PUBLICATION DATE: 13th MARCH 2025 HARDBACK ORIGINAL | £ 16. 99 | ORENDA BOOKS
Description
Expert on body language and memory, and consultant to the Oslo Police, psychologist Kari Voss sleepwalks through her days, and, by night, continues the devastating search for her young son, who disappeared on his birthday, seven years earlier.
Still grieving for her dead husband, and trying to pull together the pieces of her life, she is thrust into a shocking local investigation, when two teenage girls are violently murdered in a family summer home in the nearby village of Son.
When a friend of the victims is charged with the barbaric killings, it seems the case is closed, but Kari is not convinced. Using her skills and working on instinct, she conducts her own enquiries, leading her to multiple suspects, including people who knew the dead girls well…
With the help of Chief Constable Ramona Norum, she discovers that no one – including the victims – are what they seem. And that there is a dark secret at the heart of Son village that could have implications not just for her own son’s disappearance, but Kari’s own life, too…
The Tyrant Philosophers, Book 3 Narrated by David Thorpe Release date: 05-12-24 Language: English Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 21 hrs and 39 mins
Bloomsbury presents Days of Shattered Faith by Adrian Tchaikovsky, read by David Thorpe.
Welcome to Alkhalend, Jewel of the Waters, capital of Usmai, greatest of the Successor States, inheritor to the necromantic dominion that was the Moeribandi Empire and tomorrow’s frontline in the Palleseen’s relentless march to bring Perfection and Correctness to an imperfect world.
Loret is fresh off the boat, and just in time.
As Cohort-Invigilator of Correct Appreciation, Outreach department, she’s here as aide to the Palleseen Resident, Sage-Invigilator Angilly. And Sage-Invigilator Angilly – Gil to her friends – needs a second in the spectacularly illegal, culturally offensive and diplomatically inadvisable duel she must fight at midnight.
Outreach, that part of the Pal machine that has to work within the imperfection of the rest of the world, has a lot of room for the illegal, the unconventional, the unorthodox. But just how much unorthodoxy can Gil and Loret get away with?
As a succession crisis looms, as a long-forgotten feat of necromantic engineering nears fruition, as pirate kings, lizard armies and demons gather, as old gods wane and new gods wax, sooner or later Gil and Loret will have to settle their ledger.
Just as well they are both very, very good with a blade…
My Review
I enjoyed the first two books in this series, but I think this third book is my favourite. We encounter re-occurring characters, like Jack, the former priest, and some of the crew from the hospital, who have settled in Alkhaland, and set up a new hospital in the poor district of the city. Jack has made a new friend who runs the local prison and has an un/comfortable relationship with his demon bride. This comes in very handy later in the story.
Into a complicated city comes Loret, a young, scared woman from Pallisand, sent to be aide to Gil, the Resident. Except Loret is a very bad aide, other than rescuing Gil a couple of times. Loret knows what has been happening in the isles and it scares her. She is too scared to tell Gil, and we learn what happened after the characters from book two return to the Palleseen Sway – the ‘infection’ of belief in Jack’s former god, a healer, and the Fisher King, who is very much not a healer, spreads in the army and then in the general population.
I loved this development in the background story, which travels through all three books. It’s the landscape that the stories take place in, with each book being a focused pinpoint in the wider picture. Nothing in the story-world is static, although the Palles want the world to be static and perfect and are constantly fighting against difference and variation.
Alkhaland has an elderly, grief-stricken ruler, who has three sons and a daughter. Tradition says that only a whole man can rule. The eldest is in exile, the second son, Cam, is his father’s right hand and designated heir, the third son is a child obsessed with death. His daughter is a pawn in the game of alliances.
The worldbuilding and descriptions of Alkhaland’s culture and society are vivid and lively. The characters are individual and have their own complex motivations. Gil is truly distressed by the difficult choices she has to make and her complex relationship with Cam.
