Review: The Number Devil: A Mathematical Adventure

The Number Devil: A Mathematical Adventure by Hans Magnus Enzensberger

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


It was ok, but I've read more fun (and enlightening) math books for kids. In fact, I'm not sure what kind of kid this is aimed at - the story is a little awkward, and the math parts not so memorable. Does it suffer from language/cultural translation from the original German perhaps? Good illustrations though!



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Review: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Well, I thought the premise was sort of interesting but it turned out not to be really any sort of mystery at all. An interesting attempt at getting into the mind of an autistic person, but it wasn't anything revelatory or mind-blowing. I don't have anything bad to say about the book, but it just didn't do it for me.



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Review: Sunrise Alley

Sunrise Alley by Catherine Asaro

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Not bad, but not as gripping as Primary Inversion, which is the only other book I've read by this author. This one is about androids and humans, and the ways they converge and diverge, which is an interesting theme. However, the main character is not particularly well-developed, and I dislike the marysue-ish 'I don't feel I'm attractive but everyone else in the book falls for me' bit. The secondary main character had a more intriguing personality but was filtered through the first character, who I was irritated by. So an interesting premise, and decent but not particularly novel development of ideas.



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Star Trek: Unspoken Truth

Star Trek: Unspoken Truth by Margaret Wander Bonanno

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I generally like this author's other Star Trek books (Probe and Strangers from the Sky especially); however, I was disappointed in this one. The two subplots didn't really fit together - to me they felt disjointed,- the characterization of Saavik was okay but didn't show me anything new about the character, and I didn't like Mikal at all. I re-watched Wrath of Khan during the same period as I was reading this book, and the exploration of character in that movie was so well-done- that's what I look for in a Star Trek novel and unfortunately didn't really find (with the exception of the portrayal of Sarek) here.



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