Review: Blood and Sand Trilogy, by Jon Kiln

Some time ago on The Wayfarer’s Rest* I had a little experiment, reading half a dozen or so samples from Kindle books. It was quite interesting, with some laden with info-dumping, others insufficient to let the premise unfold. Easily the best was the sample of the Blood and Sand Trilogy, by Jon Kiln, which I just finished reading.

The story follows Vekal, a Sin Eater (confessor meets martial artist), and opens as his city is being sacked by barbarians. After the engaging spot of initial action dies down, we encounter the central premise of the plot. Vekal’s forced to try and help the barbarian warlord’s daughter, who has a peculiar sickness, and finds himself possessed by a demonic spirit. But because he’s a Sin Eater, the devil is unable to totally control him, and the pair find themselves bickering and co-operating, sometimes doing what Vekal wants, sometimes doing what Ikrit wants.

The plot holds together well, and one aspect I liked was that whilst Ikrit is clearly not a good chap, he’s also not just a moustache-twirling blacker than black villain. That would’ve made things a bit flatter, and less interesting. By humanising him, to a degree at least, he’s somewhat sympathetic (whilst still more than happy to kill people in the way). The relationship between Vekal and Ikrit varies from antagonistic to co-operative, as their goals coincide or diverge. It’s a nice take on things.

Besides Vekal/Ikrit, clearly the main character(s), there are a number of others who get some POV time. Naturally, they aren’t fleshed out quite so much, but I liked that many secondary characters had some depth to them.

The world is well-realised, and there’s a pleasant absence of info-dumping. It hangs in the background, as it should, whilst the characters get on with their adventuring. The low magic (hardly any is used) works very well, as possession or fear thereof provides the main arcane aspect of the story and world.

I do think the book could’ve been slightly better proofread. Should stress it’s not riddled with errors, and I do expect some in a novel-sized book, but there are perhaps a few too many (and sometimes phrasing’s repeated in short order).

In terms of sex, violence etc, there’s no frisky time and quite a lot of bloodshed, but it’s not as grim as many books.

Overall, I found Blood and Sand to be an enjoyable read.

Thaddeus

*For those wondering, I liked posting more frequently but just lacked the time to do so. I may resurrect TWR one of these days, but the irregular rambles and reviews on Thaddeus the Sixth won’t be going anywhere. Unless I get decapitated by a low-flying flamingo, obviously. Then my blogging will decline dramatically.

The Curta Mechanical Calculator

And now for something completely different.

There was a time, children, when computers didn’t exist. And when they did exist (hello, Colossus) but were far from commonplace. People getting telephones at home, or even, gasp, televisions were new and exciting events. The radio was made of wood, and rather more listened to (perhaps due to the absence of TV, or because the people had better accents).

But what about calculators? Think of a calculator and you think of perhaps an app, or an electronic calculator, whether a simple everyday one or a swankier scientific version.

But what if those don’t exist? Well, you can work it out in your head.

Or you could use a mechanical calculator. The one pictured is the Curta, designed by Curt Herzstark. Born in 1902, he was an Austrian and son of a Jewish father. He’d completed the Curta’s design by 1938 but the Nazi annexation of Austria rather put the kibosh on production plans. He was ordered to make devices for the German army, until he was arrested in 1943 and sent to a concentration camp. Despite the less than ideal circumstances, Herzstark was able to redraw the designs from memory whilst in the concentration camp.

The mechanical calculator he created is similar in dimensions to a cylindrical deodorant can, albeit perhaps 2/3 the height and with a slightly larger diameter. It comes in an airtight two-part container.

I am not an engineer (the people who used the Curta perhaps the most), or a mathematician, but I must admit I found it to be not very intuitive (I’ve provided links to a few helpful Youtube videos at the end of this article). There is a series of movable switches running around the lower part of the cylinder. On the top is a handle that can be rotated either in the up or down position, with a separate ring that can be rotated (with the top part raised, this resets the device).

Turning the handle is curiously satisfying, like grinding a pepper mill full of numbers.

It turns out the switches on the lower part are for integers to add, subtract, multiply or divide. Turning the handle in the down position is for addition, in the raised position it subtracts. The number currently worked upon is indicated once an initial calculation (addition) has been made. So, the switches might be flipped to 1 0 2 4 at the bottom, the handle turned, and 1024 shows up on the top. A second turn adds the same again, yielding 2048. Multiplying small numbers is simply a matter of repeated additions.

For a larger multiplication, such as 2048 by 299, the upper part of the calculator is raised, and rotated so that the 2048 at the bottom (movable switches) is entered in the hundreds rather than units. This adds 204800 to 2048 (so, a multiplication by 101). Repeated twice is multiplication by 301. The top part is raised again and returned to the units, and the handle raised to the subtraction position. A double rotation removes 2048 twice, giving us 612352. As well as this, correct, answer, the multiplication factor (299) is shown on the upper part (in a silver rather than black area). [Experimentation reveals that if you subsequently alter the switches number, this is not taken account of. So, doubling to 4096 and adding once increases the count to 300].

Anyway, it’s an interesting little thingummyjig, and I thought people into engineering, history, or creative writing might be intrigued to learn about a calculator that doesn’t need any fancy electricity to get its business done.

