Natalie Haynes makes a wonderful job of bringing the heroic women (and goddesses) of Ancient Rome and Ancient Greece to life, as never before.
Ironically, Helen of Troy herself, the fabulous stolen beauty at the centre of a catastrophic war in ancient Asia Minor, hardly gets a mention. She seems to exist only as an excuse for slaughter, and I found Haynes' view of this legendary beauty grimly convincing.
The other women (and goddesses) involved―raped, kidnapped, robbed of their children, and yet undaunted; given voices by the poet called Homer, more or less ignored by every scholar since, are all of them brilliantly brought to life in Haynes's version, and to say more would be to cheat new readers of the great pleasure of meeting them afresh.
In A Thousand Ships, broadcaster and classicist Natalie Haynes retells the story of the Trojan War from an all-female perspective, for fans of Madeline Miller and Pat Barker.
This was never the story of one woman, or two. It was the story of them all . . .
In the middle of the night, a woman wakes to find her beloved city engulfed in flames. Ten seemingly endless years of conflict between the Greeks and the Trojans are over. Troy has fallen.
From the Trojan women whose fates now lie in the hands…
Okay, consider the economics of planet earth as a ring doughnut.
The outer surface of this doughnut is our planetary boundaries, which we mustn't breach because if we do, our living world goes straight to hell (we are close!). The inner surface is human social foundation; the needs of all the humans, and all the systems of the living world that we depend on, being met.
Doughnut economics is when economic entities of all persuasions (governments, neoliberal billionaires, minor TikToc entrepreneurs; you and me) work with this model, and no other, in mind. Tricky, very tricky...
I had no idea I could understand a work like this, until I tried. Don't know if Raworth will save the world, but it's a very thorough, very interesting & informative read.
800-CEO-Read "Best Business Book of 2017: Current Events & Public Affairs"
Economics is the mother tongue of public policy. It dominates our decision-making for the future, guides multi-billion-dollar investments, and shapes our responses to climate change, inequality, and other environmental and social challenges that define our times.
Pity then, or more like disaster, that its fundamental ideas are centuries out of date yet are still taught in college courses worldwide and still used to address critical issues in government and business alike.
That's why it is time, says renegade economist Kate Raworth,…
I'm cheating, in that there are three volumes in Cixin Liu's Remembrance of Things Past, but it's in a good cause, because the first title, The Three Body Problem, turns out to be the opener to a mighty saga, and if you find The Three Body Problem grimly gripping, as I did, I assure you you're going to be fascinated by the whole epic, from the weird struggle to identify the first ever aliens to make contact with humanity, in The Three Body Problem, set not long after China's devastating “Cultural Revolution”, to the bizarre worlds of the far, far distant future.
I've cited the English language title assigned to this monumental blockbuster, but I think Liu Cixin's own, original title for the series, (Earth's Past) actually works fine. You will come to realise, as you journey through the distances in time and space; the astonishing inventions, and the different realities that open up, why it's Earth's Past we're asked to consider.
Maybe love isn't the word for how I feel about this epic. Respect and fascination seems more like it.
Read the award-winning, critically acclaimed, multi-million-copy-selling science-fiction phenomenon - soon to be a Netflix Original Series from the creators of Game of Thrones.
1967: Ye Wenjie witnesses Red Guards beat her father to death during China's Cultural Revolution. This singular event will shape not only the rest of her life but also the future of mankind.
Four decades later, Beijing police ask nanotech engineer Wang Miao to infiltrate a secretive cabal of scientists after a spate of inexplicable suicides. Wang's investigation will lead him to a mysterious online game and immerse him in a virtual world ruled by the intractable…
London. Early 21st Century. A Conservative government is in power, bringing increased wealth disparity, an ever-more militant police state, and rising civil discontent as the wealthy govern for themselves rather than the people.
But BREAKTHRU - pharmaceutical company turned religious cult – has the answer. They call it Kairos. Kairos allows the user to see a different world, and shape the world to their very will. Perfect for a cult of like-minded individuals. Disastrous when the general public is exposed. As disparate groups of people try to shape the world into their own image, reality itself is placed under threat. With society so divided, is there any way to pull the world back together?
Written in 1988, this remarkably prescient book received great critical acclaim.
