Permutation City Blog

I like that most of the superheros here are nothing more than men (or women) in tights. They have their own motivations, normally a bit strange given their circumstance. I like that there is more going on here than good and evil. As a contrast we have Doctor Manhattan who's has almost unlimited powers but little interest in using them.

I'd like to be able to compare this to the film but I can't really remember it. Setup as a mystery set against the conflicts of communist ideals and reality. Not really my sort of book but readable enough to be interesting. Maybe something more factual about the uSSR would be good.

Grahamston lies beneath Glasgow Central Station this book presents how it happens. Unfortunately there was any exciting discovery of walls of buildings still left. It was interseting to learn how much the old rail companies use to squabble.

A diverse look at all aspects of bicycles: history, culture, styles, maintenance. Although I've been riding for a while this let me know a lot more. Now I just need to decide what sort of bike to get.

The real life story of a year in the Baltimore homicide department. This is a tome at 650 fairly dense pages but worth it. It focuses on the people but rather than the murders. Even so there are a lot of them described briefly.

Daniel finds a copy of The Shadow of the Wind in the secret Cemetery of Forgotten Books. Other books by the author have disappeared and Daniel becomes entagled trying to find out what happened to them and the author. A compelling read but in the second half many of the secrets feel like they are too easily revealed in large story like converstions.

I found this to be a mis-mash of ideas. It's an alternate universe where the cimean war never ended, vampires and werewolves exist, as do home-cloning kits and time travel. The liteary aspects aren't really relevant until some way through the book. All in all I think this was trying too hard.

An odd story to associate with Wells. Mr Polly has an unremarkable and uninteresting life. This reaches it's peak with the decision to burn his shop and commit suicide. He succeeds in the first but fails in the second. This catalysis him to leave his home and find a new happier existance.

Flatland the tale of an individual, a square, living in a two dimensional world. He has a vision of a one dimensional world and is then introduced to the misterys of the third dimenision by a strange spherical visitor. This is all an excuse to get the reader to think about the fourth spatial dimension. In this edition many annotation with additional information have been added. If you're confused or interested by this then you might want to have a read.

A woman, Valentina, tries to immigrate into Britian by marrying an old man and take his money. The book is mainly about the man's daughter trying to get rid of the woman. It started as a difficult read because Valentina was irritating, not very nice and uninformed about the realities of living in the West. It was better reading towards the end once the setup had finished and more could actually happen. The strange title refers to a manuscript that one of the characters is writing.