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Al McReady

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3 hours ago, galenkia said:

Stephen King's latest.

Another book that was cheaper in hardback than Kindle.

£11 delivered to the locker versus £12.99 for the Kindle version.

Plain crazy- good for you buying the hardback.

Quite worrying really have one huge firm trying to control the price of books (and setting a crazy one). £12.99 for downloading a file!!!

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On 8/9/2022 at 6:56 AM, Lemondropkid said:

First time I've read a Maigret book, only 160 pages, whole stack of them at the local library. Gushing reviews of the writer from the great and good of literature world- let's see🙂

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I have a copy of A Maigret Christmas and Other Stories.  Georges Simenon was a fascinating man, a Belgian, who once claimed to have had 10,000 lovers in the 61 years since his 13th birthday. His second wife claimed it was closer to 1,200, one of whom was Josephine Baker. Pity he never came to Thailand he could have easily doubled that figure!

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On 9/9/2022 at 9:30 PM, Lemondropkid said:

Plain crazy- good for you buying the hardback.

Quite worrying really have one huge firm trying to control the price of books (and setting a crazy one). £12.99 for downloading a file!!!

I donate them to the charity shop when I have a few finished. 

Like to see other people have the chance to enjoy them. 

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Fizzed through this short novel. Picked out at random from a charity shop, will be going back shortly for them to resell.

A clunky translation left me disappointed compared to the stellar reviews on the cover. Took so little time to finish, I persisted and skipped through part of the defendant's back story, when it was obvious what that was going to reveal

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Latest from John Sandford

Righteous Prey by John Sandford (Lucas Davenport/Prey series #32)


Overview: Lucas Davenport and Virgil Flowers are up against a powerful vigilante group with an eye on vengeance in this stunning new novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author.

“We’re going to murder people who need to be murdered.”

So begins a press release from a mysterious group known only as “The Five,” shortly after a vicious predator is murdered in San Francisco. The Five is made up of vigilante killers who are very bored…and very rich. They target the worst of society—rapists, murderers, and thieves—and then use their unlimited resources to offset the damage done by those who they’ve killed, donating untraceable Bitcoin to charities and victims via the dark net. The Five soon become popular figures in the media …though their motives may not be entirely pure.

After The Five strike again in the Twin Cities, Virgil Flowers and Lucas Davenport are sent in to investigate. And they soon have their hands full--the killings are smart and carefully choreographed, and with no apparent direct connection to the victims, the killers are virtually untraceable. But if anyone can destroy this group, it will be the dynamic team of Davenport and Flowers.

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Churchill's American Arsenal: The Partnership Behind the Innovations That Won World War Two

by Larrie D. Ferreiro

Overview: Many weapons and inventions were credited with winning World War II, most famously in the assertion that the atomic bomb "ended the war, but radar won the war."

What is less well known is that both airborne radar and the atomic bomb were invented in British laboratories, but built by Americans.

The same holds true for many other American weapons credited with the Allied victory: the P-51 Mustang fighter, the Liberty ship, the proximity fuze, the Sherman tank, and even penicillin all began with British scientists and planners, but were designed and mass-produced by American engineers and factory workers.

Churchill's American Arsenal chronicles this vital but often fraught relationship between British inventiveness and American technical might.

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On 10/5/2022 at 2:22 AM, Zeb said:

Latest from John Sandford

Righteous Prey by John Sandford (Lucas Davenport/Prey series #32)


Overview: Lucas Davenport and Virgil Flowers are up against a powerful vigilante group with an eye on vengeance in this stunning new novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author.

“We’re going to murder people who need to be murdered.”

So begins a press release from a mysterious group known only as “The Five,” shortly after a vicious predator is murdered in San Francisco. The Five is made up of vigilante killers who are very bored…and very rich. They target the worst of society—rapists, murderers, and thieves—and then use their unlimited resources to offset the damage done by those who they’ve killed, donating untraceable Bitcoin to charities and victims via the dark net. The Five soon become popular figures in the media …though their motives may not be entirely pure.

