Permutation City Blog

An account of Enron's rise and fall. To begin with this a dry book with, for my taste, too many facts and figures. Given the way Enron was run many of these figures were huge and you really wonder how anyone thought it was a sustainable idea. It loosened a bit towards the end, the pace picking up as catastrophe loomed.

A short story telling the classic tale of a shop that sells real magic. You can read it online.

In the asteroid belt a strange capsule is discovered millions of years old. Inside is the record of an alien genome. A priceless find for the corporation that can control it. Unfortunately it is stolen by criminal known as the ghost. I like this book for it's combination of biology, nanotechnology, artificial intelligences, and things going out of control.

From the author of A Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime comes the story of a family with many problems. There are breakups, weddings, medical questions, and more. A quick read.

A story about craniopagus twins, twins joined at the head. Rose has never been alone in her life. She has carried her sister Ruby every day. Always together but still different people. This was a compelling story written in a personal tone each sister.

Dark Red is an urban fantasy webcomic. To properly declare my interests before getting into it, I run the website for the comic. I've enjoyed reading the scripts, reading the comic on a week by week basis, and collecting the hard copy of the issues. It's got some clever ideas and a nice blend of real-world and supernatural.

Permaculature tries to emulate natural ecologies to increase yields and decrease labour for the gardener. Effort is put into building up the soil so it can support plant life. Plants are raised in diverse multicultures rather than single monocultures. I'd like to look at this again before planting up a garden of my own.

Big fantasy is not normally my thing but I really enjoyed Zelazny's metaverse. It's all centred about Corwin, a Crown Prince of Amber, and in-fighting between various members of that extensive family. Corwin starts out with amnesia and has to go through many stages before he regains his memory and the truth behind what's going on.

I've kept up with the Harry Potter series but it's been a while since I've read the first book. It's a readable book but seems wholey focused on children rather than adults. The chocolate frogs and banqueting scenes are examples of this. This isn't a bad thing, it is a children's book, but ideally I'd like something behind the fun and games as well. The series is obviously going to be around for a while. I'll be interested to see how it's doing in twenty years time when it's child readers are having kids of their own.

A look at how past societies have coped with environmental difficulties. Some have disappeared and some have managed to pull through. Diamond then looks at some of today's societies and how they compare. The planet doesn't provide endless resources and this is a stark lesson that some societies in the past have flurished then disappeared completely.