Another great read! Can always trust Robb to give me a plot line I will enjoy!

Persepolis was certainly an interesting and enlightening read. It was both brutally honest and uncomfortable at times, as well as a little humorous and riveting. I learned a lot about the situation in Iran that I was not previously aware off. I became immersed in Marji and her story, her struggles, her feelings of depression and being an outsider in both Iran and Vienna.
The journey of her life always continued to surprise me, and I found myself screaming at her to change her course, to be better, to do something else. But I think this demonstrates the harsh realities of real life.
She is no perfect, fictional heroine, she's a real life person and whilst I found it practically impossible to understand her situation, I really engaged with her story.
The use of comic strips to depict the story is the only way I could imagine reading this now, I like the use of the black and white, and the darkness that overshadowed the bad times, the dreariness.
I really appreciated how easy it was to read in comic form, and certain strips stood out more than others, but I definitely think it made this kind of non-fiction piece more bareable, but more stark all at the same time.
I was thoroughly impressed with Persepolis, and I can definitely say the experience of reading it will definitely stay with me for a long time after. It's definitely a book you have to be mentally prepared to read.

This really was not my kind of book, I did not enjoy it so much. It was a little scattered in terms of the prose, so following it was really hard when it jumped back and forth in time.
The protagonist was very eccentric and a little crazy, he was not a likeable person.
The actual point to the novel, I'm not really sure. Admittedly odd points I found humorous, but overall I found the novel disturbing and not very enjoyable.
The only real reason I picked this up, was for class, so hopefully the next book I read will be much more enjoyable!

A harrowing novel I had to read for class. It definitely makes an impact and it is an experience that you cannot easily forget.

I managed to read The Assault in one sitting over the space of a couple of hours, so it's not a long or difficult novel. However, it's quite a sad novel. I was actually surprised that I was interested enough to read the whole thing at once, but I think that helped me finish it. It's one of those novels that if I had set it aside, I would likely never have picked it up again. That is because the story is not particularly exciting.

The premise of the story, is that it follows one man, Anton and how one event in the war impacts on the rest of his life. The event, is the 'assault' that the title refer to right at the start of the novel. Then every section of the novel afterwards is at set periods of his life, where we catch up and meet various people who were involved in the 'assault' and discover more about the events and motivations that drove them through the war. In this sense, it made it quite interesting to have different viewpoints unveiled at various points of his life.

The book is by a famous Dutch author, and I read the English translation for a Dutch culture class I'm taking. However, I think the topic of WWII is still very important and problematic for Dutch society because they were both an occupied nation and had collaborations with the German Nazis. Therefore, I think this book is an important part of the memory and impact the war had upon the Dutch and how they still feel about the events. And for that reason, I think Harry Mulisch portrays the events throughout this book in a very admirable fashion. He manages to be careful of feelings, by laying down the events from all sides of the story and this makes for a well-rounded novel.

After reading this, I have to say, I feel less inclined to visiting Haarlem, just because that was where it was set and now it feels like a place of horror. However, overall, I think this book is a moving, disturbing portrayal of how one war event could impact so much on the future of a family. It demonstrates how we should not forget our history, and whilst I will never read it again and would not have picked it up unless for class, I'm glad in a way I got to read it.

I became fascinated by Robert McNamara after watching the documentary The Fog of War, which I actually found really interesting. This was a moment where I got to place a proper face and personality to a figure I'd been studying and I really engaged with hearing his story and take on things. That doesn't mean to say I agree or believe everything he said. After all, I'm a historian and we tend to take things with a pinch of salt and a lot of cynicism.

However, his book was certainly much more in depth and detail than the documentary, for obvious reasons. It's hard to fit 300 pages of words into an hour documentary, well. But I still find McNamara to be a very complex character even at the end of this book. I know he polarises a lot of American society and the Vietnam War is certainly a topic that has caused a lot of outrage and upset over the years. People have criticised McNamara for attempting to use this book as a way of cleansing himself of all his fault. Admittedly, I do think he fails to take responsibility in his book for his actions. But realistically, I don't think it's now about addressing fault, and I think this is a man who did feel the weight of the burden he carried as Secretary of Defense.

Overall, this book was useful for my own research for study purposes, but also an interesting insight into the mind of what once was a very powerful man, and to see some of the impact of Vietnam War on those who were in office. He was a little too statistic heavy in his quantifications for my liking, but the narrative was mostly pretty readable.

I finally finished King Soloman's Mines. The first book I have managed to pick up and read in what feels like a long time. I've just been very busy with my studies and real life unfortunately. And even this book was inspired by the fact I'm going to be studying African colonial history next year and writing my thesis on it, and I haven't a clue about anything to do with Africa, so I'm trying to absorb some cultural material as a starting point.

This book epitomises everything about British colonialism and attitudes to the natives. It is all about white superiority and knowledge and it is the white man who saves the day, and is revered by the natives, even the native King who in any other white society would be supreme leader. Obviously this book was both set and written during a time when these ideas were perpetuated through the whole of society so it really isn't too shocking in the context. However, as a modern day reader it was a little bit of a strange mentality to adjust too. On the other hand, as a historian it was really interesting to delve into a fictional perspective of this mindset and see how people back then perceived the colonies in Africa and the country of Africa.

I really enjoyed the African setting and the mysteries and different landscapes we were introduced to. It made for an interesting tale. The different tribes and weapons that were talked about was a little confusing at times because obviously some of the tribes were fictional, whilst they also talked about the Zulus, who were a very real tribe. So I found the crossover between reality and fiction to be a tad confusing. Furthermore, the narration style of Allan Quartermain was not my favourite style of narrative to read, seeing everything only through his eyes and his recollection of the 'events', certainly skewed the story for me.

I feel like the actual characters were not really the most important aspect of this novel for me because I did not really like them so much. I more enjoyed the storyline, searching for the mystical diamonds and treasures of King Solomon's Mines and the beautiful land of Africa.

Overall, King Solomon's Mines is a fairly short read, a little dry in places, but something that I enjoyed reading, mostly. If you're interested in British colonial history and Africa, then it is maybe something you would be interested in, but otherwise I probably would not recommend as its not the most exciting of reads at times.