Egypt’s Gas Curse
“Let me tell you something that we Israelis have against Moses. He took us 40 years through the desert in order to bring us to the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil!” So said the former...
The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma (Man Booker Longlist #4)
Chigozie Obioma’s The Fishermen is the second of the three debut novels on this year’s Man Booker longlist, alongside The Chimes and Did You Ever Have a Family. In very different ways to The...
The Refugee Crisis in the United States
Aylan Kurdi, along with his mother Rehen and brother Galip, died in an attempt to escape the horrors of war-torn Syria and reach Europe. They were among the tens of thousands of refugees who have...
Should the West Have Intervened in Syria? The Syrian Refugee Crisis
It hasn't been uncommon for quite some time now to see destitute and dirty Syrian children sleeping rough on the streets of Istanbul these days. Like millions of their counterparts they have been...
Breaking Up Syria and Iraq: The Islamic State
When the Islamic State (ISIS) group symbolically dismantled the Skyes-Picot border which had long separated the modern states of Iraq and Syria in the middle of 2014, following its takeover of large...
The Transgender Character Breaking New Ground for Middle Grade Readers
Alex Gino’s George is hitting the shelves of US bookstores at a time when transgender issues are everywhere — high-profile trans women are occupying an important part of the media conversation,...
Review: Straight Outta Compton
“Straight Outta Compton” explodes with a blank screen, helicopter blades and media chatter. We could be starting another zombie apocalypse or alternatively listening to a multi-layered, cinematic...
The Chimes by Anna Smaill (Man Booker Longlist #3)
New Zealander Anna Smaill’s debut novel is an interesting choice for the Man Booker longlist. It crosses at least one, and I suspect, two, general Booker taboos – it’s genre fiction, and it...
Review: Attack On Titan
In the live action adaptation of the popular manga series “Attack On Titan” the scraps of flesh that make up the last surviving members of humanity have been cowering in fear behind three...
Review: Show Me A Hero
It’s hard to image that a television series about urban planning would be that interesting — one might as well subscribe to a channel allowing people to watch paint dry, or Norway’s infamous...