Silly and entertaining. I’d call this a Young Adult novel.
Jesse Q. Sutanto is a Chinese-Indonesian author.
She grew up in Singapore, Indonesia, and Oxford.
In 2021, Sutanto published her hit novel, Dial A for Aunties.
The Good, the Bad and the Aunties (2024) is one of the sequels. A comedy.
On Meddy Chan’s honeymoon travels, the happy couple flies to Jakarta for a Chinese New Years family reunion.
… theft, hostage taking, and abduction. But it’s nothing the aunties can’t handle.
Of the 4 largest cities in Austria, Salzburg is easily my favourite.
This time I walked several times through high parklands above town. Up on these cliffs.
There are surprisingly few people up there.
And great vistas, of course.
The old town is great.
But there are many modern touches, as well.
All that said — I much prefer Germany to Austria. 😀
You’ll already know the name Kitzbühel as a legendary winter sports resort,
The famous Hahnenkamm mountain above Kitzbühel, where every January the world’s best downhill skiers race for World Cup glory. Many consider it the most challenge course on the circuit.
I went to hike down that famed slope. Over 1200m. … I took a cable car up. 😀
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Crazy Canucks Tod Brooker and Ken Read won here.
The town itself is not particularly gorgeous when compared against other famed ski villages.
But I still enjoyed it.
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David Ignatius is an acclaimed journalist and expert on the CIA.
A fiction author, as well, with 11 novels in the suspense/espionage fiction genre.
This is the first for me — and probably the last. The story telling was TOO SLOW.
An un-Thriller.
Phantom Orbit is his 2024 book. And it is very much up-to-date in terms of technology. The detail, relevancy, and realism are impressive.
Threats to the American GPS system and satellites, especially from Russia and China, is the main thread.
It follows Ivan Volkov, a Russian student in Beijing …
The years pass, and they are not kind to Volkov.
After the loss of his son, a prosecutor who’d been too tough on corruption, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Volkov makes the fraught decision to contact the CIA.
He writes: Satellites are your enemies, especially your own…Hidden codes can make time stop and turn north into south…If you are smart, you will find me.
Terry Hayes is the English-born Australian screenwriter, producer and author.
His first book was the acclaimed novel I Am Pilgrim (2013).
Hayes and co-author Tammy Cohen were revealed as the writers of the tie-in novel to the film Argylle, under the pseudonym “Elly Conway”.
The Year of the Locust (2023) is his 2nd solo novel — and WHAT A NOVEL.
Any other writer would have broken it up into 3 books.
BEST consider it 3 books.
… an epic espionage thriller filled with wrath and retribution, faith and forgiveness, sacrifice, love and loss, all in the name of an almighty being.
It’s a mind-bending story of one man’s evolution from spy to savior when the world descends into “utter darkness.”
Hayes has constructed the plot as a quest narrative, taking Kane to the ends of the earth and back to save humanity from a person who has earned his place in the “pantheon of terrorism.” …
In the novel, Hayes takes us on a deep dive into the workings of the CIA and the National Security Agency when Kane prepares for each stage of his journey. The settings are immersive and the historical details remarkable.
From Afghanistan to Pakistan, from D.C. to Russia’s deep state and so many places in between, each landscape where Kane journeys is described in rich geographic detail with compelling backstories that contextualize each region’s cultures and values. …
At close to 800 pages, this is a really big book with really big themes and chapter after chapter of blockbuster action (and graphic violence), often ending in foreshadowing that cranks up the suspense.
The first three-fourths of “Year” definitely is the book many readers of Hayes’ first novel, “I Am Pilgrim” (another allusion to sacred texts), have waited 10 years to read. When the final part of the novel shifts into sci-fi territory, the sudden syncopation in the plot lines may throw some readers off. It’s bonkers and breathtaking.
Review: ‘Year of the Locust’ is a bonkers gem from the writer of blockbuster ‘I Am Pilgrim’
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One of the most original music videos I’ve seen the past few years.
Fred Again works on the song while his friends enjoy a Guinness drinking party all around him. 😀
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I’m enthusiastically following Archer’s William Warwick series.
Traitors Gate is the 6th instalment.
Good story telling. Kinda dumb plots.
THE TOWER OF LONDON…
Impenetrable. Well protected. Secure. Home to the most valuable jewels on earth. But once a year, the Metropolitan Police must execute the most secret operation in their armoury when they transport the Crown Jewels across London.
SCOTLAND YARD…
For four years, Chief Superindendent William Warwick – together with his second-in-command Inspector Ross Hogan – has been in charge of the operation. And for four years it’s run like clockwork.
THE HEIST…
But this year, everything is about to change. Because master criminal Miles Faulkner has set his heart on pulling off the most outrageous theft in history – and with a man on the inside, the odds are in his favour.
Personally, I’d call myself agnostic.
BUT I do admire devout atheists like Yuval Harari.
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Part of the Gideon Series:
Gideon Crew—brilliant scientist, master thief, intrepid adventurer—is shocked when his former employer, Eli Glinn, vanishes without a trace, and Glinn’s high-tech lab Effective Engineering Solutions shuts down seemingly overnight.
Fresh off a diagnosis that gives him only months to live, Crew is contacted by one of his former coworkers at EES, Manuel Garza, who has a bead on one final treasure hinted at in EES’s final case, the long-awaited translation of a centuries-old stone tablet of a previously undiscovered civilization: The Phaistos Disc.
What lies at the end of the trail will either save Gideon’s life—or bring it to a sudden, shocking close.
Crew once again faces incredible odds—but as Gideon has proved again and again, there’s no such thing as too great a risk when you’re living on borrowed time.
Jo&Joe Hostel in Vienna is housed in the 5th and 6th floors of an IKEA store at the West Train Station.
You can walk back and forth between the hostel and the 4th floor IKEA restaurant level. 😀
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Rick McCharles 