Tag: Weed

Nev Schulman – In Real Life | Review

July 10, 2019
Authors P-T (By Surname)Non-Fiction

Title: In Real Life

Author: Nev Schulman

Type: Non-Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 246

Rating 3.5/5

 

 

If you’ve ever watched MTV’s Catfish then you’ve already heard of Schulman. He’s the guy who presents the show, and in fact he earlier presented a documentary of the same name about his own experience as a victim of catfishing. Oh, and catfishing, for those of you who aren’t in the know, is when people pretend to be someone they’re not on a social networking site.

What was quite cool about this is that you get to know Schulman some more as a person, and it turns out that he wasn’t always the greatest of guys. In fact, it almost feels as though he wrote this book to come to terms with the person he was as a youth, when he got into fights, sold weed and magic mushrooms and was a bit of a womaniser.

But at the same time as telling his own story, Schulman also shares practical advice that’s designed to help other people to stay safe on social networking sites, and that makes it a little similar to one of my own books, Social Paranoia. He did it well though, and even though the book is a couple of years old by now, I think it’s held up well to the passage of time. I’d recommend it to fans of the show, but probably not to general readers. Yeah.

 

 

Click here to buy In Real Life.

Antonio Manzini – A Cold Death | Review

July 28, 2016
Authors K-O (By Surname)Fiction

Title: A Cold Death

Author: Antonio Manzini

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 308

Rating: 7/10

 

Antonio Manzani - A Cold Death

Antonio Manzani – A Cold Death

 

Disclaimer: While I aim to be unbiased, I received a copy of this for free to review.

I get to quote the blurb in its entirety for this book, because it’s short, simple and to the point: “Small town. Big secrets. Rough justice.” It’s pretty accurate.

This book is billed as an international bestseller and features Rocco Schiavone as he investigates what seems like a suicide at first but which rapidly turns into a murder. There are plenty of twists and turns along the way, as you’d expect from a crime novel, and Antony Shugaar – the book’s translator – has done a pretty good job of things.

That said, I get sent a lot of contemporary crime novels, usually from mainstream publishers (this one’s from 4th Estate, which appears to be one of Harper Collins’ imprints), and so I’m used to a high standard. This book was good, but it wasn’t great – that’s why I gave it a 7/10. It was professional quality, but nothing more.

 

Antonio Manzini

Antonio Manzini

 

The main criticism that I have for this book is the way that the police chief smokes weed throughout the book. It’s not necessarily that he does it, because I can imagine that a fair few policemen like to kick back after a busy shift with a cheeky smoke. It’s the fact that he’s the boss, and he smokes it while on duty, in his office at the station. His colleagues are aware of it, and they even directly refer to it whilst having meetings about the case, and it just broke my suspended disbelief. I just don’t think that would happen – no-one is that stupid, and if you get caught then that’d be an automatic suspension.

Other than that though, pretty good.

 

Antonio Manzini

Antonio Manzini

 

Click here to buy A Cold Death.