Book Club

Review by Stephen Kearney “An empty taxi pulled up outside ten Downing Street” ran the joke of the time “and Clement Attlee got out”. Orwell called him “a dead fish”. A chapter of this very biography is entitled “Few thought he was even a starter.” So embarrassed was...

At the  X-ray conference, Tim our regular radiologist was back from holiday, but not noceably refreshed by the break.  His increasing irritability had a comedic zest to it.  He struggled to conceal his contemot for the overinvestigation by us physicians, and cagey,...

THE KINGDOM OF WOMEN The Mosuo, who live in a remote part of western China, have a matrilineal social structure. Their ways are being rapidly superseded as modern China moves in: they have become a tourist attraction. The author has lived with the Mosuo part-time for...

The book opens in a rather macabre fashion with a lone assassin killing the main characters parents and older sister.  The 18 month old child escapes from his cot and wanders down stairs and out of the front door unbeknown to the knife wielding assassin.  Bod, as he...

Looking for America by Ian Mutch (first published 2001) review by Stephen Kearney   The Independent newspaper, in its obituary on Lord Denning, a one time powerful legal progressive who later went to seed in the mindless bog of English nationalism, mourned of his...

HUMAN KIND: A PRONOID MANIFESTO The subtitle is mine. But, it seems, they really are out to be nice to you! We have been raised with the idea that civilisation is only a veneer, and that without the forces of law and order we would quickly revert to barbarism. Witness...

Singapore Burning Heroism and Surrender in World War II By Colin Smith Published by Penguin Viking 2005 Review by Stephen Kearney 2013 (reviewed 2020)   Historical Background Singapore is a small island roughly 22 X 14 miles located at the southern tip of the...

The Railway Man by Eric Lomax review by Stephen Kearney One of the things that gives life its magic is the accidental, the freak, the one off, the random, the whole process of being in the right place at the right time or, alternately, the wrong place at the wrong...

Review by: Stephen Kearney It’s funny how you can get introduced to an author.  Just like meeting new people, it is, outside of a formalised learning environment, mainly a random occurrence.  It is one of life’s endless “ifs and buts” – “if I hadn’t stayed for another...

    Have you ever wondered why people vote for or support something diametrically opposed to their own best interests?   Why did so many Germans vote for Hitler?  Look what it brought them!  Why do so many Americans support Trump?  Look what it’s doing to...