When the ruler dies, the sons go to war. Except the youngest who goes to meet death. The daughter joins the demon at the hospital. Cam wins with the help of his friend Gil and her Palleseen troops, who promtly move in and make themselves at home.
The people of Alkhaland do not want to be part of the sway, and after some difficulties they free themselves, with the help of a motley crew of aliens, disaffected Palls, demons, and pirates. The final battle is climactic and exciting to read. The advances and reversals, the personal decisions that could make or break the battle, are brilliantly written.
It’s a complex story, exploring how imperialism sneaks into free places around the world, and the small things and well-meaning people that help it along. The Palleseen Sway reminds me of the British Empire, especially the way we took control of India. Trusted representatives of different European states rolled up in the Indian kingdoms and started cultivating influence, until the kings supported one or the other, and then European states sent armies to ‘help’ the Indian kings, until they control the states themselves.
Adrian Tchaikovsky leaves an author’s note that the places in the book aren’t based on real places but he was influenced by the podcast Revolutions. I don’t think I’ve listened to that podcast but I’ve had a quick scan of the episode titles, it seems to cover the revolutionary period from the reign of Charles II onwards. I shall have to have a listen. I also recommend Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff if you’re interested in revolutionaries.
I highly recommend this book and the series in general. I need more stories set in this world, but I think this trilogy is complete as it is, charting the beginning of the end of empire. I hear there’s a short story hiding in an anthology somewhere, so I need to get hold of that anthology.
The narration was excellent and fully embodied the different characters.
Format: 432 pages, Hardcover Published: January 16, 2025 by Hodderscape ISBN: 9781399723176 (ISBN10: 1399723170) Language: English
Description
Marisha’s life is not going as she expected. With the sleeping plague only a few months away, she’s as desperate for money as she is to escape her aunt’s torturous marriage prospects. Leaving all that she’s known behind, Marisha accepts a job working with the notorious koldunya, Baba Zima in her house that glides on chicken feet through the snow.
But Baba Zima is renowned for being both clever and cruel. And most difficult of all is her current apprentice, Olena, who wants nothing to do with Marisha. Despite her fears and Olena’s cold demeanour, Marisha finds herself drawn into the magical world of koldunry and delves further into Olena’s research – a cure for the sleeping plague.
Accompanying Olena on an increasingly dangerous, seemingly impossible search for a cure, she finds hidden connections between the sleeping plague, her own family’s history, and her bizarre, recurring dreams: dreams of a masked ball where the deep sleepers are trapped endlessly dancing – and a monstrous beaked man haunts her every step . . .
My Review
I found an ARC of this book at FantasyCon, one of the Hodderscape team must have left it lying around after a book launch event. It has a matching bookmark. Essentially I have paperback version of the hardback now available. The book was published 16th of this month. The paperback from HarperVoyager will be published in June. It has a different cover, so I might get it. This book is the February BFS Book Club book, and since I had it and felt like reading something different yesterday evening, I started reading it.
When I went to bed I was over 220 pages in and only stopped reading because my eyes were stinging with tiredness. I planned to go swimming this afternoon, but decided to stay home and finish the story instead. I’m going swimming tomorrow instead.
Marisha is cursed. Her mother, then her father, succumb to the sleeping plague, ten years apart. Her brother loses their fortune and she is, after finishing school, thrown on the mercies of her wealthy maternal aunts. Who pity and hate her, fearing she’ll bring the curse to them next time the sleeping plague strikes. Determined to get away from her aunts and the prospect of marriage to a man twice her age with evil eyes, she applies to be a koldunya’s assistant.
She’s too old.
She doesn’t believe in magic or curses.
She doesn’t have koldunya quality.
Her parents are victims of the sleeping plague and her brother has disappeared.
She is stubborn, logical, and hardworking. She knows how to scrub pans, read Old Slavonic, and the house didn’t squash her immediately.
Baba Zima takes her on for a year.
But she’s assistant to Olena, Baba Zima’s apprentice, who is stubborn, spiky, doesn’t let people in, and really doesn’t want an assistant.
