Consider Phlebas

I first read Consider Phlebas from Iain M. Banks over 28 years ago when I was on an overland journey to the Munich beer festival in a camper van with some friends. This was my introduction to the world of The Culture and Banks’ visionary description of a highly liberal, extremely technically capable, but morally ambiguous galactic civilisation largely run by sentient machines.

Real Tigers (Slough House)

I enjoyed Mick Herron’s book Slow Horses so have started to read more of the series on Kindle. Very enjoyable, good characters and it’s fun following the locations on Google street view.

Through Fiery Trials

This is the 10th book in David Weber’s “Safehold” series. I’ve been reading these for many years. Although notionally a science fiction series, a lot of the focus is on the historic scientific progression that was required to advance humanity’s weapons technology used on land, sea, and in the air. In that regard, the series starts from a technical base of approximately the late dark ages or early Middle Ages and brings us to a technology level close to the end of the 19th century. Weber shows an incredible amount of historical and scientific knowledge – many of the scenarios and examples in the series could have been lifted from the American Civil War, WW1 and others. There is also a huge religious aspect to the series with schisms and intrigues similar to what happened in Europe in the middle-ages. I’m still enjoying the series and hopefully David Weber will wrap it up soon.