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book reviews, short story, stories

Life, Death and Other Characters. Geoff Le Pard

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I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Blurb

What would you do if you were to host a dinner party and the sky wasn’t what you’d ordered? Could you find someone to shake out the creases from the clouds and tone down the wind to an acceptable zephyr? And what are the challenges facing a Portal Management Volunteer as they steer the recently departed to their chosen Hereafter? Or how would you organise your life if you were called to do God service just when you’d planned on making marmalade that weekend? Life, DEATH and Other Characters will inform and, where necessary, guide you through these and other complications amongst a lot of other short fiction that will educate inform and entertain. Well, maybe one out of three.

Review

As this is a book of short stories, my usual review is not applicable.

Geoff Le Pard has written a book of short stories that are not to be missed. Whoever you are, there is something for you here. I am not usually one for short stories, but I loved this.
There is such a variety of stories here. Some are irreverent, with tales of problems that God has; some are lough out loud funny; some are short; some are longer; some have deeper meanings for those who wish to search for them.
I love the tales where Death (or De’Ath as he has decided to call himself) is a character, but I can’t say I have a favourite story. They are all my favourites.
It is an easy read for when you have only a few minutes and don’t want to plough through a chapter of a full-scale novel. There will be a story that can fit into your time-scale. Or do what I did and start at the beginning and continue to the end.
Some of the stories are commentaries (disguised, of course) on modern life, and politics.
Whoever you are, I recommend this book to you.

I gave it 5*

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Maria and Tom have bought an antique table for the old cottage they have bought. When they hear strange noises in the night that sound like crying, they worry their house is haunted, but the sounds seem to come from the table.

They set about trying to find what is causing the disturbances. The answer is stranger than either of them had thought.

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Review of Glimpserama by Mortimer Roxburgh

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Glimpserama by [Major Roxbrough]

**** stars

Overview

This is a book of short stories. They are all set in the same era, well into the future of the Solar System, when humanity has colonised Mars, and is mining the asteroids.
There are androids whose appearance makes it impossible to tell them apart from humans. They have even achieved the ability to feel some kind of emotions.
Mars is being slowly terraformed, and humans can stay outside for short periods, but humanity still has all the same foibles as we have now.
Some of the stories have the same characters appearing, but all are separate and complete.

Blurb

Glimpserama is a glimpse into one of mankinds possible futures. The first attempt is to begin colonizing the solar system and beyond. Although technology may have advanced, will Man have learned the improved ways of living along with such progress? Maybe not! We see that though Man has moved forward with technology, he is still the same marred creature he ever was, with very much the same old problems of morality and the simple ability to get along with his fellow man. Here are fifteen stories of the human condition in the thirty-third century.

Story

The stories in this book are excellent. They hold the attention throughout. I found I had to read to the end of each one.
They are very varied. From detective mysteries to explorations beyond the solar system, to wars, we find a great variety of tales.

Characterisation.

Being short stories, there is little time for the characters to develop, although it was fascinating to follow the increasing self-awareness and growing emotions in one of the androids.
The characters had human foibles (except for the androids, of course), and felt real.

Writing.

This is the weakest part of the book. There are a great many punctuation errors that I found somewhat disconcerting, especially when Roxburgh put some of the same person’s words on a different line after the dialogue tag.
He also puts the quotation marks before the comma, full stop, question mark, etc., and he does not seem to fully understand the use of apostrophes. S ometimes they are in the correct place, but other times they are scattered in plurals.
There are places where he puts commas instead of a full stop and question marks where it’s not a question.
He also has a habit of using obscure words, many of which I had to look up. Not helpful for a clear and enjoyable reading.
There are also some spelling mistakes (lead instead of led, dyeing instead of dying, for example.)and wrong word usage (like conceded instead of conceived, and peculiarly for particularly).

Conclusion

I do have to commend Roxburgh on his research, though. It is thorough and accurate as far as present day science is concerned. Who can say how accurate his foretelling might be?
All in all, in spite of the grammar errors, the stories are good, and so I decided to only remove 1 star from my review.

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