Science Fiction and Fantasy news, reviews and discussion

The knowledge of humanity is a fragile thing. Although in recent centuries the diffusion of information has gathered pace exponentially, first with the printing press and now with electronic means of dissemination, our understanding of the world around us and our common cultural heritage remain subject to the vagaries of time and human folly. We may never know whether Amr ibn al-‘As really ordered the burning of the famed Library of Alexandria on the basis that the books contained within were either in accordance with the Quran and therefore unnecessary, or at odds with it and therefore heretical. However, we do know that Hülegü Khan, in the process of butchering the hundreds of thousands of inhabitants of Baghdad, destroyed the library there, causing the waters of the Tigris to run black with ink. The works of Catullus survive on the basis of what appears to have been a single copy made ten centuries ago, which was so corrupted the translator apologized to any reading it and expressed his desperation. The participants of the Fourth Crusade destroyed countless works of art when they sacked Constantinople in 1204, and in modern memory the Taliban, in their infinite stupidity and barbarism, destroyed ...

Though sometimes amusing, it is always disturbing when intelligent people seriously talk nonsense.

This is the opening sentence of J.M. Roberts' The Myhology of the Secret Societies. He then goes on to point out an impressive array of nonsense spouted by generally intelligent people. As the title suggests, it is not so much an investigation into the secret societies themselves as into what people have believed about secret societies.

It is a historical investigation of where the idea (and the fear) of a world-encompassing conspiracy comes from. Because the history of this myth is tied up with the history ...

Daughter of Smoke and Bone was one of the big spec fic sensations last year, at least as far as sales numbers and ubiquity (apparently that's a word) went, and some people here seemed to think very highly of it, even if nobody actually reviewed it on here so far, that I saw. So I decided to order it from Amazon in my last three-monthly-or-so order, with rather high expectations for it, at least ...