The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet Is Killing Our Culture and Assaulting Our Economy - Andrew Keen

Advantages: Beautifully written - witty and intelligent throughout
Disadvantages: Maddening and disturbing if you don't enjoy challenging novels

...I absolutely love Chuck Palahniuk's novels. I have read them all, and as a literature student I find his style fascinating. General Synopsis: Our story begins on a hijacked plane, with the protagonist Tender Branson telling his life history to a little black box. Intelligent as ever, Palahniuk intends this not to be the beginning, but the beginning of the end of this tale, so we get the story in a kind of reverse, and at the end come full circle. Therefore you get the sense that the book is written backwards, and thus it can be slightly confusing to start with! Tender was brought up in a cult, and since its destruction has lived, with the support of a kind of 'social worker' type character, on his own. He absolutely knows how to run a house, which chemicals work together and which will kill you. He works as a kind of cleaner... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful

Advantages: -
Disadvantages: -

...Angels...what does that mean to people today. Guardians sent by god to watch over us, spirits that inhabit a parallel dimension or is there a more substantial explaination to their appearance in our history. Andrew Collins seems to think there is. Unlike most of the books that are published on Angels, this is not a New Age search for something to enrich our shallow lives, this is a pure historical detective work, a search for a historical reason for the existance of Angels. A basic recap of the Biblical angle on these characters is in order. The Angels, known more often as Watchers, were the messangers of God, some of whom fell from grace by "knowing" mortal women. The offspring of this union was known as the Nephilim, giants who walk among men. Nowhere does the Bible state that the Watchers had any special powers, not un-natural ones... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful

Advantages: A worthy collection of essays
Disadvantages: Left me wanting more!

...or military historian's library as a survey of medieval warfare. Keen's analysis is insightful, showing how developments in the medieval arts of war led to the the drive toward colonisation that has made the world's political geography what it is today. The essays work well at illuminating the subject, yet each essay has its own integrity. As Keen writes in the preface: ‘Warfare was a formative influence on the civilisation and the social structures of the European middle ages. Its history in that period is in consequence of high significance alike for those who are interested in the middle ages for themselves and for their legacy, and for those whose interest is in war and its place in the story of human development.’ There are many theories of the development of history -- one of the strongest theories of history through much of history... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful