Does justice to the question, and doesn't just break it down into temporal boilerplate, or simplistic explanations. It covers specific examples across time and space, including one very interesting and informative burst of partisam gerrymandering in the "Miner Law in Michigan" case.
Antkind (Charlie Kaufman)
I had just watched "I'm Thinking of Ending Things" and was completely depressed after that, so what did I do? I went right out and bought Antkind and got sucked right in. This novel is much better than "Ending", and it is much much funnier.
It's the End of the World (Adam Roberts)
Also very funny and a useful antidote to gloomy or pessimistic thinking under lockdown. Much more academic, critical, and literary than Bill Bailey's own lockdown-literary efforts, this is also a handbook of useful information on what you might consider reading while you've got the extra time (free of travel, vacations or family visits) over the holidays and beyond...
The Liar's Dictionary (Eley Williams)
Another Royal Holloway lecturer hits it out of the park in her debut novel that switches between present-day London and the city in 1899, just before several key words without which it is hard to imagine conducting intelligent discourse had not yet come into being. This is wonderful storytelling and it is beautiful poetry, and it made me think about maps and their #mountweazels, as well as about language and 'the stations at which we post the word', spatialities, etc, EXCELLENT!
War of the Maps (Paul McAuley)
I mean, just look at the title, and realise that it's richer than you can even imagine, with so many different levels of not just map, but of being and estrangement coming into play that it just boggles! This is a great book, and it has made me a McAuley true believer...a technical term indicating that from now on McAuley has a 'free pass' from Gwilym (I'll buy anything he publishes from now on).
Mordew (Alex Pheby)
I'm a bit of an outsider, but as my appreciation of England deepens I find increasingly resonant vibrations with Dickens and Peake. This book is right in that resonance, and adds significantly to the tradition, with map.
The Unstable Realities of Christopher Priest (Paul Kincaid)
I'm picking up a bit more Priest in part as accompaniment to the stellar example of academic excellence. Literary criticism will find increasing relevance on my reading lists as I deepen my own academic endeavours in this area, and this is in my top three of all time in the category of exemplary SF criticism category.
The Lost Art of Running (Benzie)
Beautifully written, and useful in terms of actual running, this book actually does something different, which is hard to do with so many running books out there. We need to get over our fixation on VDOT02max, to realise the fascia that does free work for the runner, look at the muscles and the skeleton more, and how we hold our form. It also has the 'anthropological' take on running, but in a very good way (with map).
Exercised (Daniel Lieberman)
This book really changed my whole outlook, and I'm no longer hung up on how much I sleep, or posture (not that I was much hung on posture), and have a firm basis in the science and anthropology of running, and some sympathetic stories around how running impacts lives.
The Motion of the Body Through Space (Lionel Shriver)
A reactionary take on fitness, but very entertaining, and with some food for thought.
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