Showing 1 - 10 of 11
Isis foiled
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 15/02/2019
» Until a few years ago, no Western publisher dared say a word against Isis, the Muslim terrorist extremists infamous for taking umbridge and reacting violently. No longer. Isis is now targeted by the media and by novelists with impunity.
Renaissance history
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 14/07/2017
» I am so conditioned when I pick up a new book about Italy that I expect it to be a historical novel about Ancient Rome. That period seems to fascinate historians and historical novelists. This reviewer finds it no more than somewhat interesting.
Never volunteer
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 05/05/2017
» For millennia, the essential part of every tribe and nation has been its military. Whether called war councils, war offices or war departments, their concern was having sufficient arms and training men to use them to the best of their ability.
Sherlock Holmes is back
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 02/09/2016
» Yank Bonnie MacBird who pens and edits Hollywood films and gives courses at UCLA in creative writing, is obsessed by Sherlock Holmes. She has not only read and re-read the books numerous times, but researched their author, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Imitating his style, it was only a matter of time before she tried her hand at it.
A new practice
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 07/03/2016
» The first lesson every recruit learns is keep your head down and never volunteer. There are 22 ranks above yours and all give you orders. They don't want to hear a word out of you, except "Yes, sergeant" or "Yes, sir". It's been like this since ancient times. Don't even think. It is not what you are in the army for.
Wealth of interviews
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 08/02/2016
» Interviewing was one of my functions back in the day. Rather than the top I focused on those lower on the totem-pole, accepting the common belief that everybody has a story to tell. The column appeared weekly. We didn't meet over a drink or during a meal. (I had no expense account.)
A British Don Juan
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 07/09/2015
» Brit Tom Watson -- good looking with pleasant personality -- is every woman's dream and he knows it, and steals their hearts. More to the point, he does so for sex. Then he drops each in turn as the next one falls into his arms. Yet even when discarded, they can't quite forget his words of love and keep coming back, humiliating themselves, wishing that he'd take up with them again.
Right vs Justice
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 09/02/2015
» It would be only a slight exaggeration to say that Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks of the North Yorkshire Police is as well known in the UK in this day and age as London private detective Sherlock Holmes was a century ago. Less so in the US with its plethora of shamuses. But crime thriller fans the world over rate him as one of the best.
An author’s lament
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 18/08/2014
» As a critic, I've been taken to task more than a few times by authors whose books I gave a thumbs down. They often query why, when writing a review, I overlook the time and effort that it takes to get the manuscripts published? It takes as long and is at least as hard as the writing, they say and they are right. My defence is that the proof of the pudding is in the eating, not the preparation.
An invincible hero
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 17/12/2012
» In his first novel, Brit Victor Robert Lee is aiming high, his literary creation Cono meant to be on the same lofty level as James Bond and Jason Bourne. In Performance Anomalies, a cloak-and-dagger thriller, the first of a series, the hero is pretty much a cypher.