Showing 1 - 10 of 30
The kids aren't alright
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 08/11/2019
» Crime is not limited by gender or age. Men, women and children can all end up behind bars for committing criminal acts. Ignorance of the law is no excuse. Many jurists advocate that laws be reconsidered periodically to determine whether they are still applicable. Some turn into the Blue Laws of yore, still on the books but no longer enforced. Others get overturned.
The Future isn't now
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 29/08/2019
» A term I keep encountering is "The Future". You see it on billboards everywhere. Stadiums, department stores, condos, supermarkets, restaurants, theatres, whatever. They eschew the current autos and mobile phones and computers. Space rockets are only a generation or two away.
What if?
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 25/07/2019
» A cine buff -- contemporary, silent, foreign -- since my childhood in the Big Apple, still with a good but not photographic memory, I recall a French movie about a wealthy widow who decided to satisfy her curiosity by looking up her old boyfriends. She wondered what would her life have been like had she married one of them.
Just a thought
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 30/05/2019
» I don't mind admitting that I winced when I plucked an 800-page novel from my review bag, having long advocated that authors don't need more than 400 pages to say what needs be said. The back cover describes it as an espionage novel. I don't recall Ian Fleming or John le Carré penning tomes.
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.
Ravens' feast
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 27/12/2018
» This reviewer's understanding of historical novels is that the authors do historical research on their topic, using actual figures and imaginary ones where need-be, to write essentially factual and hopefully interesting stories. But not all historical novelists follow this form. Some are more concerned about their own largely fictitious story than the actual events behind it.
Isis destroyed
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 06/09/2018
» As most of the hijackers responsible for the 9/11 outrage were Saudi Arabian, it stands to reason that the US would take the kingdom to task. Instead, Washington turned its ire on Afghanistan and Iraq. How could that be? In fact, it made sense. America is Saudi's biggest oil customer and didn't want it to stop flowing, the more than 3,000 dead at New York's Twin Towers notwithstanding.
Targeted billionaires
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 08/06/2018
» When a rich man meets his maker, I pause for few moments, not to mourn his life but to wonder what becomes of his wealth. Of no use to him now, is it buried with him? Like the pharaohs, he intends for it to accompany him in his next life? Is it inherited by his son? To do what with?
The 18-year itch
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 21/12/2017
» Contrary to poems and films, love isn't the only reason for marriage. Nor is it the strongest. Arranged marriage takes precedence. So does making the girl pregnant and doing the right thing. Indeed there's a list of reasons, not least lust -- the sap running in both the male and female.
Vatican thriller
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 25/08/2017
» Christianity hasn't been around long, its two millennia shorter than Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism. The God-Mary match captured the public's imagination and Holy Mother Church has been matched with God ever since. It survived its encounters with the Saracens and the Reformation, and now has an estimated following of 1 billion.