Youtube links: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KomtGXzT3o

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loI1Kwed8Pk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhUfRIeRSZE

Thaddeus

Review: A Brief History of Roman Britain, by Joan P Alcock

I found this book, which covers the entire period (and a little before) of Roman Britain to be rather interesting. It’s split into distinct halves, the former being a chronological account of Roman Britain (with a chapter on Celtic tribes beforehand) and the latter consisting of chapters focusing on individual topics, such as religion.

In that way it’s something of a mixture of Adrian Goldsworthy’s Fall of Carthage and Ian Mortimer’s Time Traveller mini-series.

The level of detail included is often very deep, particularly regarding food, and does help to put the reader in the shoes of, say, a 3^rd century Briton, who might dislike the imported garum fish paste, love their new mosaic floor, and enjoy availing themselves of the public baths.

As the title indicates, the book is about Roman Britain, but to an extent it also functions as a microcosm of the rising and falling fate of the Western Empire more generally. Charting how the Empire won wars then won support from the Celtic leadership (and then lost it with greed and corruption, leading to Boudicca’s rebellion) is an interesting read but also functions as a template for how the Empire won over the people it had conquered. Similarly, declining resources partly due to increasingly frequent civil wars denuded the province(s) of military manpower, exposing them to barbarian attack and reducing economic activity as the well-paid soldiers left and suddenly merchants had lost a huge market. The benefits of city living through local bakers (removing the need to grind your own flour), baths et cetera was replaced by onerous burdens for local leaders (whose taxes and public duties increased as the Empire weakened), leading them to leave and reducing the urban population.

I was a little worried about the first chapter. It’s a little bit listy, not quite to the extent of The Iliad or the Bible, but thereafter the book’s much easier to read.

The writing style could be a little more fluid and little less matter of fact, but except for the first chapter on pre-Roman Celtic tribes, it’s a minor point.

There are one or two small errors that perhaps should’ve been caught. (I’m no longer a Grammar Nazi about this sort of thing, as some mistakes are almost certain in a full-sized book, but certain errors such as writing Julius rather than Julian can be a little confusing). There was also confusion over the name of Isis’ son (Hippocrates or Harpocrates, which might reflect a Greco-Roman divergence or simply be a homophonic typo).

However, those small quibbles apart, I found the book to be interesting, detailed (immensely so in some places), and enjoyable.

Thaddeus

Review: A History of the First World War, by BH Liddell Hart

A bit outside my usual area, but this military history seemed interesting, so I gave it a look. It charts the course of the war from beginning to end, including an introductory segment setting the scene.

Reminiscent of Dodge’s Napoleon biography (first volume), I actually found the political and military preamble to the war itself to be the most interesting part. Setting the scene with the Schlieffen plan and the varying states of readiness of the Great Powers was very nicely done.

The war was notable, amongst other things, for the rapid invention and development of new technology with battlefield implications. The radio, rail, aircraft, gas shells, and tanks were all either created for the first time, advanced swiftly or otherwise had great military significance. Machine guns had existed for a little while by this stage but this was the first war when they gave near total predominance to defence over attack (until the tank rolled up).

It was fascinating to read of how the Germans really could have won the war early on, but for Moltke buggering up the plan Schlieffen had put together some years earlier, denuding the powerful right of strength whilst reinforcing the centre.

I’ve read enough military history (admittedly, mostly classical) to know that some wars are notable for their brilliant strategy, and some are remarkable for surprising incompetence or plain bad luck. The latter was not unique to the First World War (we need only look for how the Romans repeatedly mishandled the Cimbri for evidence that strategic/tactical idiocy and generals infighting can endanger a national cause). World War One does have the slight mitigation that new technologies were not fully understood (aircraft could have been employed on a more aggressive basis, for example), and the exacerbating factor that the same mistakes were made repeatedly, at immense cost of human life.

The sheer numbers of people involved is also worthy of remark. Tens of thousands (or more) fell during the largest battles, millions of men lived in trenches.

I must admit I sometimes found things a little hard to follow, although the gist was never in doubt. (I maintain that military history is more interesting before the use of gunpowder became widespread). There is a good number of maps, with many chapters beginning with a map of the local situation. A nice addition, which was not present, would have been something along the lines of a trench cross-section or the odd diagram of a plane, machine gun or tank, but it would’ve been an extra rather than some necessary that is missing.

It should be firmly stressed that this is a military history, and politics, excepting the interesting preamble to war breaking out, is mentioned only in so far as it directly relates to the war. Russia vanishes after the revolution and peace is agreed between the Bolsheviks and Germany.

The author does comment on both military and moral failings of generals when it comes to mistakes made (some understandable, others perhaps less so), and also those of the ordinary soldier. Whilst rarer, instances of soldiers performing misdeeds (such as advancing well, then coming across quantities of alcohol and getting lashed as a ferret on Christmas Day) are mentioned. That said, the focus of the book is clearly on the military aspects, with morale (and morality) considered alongside ammunition, supply lines, and so forth as a military asset, or deficiency.

Overall, I found the book interesting, occasionally a bit tricky to follow. As I’ve said before, its sole interest is the military side of things, so those after something considering the political or social implications of the war will find it lacking. Those seeking to understand the strategic and tactical situation that unfolded from 1914 to 1918 will find it of significant use.

Thaddeus