Book Review: The Age of Surveillance Capitalism


A boring book cover.

The Age of Surveillance Capitalism is a deeply-reasoned examination of the threat of unprecedented power free from democratic oversight. As it explores this new capitalism's impact on society, politics, business, and technology, it exposes the struggles that will decide both the next chapter of capitalism and the meaning of information civilization. It shows how we can protect ourselves and our communities and ensure we are the masters of the digital rather than its slaves.

Continue reading →

Book Review: Just One Damned Thing After Another


Book Cover.

The first book in the bestselling Chronicles of St Mary's series which follows a group of tea-soaked disaster magnets as they hurtle their way around History.

Continue reading →

Book Review: The Entrepreneurial State


Book cover with a lion on it.

This book debunks the myth of the State as a large bureaucratic organization that can at best facilitate the creative innovation which happens in the dynamic private sector. It argues that in the history of modern capitalism the State has not only fixed market failures but also shaped and created markets, actively investing in new technologies and sectors that private investors only later find the courage to move into.

Continue reading →

Book Review - Terry Pratchett's Discworld Imaginarium


Terry Pratchett wearing a top hat.

Paul Kidby has collected the very best of his Discworld illustrations in this definitive volume, including 40 pieces never before seen, 30 pieces that have only appeared in foreign editions, limited editions and BCA editions, and 17 book cover illustrations that have never been seen without cover text. If Pratchett's pen gave his characters life, Paul Kidby's brush allowed them to live it, and nowhere is that better illustrated than in this magnificent book.

Continue reading →

Book Review - Kindred


Book cover showing a woman running through trees.

The visionary author’s masterpiece pulls us—along with her Black female hero—through time to face the horrors of slavery and explore the impacts of racism, sexism, and white supremacy then and now.

Continue reading →

Book Review: Mismatch by Kat Holmes


Book Cover of Mismatch.

In Mismatch, Kat Holmes describes how design can lead to exclusion, and how design can also remedy exclusion. Inclusive design methods—designing objects with rather than for excluded users—can create elegant solutions that work well and benefit all. Holmes tells stories of pioneers of inclusive design, many of whom were drawn to work on inclusion because of their own experiences of exclusion.

Continue reading →

Book review: This Is How You Lose the Time War - Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone


A red bird and a blue bird.

Red belongs to the Agency, a post-singularity technotopia. Blue belongs to Garden, a single vast consciousness embedded in all organic matter. Their pasts are bloody and their futures mutually exclusive. They have nothing in common—save that they’re the best, and they’re alone. Now what began as a battlefield boast grows into a dangerous game, one both Red and Blue are determined to win. Because winning’s what you do in war. Isn’t it?

Continue reading →

Book Review: The Gendered Brain by Gina Rippon


Gendered Brain Book Cover.

Do you have a female brain or a male brain? Or is that the wrong question? We live in a gendered world where we are bombarded with messages about sex and gender. On a daily basis we face deeply ingrained beliefs that your sex determines your skills and preferences, from toys and colours to career choice and salaries. But what does this constant gendering mean for our thoughts, decisions and behaviour?

Continue reading →

Book Review: Zero Sum Game by S. L. Huang


A bullet hole in a window.

A blockbuster, near-future science fiction thriller, S.L. Huang's Zero Sum Game introduces a math-genius mercenary who finds herself being manipulated by someone possessing unimaginable power...

Continue reading →

Review: Because Internet by Gretchen McCulloch


The book cover.

The internet isn't the first technology to alter how we communicate, but it is making our language change faster and in more interesting ways than ever before. Linguistically inventive niche online communities spread slang and jargon exponentially faster than in the days when new dialects were constrained by physical space. What's more, social media provides a fascinating laboratory for watching language evolve in real time.

Continue reading →