23 June 2012
Call no: 800
Genre: historical fiction, sff
Setting: alternate world, C19th, Naples
6 Stars
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Conrad Scalese’s latest opera was a great success. Unfortunately the theatre in which it was performed has just been stuck by lightening. And since the composer and many of the performers have fled Naples the church decides to blame him. … Continue reading
8 May 2011
Call no: 937
Genre: history, non-fiction
Setting: Italy, New York
7 Stars
2 Comments
It is hard to blurb this book. On the one hand it is about Vesuvius and volcanic explosions and disasters both natural and man-made. But it is also a book about the origins of the earth, of the universe, and about how precarious our existence is. How so much of what we are today is dependent on natural events a thousand years ago, or a millennia ago, or so long ago that it is almost pointless to count the time because it is so difficult to grasp those sort of numbers.