Skip to main content
Tag

praise

Book Review: The Humans by Matt Haig

By Amazon, Books & Authors, ReviewsNo Comments
the-humans-matt-haig-book-cover The Humans is a unique and brilliant novel that you have to read.

Professor Andrew Martin is a Mathematician at Cambridge University. He is about to share his prove of the Riemann hypothesis. But up in the nights sky, among the stars is a planet with an alien race watching.

The Vonnadorians think Humans are savage. They have decided that Humans are not ready for the knowledge of Martin’s work and where it will lead them. So they send a nameless Alien in the guise of Professor Andrew Martin, to destroy the knowledge and anybody that knows of its existence.

The nameless Alien tells the story from his perspective, addressing others of his species. He starts by noticing the ugly appearance of Humans and the odd social conventions that we have. As he learns these social conventions he gets himself into hilarious situations that will have the Reader laughing aloud.

Pretending to be Professor Andrew Martin the Alien gets to know Martin’s Wife Isobel, Martin’s teenage son Gulliver and the family dog Newton. He becomes emotionally attached to them. To the point where he falls in love with Isobel, becomes a father figure to Gulliver and learns to communicate with Newton. He realises he has to make a difficult choice.

But he knows what ever decision he makes, his people won’t deviate from their plan. His people are driven by pure logic and in his society Mathematics is like the only religion.

His decision leads to another being sent to complete the job. But what will the Alien do?

The writers voice is captivating throughout. The characters were well-rounded and had the appropriate level of depth. The pacing was ideal. Every time the Reader gets to the end of a chapter he/she will think: just one more chapter, before I stop.

The Humans is throughly entertaining. Towards the end of the book the Alien writes a list giving advice to Gulliver. This 97 point list was great and will make the Reader think about life.

I can’t heap enough praise on this superb story. The Humans has become one of my all-time favourite books and one that I’ll read again and again.

The Humans is available to buy on Amazon.

Review soon,

Antony

mental-health-wisdom-banner



I aim for posts on this blog to be informative, educational and entertaining. If you have found this post useful or enjoyable, please consider making a contribution by Paypal:


Share on Social Media:

Blog Development: A Complete Theme Redesign by TRH Development

By LifeNo Comments
people-per-hour-logo Over the years my blog theme had become out of date and the CSS had been cannibalised. So I was looking for a WordPress expert to do a complete redesign of the current theme. I found Tia from from TRH Development on people per hour.

I explained to Tia what I wanted, we agreed a price and she got to work. My role was to give her feedback as we went along. Here’s a list of work Tia did for me:

  • Complete redesign of my blog using a child theme of Twenty Fourteen (to allow for theme updates).
  • Coded to the highest HTML5 and CSS3 standards. This CSS3 was essential as the style sheet on my old theme had been cannibalised over the years and was full of conflicts.
  • WordPress Menu Functionality – including support for sub-menus. A major reason for this update was to allow me to use the added functionality features of WordPress.
  • A mobile/tablet version of the site.
  • The ability for the reader to Switch between the Desktop/Mobile versions, which is possible by using a link in the footer.
  • Removal of the ‘Go’ button with the search input field.
  • Archives expand to include post titles.
  • Photo caption boxes have been slimed down at the sides, making them stylistically look better.
  • Various minor tweaks based on my feedback to make the theme’s look as close as possible to the old theme.

Tia also added two great new features:

  • Pagination – which is the page bar under the blog posts on the home page. I really like this page browsing experience for readers.
  • Lightbox image viewer with play/pause slideshow. I love this. I have some great photos. Now if you click any image on a photo post or page (such as Photos) it brings up the image full size without leaving the page and allows you to play/pause a slideshow.

To follow on from Tia’s superb work, I also made a few minor tweaks to the blog myself:

  • Changed the font from Arial to Verdana.
  • Removal of the large Amazon banner on the sidebar.
  • Added book cover thumbnail images on the I’m Reading and On My Bookshelf sections on the sidebar.
  • Changed UL in style sheet to square.

Tia at TRH Development was awesome. I intend on using her again, probably later in the year, to design me a WordPress theme for my professional writers website. My feedback for Tia on people per hour really says it all:

Awesome. Brilliant. Excellent Communicator. Job done to the highest standard. I can’t heap enough praise on Tia for the expert knowledge & skills along with her professionalism. Am already planning my next project with her.

So if you need a Developer for a website, I highly recommend Tia from TRH Development.

Blog soon,

Antony

Share on Social Media:
×