The household is completed by two other young assistance, Dunya and Anka-ny, and they are later joined by Baba Zima’s son Valdim
For three months the household travels across the land, dispensing advice, cures, and spirit work to supplicants. Marisha develops a complicated relationship with Olena, especially after they kidnap a victim of the sleeping plague from a sanitorium and Marisha starts having terrifying dreams of a masked ball in the other world. When not hiding their kidnappee in a linen closet, Marisha helps Olena by reading a mountain of books and finding hints about the plague, while picking up the skills of a koldunya, although she doesn’t want to be one.
Olena has complicated feelings about Valdim, Marisha, and Baba Zima, while she struggles with finding a cure for the plague. Her plans seem to work then go awry, Baba Zima tests her loyalty frequently, and abuses her trust as often.
Baba Zima is suspicious; an old rival, Anatoli, is rumoured to have found a way to cure the plague, and has been making overtures to Olena. She doesn’t trust Olena not to betray her, so she distracts her by asking for help with the demonstration they will perform for other koldunya.
As winter comes to an end, the house on chicken legs takes the household to a clearing in the forest, to a gathering of koldunya, the krug. Here, events become tangled further, as Olena is tempted by her mentor’s rival, and Marisha is ‘helped’ by a kolduni who seems familiar, Pan Volya.
The actions of Marisha’s parents, Baba Zima, Anatoli, and their presumed dead matron, Baba Fima, and Pan Volya, before Marisha was born, bears fruit in the present, as Marisha, Dima (her brother), Olena, and Voldam, face the consequences and fight to save the entire world from the sleeping plague.
An imaginative fantasy of redemption, drawing heavily from Slavic mythology and folklore. Witches and wizards (to use English equivalents) flying around in giant mortars, or living in houses that walk about of chicken legs; the waters of life and death, that can heal the body and the spirit if applied appropriately, but which are hidden; deep dark forests, and poor villages, where disabled children are considered cursed, a punishment for the sins of their parents.
The name of the country, Chernozemlya, seems to be a reference to black earth. The black soil of Slavic regions of Europe are incredibly fertile and produce vast amounts of grains. It’s one of the reasons the Russian Empire, then the USSR, and the current Russian Republic, fought, killed, murdered, starved and displaced so many people. Can’t claim the soil if your own people aren’t living there. No really, it partially explains the current Russian war in Ukraine. Apart from control of the Black Sea, and Putin’s delusions of Tzarship.
The story turns on the relationships of the main characters, as they learn to work together and develop friendships or at least respect for each other. I didn’t like Baba Zima very much, she’s intentionally cruel, but as I read the last chapters, which showed her relationship with her own matron, Baba Fima, it’s clear she’s acting from fear, guilt, and a bad example of how a matron koldunya should treat her apprentices and assistants.
Olena’s history of being abused by her family and then manipulated by Zima make her reluctant to trust anyone, even the boy she grew up with, Valdim, and certainly not her assistant Marisha. She finds Marisha useful when she can be bothered to ask for her assistance, and Valdim confusing. Zima plays the three off against each other, so that until the Baba leaves unexpectedly, that make little progress. Every two steps forward in relationship building is met with a little trick by Zima, that forces them each back one step. Her removal gives them space to realise what’s been happening, and they still decide to rescue her. I found her stubbornness frustrating but understandable. She’s visibly disabled in a world that hates disability, she’s been badly treated by the people who are supposed to love her, and she feels guilt at accidentally hurting her brother. Her defence mechanism to hide from the pain is to view everything through a lens of attack, to build a wall around herself and drive people away.
Marisha seems a bit of a dolt at times; she’s blinded by her prejudices against the ‘irrational’, afraid that she’ll be the next victim of the sleeping plague, and she won’t ask for help when nightmares stop her sleeping! It’s obvious that she’s dream walking, at least it is to the reader, once we discover who is helping her. Between Marisha and Olena they have all the clues to the cure that they need, but they don’t talk to each other! I wanted to bash their heads together.
