumed by the bus, until she figures a way off it by thinking back on her emotions and relationships.

• "How to Train Your Demon" by Lisa Lacey Liscoumb: the usual woman summons a demon story, only here the demon is asked to do housework for the woman and gets to eat cookies. But it is still a demon and does a favour for her in the only way a demon knows how.

• "Woman, Soldier, Girl" by Priya Chand: a story is a woman soldier in a steampunk India that, after being defeated by the British, is forced to work for a British family while hiding her machinery and soldier background from them.

• "Bridge for Sale" by S. Cameron David: a short short story about a conman selling the Brooklyn Bridge to an unusual customer.

• "Picass-O-Matic" by Paula Keane: a robotic plastic surgeon decides to get artistic on its patients, but perhaps takes the changes to be made too literally.

• "Minotaur" by Maia Brown-Jackson: a story of a maze, a Minotaur and two girls destined to meet in the maze.

• "Perdition" by Rowan Wren: a story of the daughter of the Devil who is sent to Earth to make it into a better Hell. But instead, she finds love, and it would change lives.

• "Mamá Chayo's Magic Lesson" by Tato Navarrete Díaz: a young witch listens to a story from her grandmother, also a witch, and picks up a lesson on being selfish and thinking only of ourselves.

A fascinating book that, like "The Martian", contains a few specific 'hand wavy' parts, but for the rest, strictly follows the rules of physics as we know it, and features a protagonist (or two) that can science (and engineer) the heck out of things to solve problems.

The book starts with Ryland Grace waking up on a spaceship with no memory of how he got there, along with fellow dead crew members. As he explores the ship and his memory of recent events starts to return, we learn that Earth is in trouble. A lifeform that is literally breeding on the energy of the sun has been discovered. As it multiplies (exponential growth), the sun gets dimmer, with catastrophic consequences for the Earth. Ryland learns that other nearby stars are also dimming, except for one: Tau Ceti. And he's on a mission to that star to discover why it's not affected before it is too late for Earth to survive.

At that star, he will make a voyage of discovery as he uses his wits and scientific knowledge to make deductions and test them by making experiments. He will encounter problems and solve them with intellect and skill, only to move on to the next one. But by the end of the story, just when you thought all the problems have been solved, one final one is presented that will require him to make a decision that may well end his life, for the sake of friendship.

This is a story of solving problems with science and engineering, yet not forgetting that you sometimes have to put them aside to do what seems to be the right thing.

A fascinating and lovely book looking the beauty that can be found in chemistry. While most 'stock photos' of chemistry often focus on people in lab clothes staring at test tubes, this book shows what most chemists see: the beauty in the chemical reactions itself. But it doesn't stop at that. While it features lots of wonderful shots of chemical reactions (and is a major reason for producing the book), the text in the book fills in the general details of what is happening in the chemical reactions to produce such beautiful effects.

What follows is a chapter by chapter look at the kinds of chemical reactions featured in the book.

1 EFFERVESCENT: THE BEAUTY OF BUBBLES: a look at bubbles generated by various chemical reactions, from the bubbles generated by household items to those by yeast (creating Champaign), followed by a look at how bubbles appear in liquids, start to grow and then burst on liquid surfaces.

2 ORDERLY: THE CHARM OF CRYSTALS: the chapter looks at crystals. Their beauty was appreciated since ancient times and still. Today, crystals are used to generate purer versions of a particular chemical. Substances are also solidified into the form of crystals so that their structure can be studied.

3 INSOLUBLE: THE POWER OF PRECIPITATION: a chapter that looks at the puzzle of how soluble substances can be made to become solid and precipitate when mixed. It then considers why water is such a good solvent for so many substances. It then looks at the Hydrogen bond, a chemical bond that is neither too strong nor too weak, allowing water to be a liquid at room temperatures.

4 EXUBERANT: THE DELIGHT OF DENDRITIC GROWTH: related to precipitation, this chapter looks at how snowflakes and other substances form patterns as they grow from chemical solutions. While much of the chemistry behind dendritic growth has been figured out, mysteries remain, like why snowflakes can look so symmetrical.

5 INCENDIARY: THE FASCINATION OF FLAMES: this chapter looks at how a flame burns and looks at the chemical processes that occur as combustion takes place and leaves behind other substances that are only now being discovered, like carbon spheres and nanotubes.

6 GALVANIZING: THE ENCHANTMENT OF ELECTROCHEMISTRY: a look at the chemistry involved in plating materials with the help of electricity. Starting with what happens when metals are oxidized and reduced, which leads to the concept of batteries. Batteries are then used as a source of energy to break apart (electrolysis) and combine (electroplating) materials. A brief section on what makes metals different from other materials is also given.