After The Five strike again in the Twin Cities, Virgil Flowers and Lucas Davenport are sent in to investigate. And they soon have their hands full--the killings are smart and carefully choreographed, and with no apparent direct connection to the victims, the killers are virtually untraceable. But if anyone can destroy this group, it will be the dynamic team of Davenport and Flowers.

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Just finished this one. Have to say it's not up to the usual standard of Sandford's previous books. He doesn't mention a ghost writer, but I wonder...

The biggest plot hole I couldn't get past was the fact The Five are Bitcoin billionaires, but a big portion of the book has a sixth going from city to city to collect cash so she can disappear. Why on earth didn't she have a Bitcoin wallet which the billionaires could transfer money to. Of course if she did then there wouldn't be anything to write about.

Another minor quibble is the author interjected politics into his writing that didn't do anything to further the plot, other than to get a few political digs in.

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9 hours ago, forcebwithu said:

Just finished this one. Have to say it's not up to the usual standard of Sandford's previous books. He doesn't mention a ghost writer, but I wonder...

He is pushing 80 so you never know. He has involved his son in recent books so that might be the case here.

I listened to it on an audiobook and still enjoyed it.

 

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Like all Winterson novels (Sexing the Cherry, The Passion), this ambiguous love story is a philosophical meditation, this time on the body: the body as physical phenomenon, and the body as repository of our emotions and souls. The object is a married woman named Louise, and the narrator is her lover, gender undeclared, who reveals the topography of desire for readers. From: https://books.google.com/books/about/Written_on_the_Body.html

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Ian Rankin - Inspector Rebus Book 24 - A Heart Full of Headstones

John Rebus stands accused: on trial for a crime that could put him behind bars for the rest of his life. Although it's not the first time the legendary detective has taken the law into his own hands, it might be the last.


What drove a good man to cross the line? Or have times changed, and the rules with them?
Detective Inspector Siobhan Clarke faces Edinburgh's most explosive case in years, as a corrupt cop goes missing after claiming to harbour secrets that could sink the city's police force.


But in this investigation, it seems all roads lead to Rebus—and Clarke's twin loyalties to the public and the police will be tested to their limit.


A reckoning is coming—and John Rebus may be hearing the call for last orders...

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On 10/16/2022 at 10:24 AM, galenkia said:

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Alan, I know you enjoy your books and cricket. Have you ever read Fatty Batter by Michael Simkins and Penguins Stopped Play by Harry Thompson?  

Im not a great reader tbh but both these books are brilliant if you enjoy club cricket. 

If you haven't read them I'm willing to send them to you if are interested. (once I'm back from Thailand in January). 

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Forgot to post pictures
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The Boys from Biloxi by John Grisham

For most of the last hundred years, Biloxi was known for its beaches, resorts, and seafood industry. But it had a darker side. It was also notorious for corruption and vice, everything from gambling, prostitution, bootleg liquor, drugs...even contract killings. The vice was controlled by a small cabal of mobsters, many of them rumoured to be members of the Dixie Mafia.

Keith Rudy and Hugh Malco grew up in Biloxi in the sixties and were childhood friends. But as teenagers, their lives took them in different directions. Keith's father became a legendary prosecutor, determined to 'clean up the Coast.' Hugh's father became the 'Boss' of Biloxi's criminal underground. Keith went to law school and followed in his father's footsteps. Hugh preferred the nightlife and worked in his father's clubs. The two families were headed for a showdown, one that would happen in a courtroom.

Rich with history and with a large cast of unforgettable characters, The Boys from Biloxi is a sweeping saga of two sons of immigrant families who grow up as friends, but ultimately find themselves in a knife-edge legal confrontation in which life itself hangs in the balance.

In this novel, Grisham takes his powerful storytelling to the next level, his trademark twists and turns will keep you tearing through the chapters until the stunning conclusion.

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