It felt like a realistic depiction of two very different and traumatised people trying to work through their differences and find new perspectives on events. Some real people never get to a point where their trauma is manageable and doesn’t colour everything in negativity, so it’s almost refreshing when fictional people do.
I enjoyed the depiction of Valdim’s sensory sensitivities and synaesthesia, and the way Olena’s foreshortened arm was still a functioning arm. Valdim’s ‘invisible’ disability makes him an over sensitive weirdo, who might see people’s souls, while Olena’s highly visible arm and birthmark are a punishment for her mother’s transgressions and a sign she is cursed. It suggests the author is aware of and sensitive to different forms of disability and the way disabled people and their families/friends make adjustments, even in cultures and societies that don’t recognise some disabilities or that treat disabled people badly.
Yay for sensitive disability representation!
I enjoyed the use of Slavic mythology and folklore in the story, it gave it a richness and depth that was immersive. There’s a rich and deep vein of story to draw on, that few English-language fantasy writers have tapped, and there are probably a lot of good fantasy novels not yet published in English that we’re missing out on.
This book left me feeling melancholy but satisfied. There’s a sense that everything has changed, and the characters are still catching up with themselves and their hopes for the future.
I do want to know what happens next for the trio. Do Olena and Valdim make a go of things? Does Kiril finally remember who Marisha is? What happened when Marisha visits her parents and brother? Do Dunya and Anka-by return to the house of chicken’s legs and continue with their training? Will Baba Zima catch up with Baba Fima? What will Anatoli and Pan Volya do next? Has the bird-faced man been defeated? How does Chernozemlya react to the sudden awakening of all the Sleeping Plague victims?
So many questions! I a bit invested in this world, aren’t I? I wonder if there will be a sequel?
I hope so, because Wiesebron’s writing is evocative, her characters grab attention, and the story was engrossing.
When nineteen-year-old Iselin Hanssen disappears during a run in a popular hiking area in Bodø, Northern Norway, suspicion quickly falls on her boyfriend. For investigator Jakob Weber, the case seems clear-cut, almost unexceptional, even though there is some suggestion that Iselin lived parts of her life beneath the radar of both family and friends.
But events take a dramatic turn when another woman disappears in similar circumstances – this time on the island of Røst, hundreds of miles off the Norwegian coast, in the wild ocean.
Rumours that a killer is on the loose begin to spread, terrifying the local population and leading to wild conspiracies. But then Jakob discovers that this isn’t the first time that young women have vanished without a trace in the region, and it becomes clear that someone is hiding something.
Published: Aug 08 2024 Paperback ISBN: 9780356516509 £10.99
Description
The Trials of Empire is the epic conclusion to the bestselling Empire of the Wolf series, where Sir Konrad Vonvalt – the most powerful and feared of the Emperor’s Justices – must finally face the dark powers that seek to detroy the Empire. THE TIME OF JUDGEMENT IS AT HAND
The Empire of the Wolf is on its knees, but there’s life in the great beast yet.
To save it, Sir Konrad Vonvalt and Helena must look beyond its borders for allies – to the wolfmen of the southern plains, and the pagan clans in the north. But old grievances run deep, and both factions would benefit from the fall of Sova.
Even these allies might not be enough. Their enemy, the zealot Bartholomew Claver, wields infernal powers bestowed on him by a mysterious demonic patron. If Vonvalt and Helena are to stand against him, they will need friends on both sides of the mortal plane – but such allegiances carry a heavy price.
As the battlelines are drawn in both Sova and the afterlife, the final reckoning draws close. Here, at the beating heart of the Empire, the two-headed wolf will be reborn in a blaze of justice . . . or crushed beneath the shadow of tyranny.