7 CHROMATIC: THE CURIOSITY OF COLOR CHANGES IN PLANTS: this chapter looks at the chemicals that gives flowers and leaves their particular colours, and also briefly looks at efforts to grow plants with new colours, like blue roses.

8 CALESCENT: THE HELPFULNESS OF HEAT: a look at how chemical reactions look like under different kinds of light (mainly infrared light), showing that even when nothing visible seems to be happening, a chemical reaction is taking place due to a change in temperature. An explanation is also briefly provided for how some chemical reactions can remove heat (become colder) which is due to an increase in the entropy is the system, more than enough to compensate for the decrease in heat.

9 ORGANIC: THE CONTORTIONS OF CHEMICAL GARDENS: the beauty of chemical gardens (organic looking growths produced by chemical reactions with various metals) is looked at in the chapter, showing some incredible and beautiful forms that can be produced. Their resemblance to trees and bushes of real gardens is more than skin deep, for some chemical processes taking place resemble those that take place in organic cells.

10 CREATIVE: THE PROFUSION OF PATTERNS: a look at the fascinating patterns that can be produced by what are known as reaction-diffusion systems. Based on the work of chemists as well as Alan Turing's theory on activation and inhibition, it would show how patterns similar to those found on animals could be created by the actions of chemicals.

An excellent read that immerses the reader in a steampunk and magical alternative world set in the early 20th century, where djinns and other magical creatures exist in Egypt and the rest of the world. This was made possible when a mysterious mystic named al-Jahiz broke the barrier between our world and the magical one. This allowed Egypt to resist European colonization (with the help of djinn) and to become a world power.

Into this world steps Fatma el-Sha’arawi, who works at the Egyptian Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities. She helped save Egypt (and the world) from being taken over by ancient beings from another world in a previous tale ("A Dead Djinn in Cairo"). In this story, she starts with an investigation into the mysterious deaths of a secret brotherhood group that would lead her to confront a person with immense magical powers who claim to be al-Jahiz, who has returned to lead a revolution against the elite.

With a supporting cast of fascinating characters like her new partner, her secret lover, a man channelling (or becoming?) an ancient Egyptian god, djinns, 'angels' and others personnel from the Ministry, she would confront the person, leading to a climactic battle that would determine the fate of the world. And only she may be able to wield the ultimate item of magical power that can stop that person, and others, from carrying out a plan to dominate the world.

The author hints of magical beings inhabiting other parts of the world, which opens up the possibility of a series of future stories involving Fatma and other characters in other adventures around the world. If true, this is one reader eager to join in their adventures.

An average issue with some interesting stories by Stephanie Kraner, Rich Larson, Corey Flintoff, James Enge and Robert Grossbach.

• "A Father's Hand" by Stephanie Kraner: an emotional story about a boy who forms an emotional relationship with a robot who guides him through life in a world where a war between human and robots has apparently occurred. But when the robot 'father' starts to break down, it is the boy who must now lead and find a way to fix his father or come to terms with him no longer being around.

• "Dontay's Bones" by Danian Darrell Jerry: a story about life in Memphis that depends on too much knowledge about American culture of the place for me to get into the story

• "Goodwill Objects" by Nina Kiriki Hoffman: a man gets a gift from him former girlfriend, which strangely comes to life, and grants the ability to make wishes, and somehow beings them back together

• "The World, A Carcass" by Rich Larson: the daughter of a dead king is forced out of ruling by her uncle, who plans to marry her off. But she has other plans to regain the throne, with help from her bodyguard, who disobeyed her father's orders.

• "Severed Fruit" by Pan Morigan: an elderly person soon to die is called back to deal with apparitions that may have come from her past.

• "Molly Whuppy" by Corey Flintoff: a retelling of an English/Scottish fairy tale of a resourceful young girl with extraordinary hair who, with the help of a magpie, defeats a giant, marries off her two elder sisters, and gains a throne.

• "Babylon System" by Maurice Broaddus: a prisoner in a system run by automations and strict rules, strives to free and make the other prisoners free.

• "Drunkard's Walk" by James Enge: a man enters a village only to discover there is no way out. It would require the use of advanced multidimensional mathematics, and the help of an observant boy, to figure out what and put it to and end.

• "The Plus One" by James Enge: an officer on Mars handles the case of a dead body. While the cause is death is straightforward, the events leading up to it are not, causing the officer to question how much life on Mars is worth when everything vital, like air, water and living space, comes at a price.

• "Refugees" by Robert Grossbach: a courtroom drama around the defendant who allows his alien friend and his rather large group to become refugees from their own planet in his backyard (they are rather small aliens). But it all goes wrong when one aspect of their biology is not revealed to the defendant at the time, leading to the court case.

• "When the Water Stops" by Eugen Bacon: a short short about people struggling to survive when the world is short of water.