I enjoyed this book from a few angles. Firstly it is closely linked to the Ern Malley affair in 1943 – The Angry Penguins. Secondly it is also about living in a foreign country. Thirdly it is about consequences of actions that might have seemed ok in the past but don’t turn out that well.

I read it over two nights and had the usual sleep deprivation as a result.

This is the third in a series of books by Siegfried Sassoon. The first is called Memoirs of a Fox Hunting Man and is an enchanting description of Edwardian England that is safe and secure in its isolation from world turmoil. The tranquil and genteel country estate life of the gentry that focuses on a young man’s sporting achievements is set against a backdrop of the impending Great War. The chilling unpreparedness for what was to come and the human warmth that pervades the training of a cavalry regiment in the English heartland makes the known murderous events so much more poignant. The second book Memoirs of an Infantry Officer retains the gentleness of the preceding book but has the sharp and jagged edges of trench warfare protruding from its pages in a way you could imagine it happening in the trenches. Simple descriptions of horror juxtaposed against the memories of home and a better life tumble into serious questioning of the morality of war and the repulsive indifference of the aristocracy to suffering of ordinary soldiers. Ben Elton wrote a book, The First Casualty that seems to draw inspiration from Sassoon. It is easy to see how the writing of Sassoon and Wilfred Owen has coloured our understanding of the Great War. The final book, Sherston’s Progress, takes us into a world that does not understand what is happening in the trenches, sees the casualties and deaths as something that is “the Kaiser’s fault” rather than the result of outdated aristocracy that has not kept up with the changes of the past 30 years. 30 years when there was more technological advance than in the previous millennium. Changes in the way that ethnic groupings saw themselves as having no allegiance to Emperors, Sultans, Kings or any other imperial powers imposed upon them by force. Changes in the way that middle classes wanted political power to go with their increasing economic power. Changes that were modern rather than mediaeval. The final book was written when the Nazi rise to power was under way. Discussions of the intense conflict between a pacifist sentiment that you do not like killing a kindred spirit (possibly even a cousin) and a sense of duty to defend a beloved way of life that meant so much in your youth. The tension between duty and harsh reality. Loss of faith in the fundamentals of your own culture. A yearning to express the horror and yet uncanny beauty of the extremes generated by mechanised war. All through the prism of time. Written in the third person, this is extremely auto-biographical. How else could one write of such experiences? CEW Bean experienced trench warfare first hand and wrote about it from the perspective of others. Very few could write personally until their latter years. I recognise the language used from my grandparents and great aunts and uncles. An unsufferable loss of a generation of young men … then another in the subsequent World War. Is it any wonder that those generations took refuge in post War consumerism and looked to find comfort?

This is a terrifying book in some ways. Yet it almost seems normal in the context of Nazi Germany. That is why it is terrifying.
The story is almost a “normal” crime novel about a privileged class murder except that the privileged class is one of mass murderers. The premise of the what-if question posed by the novel is easy to believe; also hard to understand. It touches on:
• the nature of power
• the way International relations almost require turning a blind eye to atrocities
• the control of information
• propaganda and its insidious influence on popular thought
• suppression of ideas and free thought
• career vs principle
It is a very good thing to think of what might have happened if only a few things in the past were different.

This is the first Robert Harris book I read. It started me on a reading journey that I have not regretted.
What I love about this book is the way it tells a story of immense scale and impact (eruption of Vesuvius and the destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum) with the history and well shaped cultural insights being a background to a love story and tale of Imperial values, in what is arguably the peak civilisation outside the past 200 years.
I highly recommend this book and author.

I wonder how Robert Harris got away with this. It seems to cut to the bone and it is clear that he has some inside knowledge of the workings of the political system in Britain.

Conspiracy theories are one thing. Grand International conspiracies with one Government manipulating another major power is another thing again. Then add the thinly veiled likenesses to current politicians and it is more than a little concerning. You almost wonder if the accusations are not challenged then they might be true.

Regardless, the book is a compelling read. It seems to me that Robert Harris has taken his method of historical fiction writing and applied it to contemporary political life.

Another book by Alan Furst that I have greatly enjoyed. This is the originating book for the series focusing on the lead up to and during the second World War. It is about the minutiae of espionage and it seems to me to be the most authentic of all books on the subject (at least fictional). The scope is enormous and the ideas resonate for me.

• How war and conflicts of ideology can corrupt good people.
• Understanding your place in the world as an adolescent.
• How loyalty can overcome brainwashing.
• Mobilising the disaffected to a cause.

I felt for a young man trying to make sense of a world that was mad. Then doing what needed to be done to survive it… as one would. I read this book after reading almost every other book in the series. In some ways I am glad I did because the scope of the book needs some context to ground your understanding of what is happening.

As a first major writing effort, it has to be one of the best.

This is another must read book.

Is a superior culture the reason for Western dominance of the world over the past two centuries? Or was it just circumstance?

This book has the answers. It surprised me in a way and yet what I read made immediate sense.

Another must read. I read it after Collapse by the same author and am glad I did.

This is one of the best books I have ever read. It covers a broad scope and does so in considerable depth and with what looks to be sound analysis.

The part that resonates the most to me is the discussion of Easter Island. How, for 300 years the surplus of food allowed through intensive agriculture funded an allocation of 25% of the island’s resources towards building the famous statues. Ironically, the deforestation that was driven by the need for timber to move and erect the statues led to the destruction of local birdlife, access to fisheries and the intensive agriculture. The largest volcano on the island translates as “the place to get canoes”. Without the trees to make canoes, tuna and dolphin was no longer on the menu. All the native tree species were wiped out. on Page 114 is the quote I like the most “What did the Easter Islander who cut down the last palm tree say while he was doing it?”.  “Jobs, not trees!” or “Technology will solve our problems, never fear, we will find a substitute for wood” or: “we don’t have proof that there aren’t palms elsewhere on Easter, we need more research, your proposed ban on logging is premature and driven by fear-mongering”.

It puts things nicely in context. They were not much different to us at all.

Most importantly in this book, there is a solid discussion about why societies make the choices they do. It covers not just the failures but successes too, comparing and contrasting similar situates where there were the same challenges and different decisions and outcomes.

The final message for me is that poor long-term choices eventually come up against a limit or challenge that is too great to allow a simple change of some detail or other.  A choice to do something different or suffer the (often gruesome) consequences must be made.

A must read.

This is another good book from Robert Harris. It is focussed on the life of Cicero in his time as a public figure. While Cicero is interesting for achieving high office without a power base, the descriptions of Roman life and politics are what I like the most. Narrated from the perspective of an elite slave, it shows how little things have changed in politics. It shows how much has changed socially. Then there is that broad canvass of the Roman Empire and just how civilised they were at one level and yet savage at another. The treatment of Roman citizenship was the first time it became clear to me how much this concept meant at the time. I was reminded of my reading of Gibbon and how the Enlightenment sparked a renewed interest in the Greek and Roman concepts of Republic and citizenship. How all that resulted in The Terror and Napoleon. I was also reminded of how excess wealth gets used to create power. That power can be used for many purposes and those are not much different today to 2000 years ago. The writing is again something that made me read until far too late at night. I read this reasonably large book over two nights and an afternoon. It left me wanting more.