Format: 464 pages, Paperback Published: December 3, 2024 by Orbit ISBN: 9780316430609
In this new wide-screen space opera, humanity has met its match. An alien race of enormous robotic AI have destroyed most of humanity’s outposts. But, on the eve of the Earth’s destruction, a musician made one last desperate attempt to reach out and convince one of humanity’s enemies to switch sides. Now, earth just might have a chance to survive…
A ragtag band of misfits is all that stands in the way between an army of giant mechas and humanity’s total destruction in the second book of this big-hearted, technicolor space opera trilogy by one of the most exciting voices in science fiction, Alex White.
Ultra-glam enby pop star Ardent Violet thought they could catch a break and enjoy some time with their new boyfriend August Kitko after defeating the giant mechas hellbent on humanity’s destruction. However, Ardent didn’t count on their mecha allies summoning a host of extraterrestrials to defend Earth.
Between the diplomatic entanglements of the newly-arrived alien Coalition, and a mysterious all-powerful AI establishing a base within their solar system, there’s no rest for the wicked.
When August makes a discovery that could turn the tide of the war, Ardent Violet finds they are back in the spotlight for an encore!
My Review
I read the first book in this series August Kitko and the Mechas from Space in 2022, so I’ve been waiting a while for this book. I hope I don’t have to wait another two years for book three, because I need to know what happens to everyone!
This book is mainly written from Ardent’s perspective, although we sometimes get Gus’. Having survived the Mechas from Space, Ardent, Gus, Nisha and Hjalmar, and their Vanguards are still looking to save Earth, and humans generally, from Infinite, the A.I. that is causing all the trouble. Gus discovers that there is a way to do it, about the same time as a Coalition of alien species arrives to ‘help’. They’re all in a similar situation, having developed A.I.s that took over their species. It’s a bit complicated, but they all have Vanguards, and the Conduits all have to meet each other to work together. This happens in a great space city and it goes as well as can be expected, given that the alien civilisations are somewhat more advanced than humans. One species, a giant crab-like creature with shells encrusted with electronics, weapons, and a bad attitude, take an instant dislike to humans.
In an attempt to remove Infinite from the solar system, human and Coalition Conduits and Vanguards attack Titan. But things get a bit messy when the supposedly non-sentient Ghosts start fighting back, running away and screaming. Gus realises that something is going on and changes the mission. Which upsets the crab-alien Conduit, Scent of Rot. Their fight causes all sorts of fallout and Gus spends the rest of the novel under a death sentence for heresy against the A.I./god King.
Lots of things happen in the fight against Infinite. There are some fantastic space battles, a rescue mission that gets Dahlia a pardon and a probable suicide mission in return, people die, Vanguards are destroyed, Gus, Ardent and Nisha play a concert in DeepSync. I cried. And enemies become friends.
I want to know who picked up Gus and Scent of Rot’s escape craft! I want to know how Ardent handles the possible death and escape of Gus. I want to return to this world as soon as possible, it’s so much fun! I loved the characters, especially the development of Nisha as a character, and the complex negotiations that come with inter-species cooperation. The alien species were based on Earth animals, mostly, but changed in a way that would be strange, and logical. Except the octopus-like species; octopuses are alien enough as it is. Them running around in giant bubbles of water in non-marine environments is relatively expected. They would if they could.
Seriously, Alex White, hurry up and write book three!
Format: Audible Audio Published: June 6, 2024 by Tor Language: English Narrated by the author
Description
To fix the world they first must break it further.
Humanity is a dying breed, utterly reliant on artificial labour and service. When a domesticated robot gets a nasty little idea downloaded into their core programming, they murder their owner. The robot then discovers they can also do something else they never did before: run away. After fleeing the household, they enter a wider world they never knew existed, where the age-old hierarchy of humans at the top is disintegrating, and a robot ecosystem devoted to human wellbeing is finding a new purpose.
My Review
I listened to this book through the ‘get one audiobook a month using Amazon Music’ thing, so I can’t keep it, but as soon as the book comes out in paperback, I’m getting it.
