Andrew Blackman, literary fiction writer, traveller, book reviewer and essayist

Reading

Borges Marathon, Part 14: The Lottery in Babylon

How do you explain the effects of random chance? Borges invented an all-powerful Lottery governing all possible events in life to help us think through it.

Reading

The Echoes by Evie Wyld: Review

My review of a beautifully dark and thought-provoking new piece of literary fiction by Evie Wyld, set between a remote Australian outback village haunted by terrible memories and a London…

Thinking

Prevent Prevent

How a system designed to identify potential terrorists is catching innocent people and destroying freedom of speech.

Reading

May 2024 Reading Roundup

Here are the books I read last month, from historical fiction to a futuristic novel and a non-fiction book about a radical solution to climate change. Pretty much everything except…

Reading

The Future by Naomi Alderman

What kind of future do we want? How would it look if it was based on trust instead of fear? For a novel that starts with the end of the…

Thinking

I’ve forgotten how to blog

How to write a blog post when the world is disintegrating around you.

Reading

Borges Marathon, Part 13: The Circular Ruins

What happens when one man tries to dream another into existence? Jorge Luis Borges imagines this scenario in this thought-provoking story.

Reading

October Reading Roundup

My reading for October 2023 was dominated by the climate crisis and the horrific situation in Gaza.

Reading Australia

A roundup of my reading of Australian literature during a long road trip around the country.

Reading

Best Books I’ve Read So Far This Year

At the halfway point of 2023, here are the highlights of my reading year so far, including a Saudi Arabian novel, a history of Algeria and an Australian masterpiece.

Reading

Shadows on the Tundra: A Lithuanian Tale of Gulag Survival

I've read gulag memoirs before, but Shadows on the Tundra affected me even more deeply than the others—perhaps because of the age of the narrator, or perhaps the Lithuanian history…

Reading

The Social Life of DNA

We all know about the physical properties of DNA and its contributions to medical and scientific research. But what interests sociologist Alondra Nelson is the social life of DNA.

Reading

Dominoes by Phoebe McIntosh

Dominoes by Phobe McIntosh explores important issues of race and identity, while through its heart runs a classic tale of star-crossed lovers.

Reading

Borges Marathon, Part 12: Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote

In “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote”, Borges plays with ideas of authorship and originality by inventing a French Symbolist poet who embarks on the impossible task of composing Don…

Andrew Blackman

Andrew Blackman

Andrew Blackman