Orwell is a man of strong convictions. He believes so passionately in the fight against fascism that in 1936 he travels to Barcelona to fight in the revolution. Homage to Catalonia is a detailed account of the politics surrounding the revolution, a fervent defense of the working class and a witness of war from the trenches. “All the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.” I will be honest and say that the politics interested me […]
Do you ever find yourself climbing into an open grave during a bombing raid and just wish you’d stayed in bed?
“Hollow City” is the second book in the “Peculiar Children” series, picking up immediately where the first book left off without much catch-up exposition. As I continued reading the series, my feelings got darker and more desperate, in line with the experience of the characters. There is very little hope or joy in Jacob Portman’s journey. He is a young man who answers the call, and then just plugs away at all the minutiae of being a hero. It’s not that it’s a chore to […]
Point Counterpoint, or: How I learned to Stop Worrying and Enjoy the Show
Like the two disconnected eyes of some monstrous oracle, these books look out of their respective time periods, casting forward to try and envision a future that could arise from contemporaneous events. One sings of nationalistic pride in service to the state, while the other firmly declares that war is a pointless and exploitative endeavor whose only benefit is the fostering of an unwieldy bureaucracy feeding on the health of its people. These books are diametrically opposed to one another, but each also serves as […]