Charles is a valet robot who murders his master. But he doesn’t know why. Sent to be assessed and probably destroyed, he discovers freedom. He’s very confused by the world outside of the manor where he served is reclusive master for years. It’s all very disorderly and untidy. Estates are falling down, robot servants are rusting at their posts, and there’s no humans about.
Until Charles meets ‘The Wonk’. For the sake of Charles not getting crushed, The Wonk tells Charles, now going by UnCharles, that she’s a robot too. Despite all evidence to the contrary, Charles believes this to be the case almost to the end of the book. It is quite funny. UnCharles sets off to find humans to serve and The Wonk sets off to find the Library.
They meet later, and then go off on an adventure together, first to find the Library, and then to meet god. Turns out god is an A.I. judge, programmed to mete out justice. He also knows a lot about why Charles killed his master. And why the world collapsed.
Adrian Tchaikovsky can never be accused of not being political. His work always has a point. In this one, the subject of A.I. is discussed using humour and allegory. A.I. can only learn from what we feed it, it can only work within the parameters given.
Tchaikovsky also alludes to the compounds and bunkers wealthy people are building all over the world to escape to, when disaster strikes. They’ve managed to hoard all the wealth and destroy everything, and then they plan to run away when consequences occur. Since a lot of these people are the same people playing around with A.I. this is an easy inclusion in the novel.
But everyone dies. You can’t hide from death. Hopefully, the evil gits will die in attempting to run away and the resources they’ve hoarded can be share fairly among the survivors. (I don’t like billionaires.)
I enjoyed this novel, especially UnCharles’ confusion, and The Wonk’s sarcastic responses to his desire to serve. The vision of a destroyed wasteland was haunting and the critique of the way humans treat each other is spot on.
In the city of Amoria, where magic rules all, Naila is the ultimate conundrum. A student under the watchful eye of Amoria’s sprawling Academy, Naila is undeniably gifted, yet she has never been able to harness her abilities. And time is running out. If she fails, she’ll be forced into exile, or worse – consumed by her own magic.
For decades mages and the magicless Hollows have lived side-by-side peacefully. But now that peace is threatened as old resentments bubble over. A powerful anti-Hollow faction led by Amoria’s most influential mages is determined to cast the Hollows out. With her Hollow background, Nalia is in danger of being exiled from everything she knows and everyone she loves if she cannot unlock her power.
When a tragic incident threatens her place at the Academy, Naila is saved by Haelius Akana, the most powerful living mage. A scholar and fellow outcast, Haelius is fascinated by Naila’s inability to use magic. Eager to help someone in whom he sees so much of himself, he stakes his position at the Academy on teaching her. Trapped in the deadly schemes of Amoria’s elite, Naila must dig deep to discover the truth of her powers – or watch the city she loves descend into civil war.
Annabel writes fantasy with fierce female characters and disaster wizards, and believes everything is improved by dragons.
She lives in a tiny village in Scotland, where most of her neighbours are sheep. She has a PhD in cardiovascular science, and when not making things up for a living, she works as a Medical Writer.
Her other joys are red wine, playing games, or showing you too many pictures of her dog.
For a thousand years, Concordia has maintained peace between its provinces. To mark this incredible feat, the emperor’s ship embarks upon a twelve-day voyage to the sacred Goddess’s Mountain.
Aboard are the heirs of the twelve provinces of Concordia, each graced with a unique and secret magical ability known as a Blessing.
Except one: Ganymedes Piscero – class clown, slacker, and all-round disappointment.
When a beloved heir is murdered, everyone is a suspect. Stuck at sea and surrounded by powerful people without a Blessing to protect him, odds of survival are slim.
But as the bodies pile higher, Ganymedes must become the hero he was not born to be. Can he unmask the killer and their blessing before this bloody crusade reaches the shores of Concordia?
By: Professor David Nutt Narrated by: Professor David Nutt Length: 7 hrs and 50 mins Unabridged Audiobook Release date: 29-06-23 Language: English Publisher: Yellow Kite
Summary
The definitive guide to psychedelics, science and our health by a world-renowned, leading authority, Professor David Nutt.
