Battling the Gods by Tim Whitmarsh

EGGHEAD CHOICE - Crack open for a hard boiled think

Atheism didn’t start with Charles Darwin, Bertrand Russell or Richard Dawkins in the modern era. Neither can any of Baruch Spinoza, Thomas Hobbes, David Hume, Voltaire, Arthur Schopenhauer, or Friedrich Nietzsche take full credit for exposing the delusion of theism. Atheism began way back in antiquity, and has a long and distinguished pedigree. This superb book by Cambridge Professor of Greek Culture Tim Whitmarsh (http://www.classics.cam.ac.uk/directory/professor-tim-whitmarsh) traces these […]

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Exposure

FANTASTIC FICTION - Escapes to other places and other times

Helen Dunmore (http://www.helendunmore.com/) is a prolific and well loved writer across a range of categories – novels, young adult fiction, children’s fiction, poetry, short stories and essays. Her latest novel, Exposure (2016), is ideal as a winter read. With the world closed down outside, let Dunmore and your imagination transport you fully to a different world. That

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The Promise

FANTASTIC FICTION - Escapes to other places and other times

Robert Crais (http://www.robertcrais.com/) is an American author of detective fiction who has been influenced by Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett. For those of a certain age who remember and loved Hill Street Blues (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hill_Street_Blues), Crais was the scriptwriter for that TV series. Now a highly successful writer of crime and thriller fiction, his latest publication is The Promise

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Leviathan

EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE - Science & Technology

It is in line with the perversity of my nature that one of my favourite places in Scotland is Dundee. Aside from its many qualities, one aspect of understanding the city is to know about its history of whaling. (http://www.fdca.org.uk/Whaling_Industry.html) The McManus Galleries (http://www.mcmanus.co.uk/) has excellent displays on the subject, and it was here first in

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Forty Thieves

CRIMINALLY MINDED - Tales of the behaviourally challenged, FANTASTIC FICTION - Escapes to other places and other times

Thomas Perry (http://www.thomasperryauthor.com/Thomas_Perry/Welcome_1.html) has offered a variety of suspense fiction starting with The Butcher’s Boy, which received a 1983 Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for Best First Novel. This was followed by Metzger’s Dog, Big Fish, Island, and Sleeping Dogs. He then launched the critically acclaimed Jane Whitefield series. To date he has published

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The Unauthorized Version by Robin Lane Fox

PAST PRESENT - What's new in History, SPIRIT MATTERS - Reaching for the Divine

The Bible (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bible) is the most widely distributed collection of literary texts in human culture. The Greek word βιβλία (biblía) means ‘books’. Its two parts, The Old and New Testaments between them comprise 66 books. This number itself is contentious because there is no one ‘Bible’. Different faith traditions have fixed their ‘canon’ of Scripture in different ways. It is nevertheless the

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The Guilty

CRIMINALLY MINDED - Tales of the behaviourally challenged

David Baldacci (http://davidbaldacci.com/) began writing  stories as a child, when his mother gave him a notebook in which to record them.  He wrote for more than two decades, penning short stories and later screenplays  without much success. While practicing law, he turned to novel writing, taking  three years to write Absolute  Power. Published in 1996,

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