The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 128

The Florentines: From Dante to Galileo: The Transformation of Western Civilization by Paul Strathern

Goodreads Blurb: A sweeping and magisterial four-hundred-year history of both the city and the people who gave birth to the Renaissance.Between the birth of Dante in 1265 and the death of Galileo in 1642, something happened that transformed the entire culture of western civilization. Painting, sculpture, and architecture would all visibly change in such a striking fashion that there could be no going back on what had taken place. Likewise, the thought and self-conception of humanity would take on a completely new aspect. Sciences would be born—or emerge in an entirely new guise.

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: The things I’ve learned from this book: 1) Most of the major figures in the Renaissance all came from the same place in Italy and 2) Bankers had a lot more to do with that same Renaissance than you would have suspected 😁

Amazon Associates: The Florentines: From Dante to Galileo: The Transformation of Western Civilization by Paul Strathern

If you’ve enjoyed this wee post remember to follow the Wee Blog if you haven’t already. Also check me out on X, Goodreads, Instagram, Mastodon, Threads, Pinterest, Tumblr, Spotify, TikTok, YouTube, Facebook and Kofi. Until next time stay safe, and have a bonnie day.

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 127

Isaac Steele and the Best Idea in the Universe by Daniel Rigby

Goodreads Blurb: Brought to you by Its Majesty’s Government. Greatest Britain: For a Global Universe.

Strap yourself in and maybe put on a crash helmet, Agent Isaac Steele has another case to crack.

The theft of the Best Idea in the Universe from Thresia’s Intergalactic Bank of Ideas plunges the Discovered Universe into chaos. With a robotic partner who’s not the machine he fell in love with and a mind as cool and measured as a forest fire, Isaac must unravel a cosmic conspiracy that stretches further than the reaches of even his depraved imagination.

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: This is without a doubt one of the most bizarre books I’ve ever read – and I’ve read Flatland. Still the action grabs you from the get go, the main character is incredibly likeable and the plot is undoubtedly intriguing. Would recommend, five out of five ⭐️🌟✨

Amazon Associates: Isaac Steele and the Best Idea in the Universe by Daniel Rigby

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 126

Bleak House by Charles Dickens

Goodreads Blurb: The complex story of a notorious law-suit in which love and inheritance are set against the classic urban background of 19th-century London, where fog on the river, seeping into the very bones of the characters, symbolizes the corruption of the legal system and the society which supports it.

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: This was a very aptly named book – I did indeed feel very bleak after finishing it. Only one character could be said to get a happy ending, and even then it’s not without its scars.

Amazon Associates: Bleak House by Charles Dickens

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 125

The Borgias: Power and Fortune by Paul Strathern

Goodreads Blurb: The glorious and infamous history of the Borgia family―a world of saints, corrupt popes, and depraved princes and poisoners―set against the golden age of the Italian Renaissance.

The Borgia family have become a byword for evil. Corruption, incest, ruthless megalomania, avarice and vicious cruelty―all have been associated with their name. And yet, paradoxically, this family lived when the Renaissance was coming into its full flowering in Italy. Examples of infamy flourished alongside some of the finest art produced in western history.

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: Wow there was a lot of syphilis in this book. A brilliant, and engaging look into the terrifying and fascinating family and world of the Borgias. A book well worth the read. Even if it does have a lot of syphilis in it 😁

Amazon Associates: The Borgias: Power and Fortune by Paul Strathern

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 124

A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab

Goodreads Blurb: Kell is one of the last Antari—magicians with a rare, coveted ability to travel between parallel Londons; Red, Grey, White, and, once upon a time, Black.

Kell was raised in Arnes—Red London—and officially serves the Maresh Empire as an ambassador, traveling between the frequent bloody regime changes in White London and the court of George III in the dullest of Londons, the one without any magic left to see.

Unofficially, Kell is a smuggler, servicing people willing to pay for even the smallest glimpses of a world they’ll never see. It’s a defiant hobby with dangerous consequences, which Kell is now seeing firsthand.

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: A really enjoyable crash through a twisted world of magical dimension hopping.

Amazon Associates: A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 123

The Christmas Party by Kathryn Croft

Goodreads Blurb: When Sasha receives a call from her old university friend Gabby inviting her to spend Christmas at Gabby’s remote Scottish lake house, Sasha knows she shouldn’t go.

Twelve years ago, on Christmas Eve, when Sasha and her five closest friends were celebrating the festive season, something truly horrific happened that would change the course of their friendship forever. Something that meant Sasha hasn’t spoken to any of them since that night.

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: I found this book’s ending very vindicating, because I’d correctly guessed the culprit half way through.

Amazon Associates: The Christmas Party by Kathryn Croft

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 122

Arthur: The Always King by Kevin Crosley-Holland and Chris Riddell

Goodreads Blurb:Be enthralled by the world of Arthurian legend in this masterful retelling. From King Arthur’s childhood to his final battle, the timeless tales of the sword in the stone, the quests of the Knights of the Round Table and the wizardry of Merlin are woven together into a breath-taking feat of storytelling.

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: The amount of problems that could have been fixed if people would just shut up and listen to Merlin.

Amazon Associates: Arthur: The Always King by Kevin Crosley-Holland and Chris Riddell

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 121

Longbourn by Jo Baker

Goodreads Blurb: If Elizabeth Bennet had the washing of her own petticoats, Sarah often thought, she’d most likely be a sight more careful with them.

In this irresistibly imagined below-stairs answer to Pride and Prejudice, the servants take center stage. Sarah, the orphaned housemaid, spends her days scrubbing the laundry, polishing the floors, and emptying the chamber pots for the Bennet household. But there is just as much romance, heartbreak, and intrigue downstairs at Longbourn as there is upstairs. When a mysterious new footman arrives, the orderly realm of the servants’ hall threatens to be completely, perhaps irrevocably, upended.

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: I loved this book. It’s one of the few, if only, retellings of Pride & Prejudice in which you leave liking Mr. Collins far more than Elizabeth Bennet.

Amazon Associates: Longbourn by Jo Baker

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 120

Space Unicorn Blues by T.J. Berry

Goodreads Blurb: Having magical powers makes you less than human, a resource to be exploited. Half-unicorn Gary Cobalt is sick of slavery, captivity, and his horn being ground down to power faster-than-light travel. When he’s finally free, all he wants is to run away in his ancestors’ stone ship. Instead, Captain Jenny Perata steals the ship out from under him, so she can make an urgent delivery. But Jenny held him captive for a decade, and then Gary murdered her best friend… who was also the wife of her co-pilot, Cowboy Jim. What could possibly go right?

(Goodreads Page)

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: Way more depressing than you’d think a book about a space unicorn would be.

Amazon Associates: Space Unicorn Blues by T.J. Berry

The Wee Writing Lassie’s 300 Books in a Year – Book 119

Hidden In Plain Sight: The simple link between relativity and quantum mechanics by Andrew H. Thomas

Goodreads Blurb: You never knew theoretical physics could be so simple! In this exciting and significant book, Andrew Thomas clearly illustrates the simplicity which lies behind nature at its fundamental level. It is revealed how all unifications in physics have been based on incredibly simple ideas.

Using a logical approach, it is explained how the great 20th century theories of relativity and quantum mechanics share a common base, and how they can be linked using an idea so simple that anyone can understand it.

An idea which is so simple it has been hidden in plain sight.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Goodreads Review: Man did I feel smart while reading this book 📚