Trees – DaneCobain.com

Title: Midworld

Author: Alan Dean Foster

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 216

Rating: 4.5*/5

Alan Dean Foster – Midworld

I picked up this book because I watch Todd the Librarian on YouTube and this is her favourite book. I figured if it’s good enough for Todd then it’s good enough for me and so I picked it up, and it was delightful.

What’s interesting about it is that it’s almost like a mixture of fantasy and science fiction, following the story of Born as he defends his village against the creatures of the forest. They live amongst the trees and live in harmony with the planet, but then a couple of strange men show up from a futuristic world. What follows is a classic case of technology not being all that it’s cracked up to be.

I thought this was a fantastic read, and Alan Dean Foster has an unusual writing style that’s perfect for people who love strange words and beautiful language. At the same time, at its heart it’s just a good old-fashioned adventure story, but it also has a lot to say about society. It’s arguably even more relevant now than it was when it was published back in 1977. It was a great little book and I’m glad I picked it up. Thanks, Todd!

Alan Dean Foster

Click here to buy Midworld.

Roald Dahl – Someone Like You | Review

Title: Someone Like You

Author: Roald Dahl

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 270

Rating: 9/10

Roald Dahl – Someone Like You

You will have Adele’s song stuck in your head the entire time that you’re reading this, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Someone Like You is a fantastic collection of short stories, and unlike the work that Mr. Dahl is most well-known for, it’s definitely not one for kids.

See, the stories are dark, and I like that – subject matter includes a bet in which a man could lose his finger, a man who’s almost driven mad by his sound machine (which records even the cries of plants and trees when they’re uprooted), and even a man who’s terrified that he’s about to be bitten by a poisonous spider. That story features some casual racism towards the end, but because it’s from a character and from a time when it was much more common, that’s Dahl forgiven.

Two other stories of note include The Great Automatic Grammatizator, a machine which resembles a giant computer and which can spit out short stories and novels at a speed and standard that no other writer could keep up with, and a longer set of stories which are grouped under the title of ‘Claud’s Dog‘, and which are loosely linked together and which left me feeling a little confused, although the ending was fantastic.

Overall, then, this is not just one of the best books of Dahl’s short stories that I’ve read, but one of the best books of short stories in general. It’s worth tracking down a copy for your collection.