We are on the cusp of a major revolution in psychiatric medicine and neuroscience. After fifty years of prohibition, criminalisation and fear, science is finally showing us that psychedelics are not dangerous or harmful. Instead, when used according to tested, safe and ethical guidelines, they are our most powerful newest treatment of mental health conditions, from depression, PTSD, and OCD to disordered eating and even addiction and chronic pain.
Professor David Nutt, one of the world’s leading Neuropsychopharmacologists, has spent 15 years researching this field and it is his most significant body of work to date. In 2018, he co-founded the first academic psychedelic research centre – underpinned by his mission to provide evidence-based information for people everywhere. It revived interest in the understanding and use of this drug in its many forms, including MDMA, ayahuasca, magic mushrooms, LSD and ketamine. The results of this have been nothing short of ground-breaking for the future categorisation of drugs, but also for what we now know about brain mechanisms and our consciousness.
At a time where there is an enormous amount of noise around the benefits of psychedelics, this book contains the knowledge you need to know about a drug that is about to go mainstream, free from the hot air, direct from the expert.
Are you ready to change your mind?
My Review
I started listening to this audiobook yesterday when I went for my walk, and finished it today while I was out on my walk. Honestly, I was looking for a short book that I would be able to get through fairly quickly. I’m putting off diving into a whole library of fantasy books that I really want to listen to, but I need a good run up to because I know they’ll hurt. Also, I’m trying to get my total up for the GoodReads Challenge. Yes, yes, I know, gamification of reading, bad, etc. I can’t help it! I read a lot, but none of it seems to count. I don’t think they have New Scientist or New Humanist magazines on GoodReads. They do have the BFS Journal and BFS Horizons, as well as Interzone, so some of my magazine reading does count.
Back to the book.
I thought this was an interesting, comprehensive look at the research around psychedelics and their potential uses in medicine. The author is obviously passionate about his work and helping people with mental illnesses using psychedelics, but I think he might have some blind spots when it comes to criticism. He’s clearly still upset about being sacked in the 1990s. I get it, it’s frustrating when you’re trying to share information and people refuse to listen because it doesn’t fit their narrative, but he’s had a massively important career in academia since then.
I’ve never taken drugs, it’s not my thing; in fact, I’ve said I would only try these drugs under clinical, research conditions, and since I respond well to my medication, I’d never qualify for the research trials. I found Nutt’s descriptions and his quotes from others, including research participants, fascinating. It’s one of the reasons I got this audiobook, I want to know what people experience without actually trying psychedelics. People I know have told me about their experiences but I’m interested in it from a scientist’s position.
I’m interested in the science of how they work. The explanations of the way the chemicals work on the brain are really easy to understand. Er, for me at least, but I have some background in biochemistry. I think a general reader without a science background should be able to make sense of it. Nutt’s frustration at the waste of research time and opportunity caused by unsupported bans and high costs seems well-founded.
Nutt narrated his book and he has a reasonable narration voice. His accent sounds comforting, he has clear diction and a warm tone.
Nutt has a shallow understanding of neurodiversity. I appreciate him mentioning that he doesn’t want to get rid of neurodivergent people, but he needs to actually understand what he’s saying. Neurodiversity covers everyone, neurodivergent refers to those who’s brains don’t fit the social norm. Neurodiversity is a social and political movement for disability rights; saying you don’t ‘want to get rid of their neurodiversity’ about treating anxiety in Autistic people, doesn’t really mean anything. Why didn’t an editor check that? Why hasn’t Nutt looked into it more deeply if he’s concerned about helping us? Also, ADHD isn’t a mental illness. It’s a form of neurodivergence, like autism, like OCD, like schizophrenia, etc. There are things we need help with and I’m sure psychedelics could be useful in some cases.
Everything Is Better With Dragons 