Reader’s Diary

Vince Flynn

This is an above-average thriller featuring Flynn’s hero, CIA assassin Mitch Rapp.

Brad Stone

This is a mildly interesting book about “robot” combat: “Robot Wars“, “Battlebots“, and the like. I put the word in quotes because these are no autonomous machines but, rather, remote-control vehicles. The book’s main focus is on legal battles between the founder of the “sport” and the production company. It would have been far better had Stone gone into greater detail about the machines themselves and their builders.

Colleen McCullough

Colleen McCullough brings Roman series to a close with this sixth massive novel. It begins with Caesar winding up the civil war, continues thought his assassination and finishes with Octavian (Caesar’s heir, later known as Augustus) hunting down Caesar’s killers. It’s a shame that - according to the author’s note - there will be no more books in this series, one of the finest in the historical fiction genre.