Here are 100 books that Curse the Day fans have personally recommended if you like
Curse the Day.
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I like fiction which makes a character confront what the poet Thom Gunn called ‘the blackmail of his circumstances’: where you are born, the expectations of you. I like to think I am very much a self-created individual, but I can never escape what I was born into; the self is a prison that the will is trying to break out of. I like literature which reflects that challenge.
I could have chosen any Raymond Chandler novel for this list; he is such a brilliant stylist, one of the best in the language.
His lugubrious, heavy-drinking, first-person detective Philip Marlowe is my kind of fictional hero, a genre-defining character, perpetually alone though he yearns for the glamorous women he meets.
Raymond Chandler's first three novels, published here in one volume, established his reputation as an unsurpassed master of hard-boiled detective fiction.
The Big Sleep, Chandler's first novel, introduces Philip Marlowe, a private detective inhabiting the seamy side of Los Angeles in the 1930s, as he takes on a case involving a paralysed California millionaire, two psychotic daughters, blackmail and murder.
In Farewell, My Lovely, Marlowe deals with the gambling circuit, a murder he stumbles upon, and three very beautiful but potentially deadly women.
In The High Window, Marlowe searches the California underworld for a priceless gold coin and finds himself…
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
I have been writing for many years, and my main preference is political thrillers with criminal overtones. I first became interested in politics when I worked at several political conferences in the 60’s and 70’s. I have been involved in several criminal cases, including my own, and within my family, I have a nephew in the police force. For many years I have had the opportunity to mix with the upper tiers of society as well as the criminal classes and this has given me great insight into creating my characters and plots.
This is one book I really could not leave alone. An experienced political journalist loses his sister in a road accident, but the journalist thinks her death has something to do with some government secrets she knew about.
I was drawn into this story from the start. Peston’s style is first person central and it holds the readers attention. He turns what could be a simple plot into a complicated plot with the main protagonist digging out secrets while risking his own life. I loved this one. There are a lot of very realistic passages from a writer well-schooled in the political world.
THE HUNT FOR A KILLER LEADS ALL THE WAY TO THE TOP...
'Brilliant' - THE TIMES 'Cracking' - DAILY MAIL 'Winning' - SUNDAY TIMES 'A hell of a read' - OBSERVER 'Enthralling' - FINANCIAL TIMES 'Enjoyable, intelligent' - GUARDIAN 'A romping thriller' - INDEPENDENT 'A rollicking read' - EVENING STANDARD 'A gripping thriller' - DAILY EXPRESS 'Fascinating' - DAILY MIRROR 'Gripping' - RADIO TIMES 'Compelling' - THE SUN
THE BIGGEST THRILLER OF THE YEAR FROM BRITAIN'S TOP POLITICAL JOURNALIST, ROBERT PESTON. ________________________
1997. A desperate government clings to power; a hungry opposition will do anything to win. And journalist Gil…
I have been writing for many years, and my main preference is political thrillers with criminal overtones. I first became interested in politics when I worked at several political conferences in the 60’s and 70’s. I have been involved in several criminal cases, including my own, and within my family, I have a nephew in the police force. For many years I have had the opportunity to mix with the upper tiers of society as well as the criminal classes and this has given me great insight into creating my characters and plots.
I do love a chase thriller, especially one that has you scratching your head until the author reveals a clue or adds more calculated confusion or a red herring. This plot starts with a terrorist attack in Europe and involves a clever barrister and an agent trying to solve a mystery that introduces us to a double agent.
I think the plot is a very clever one where no one can be trusted until the mystery is solved. Kent is really good at characterization and some of his descriptive work I found very colorful. A damn good read.
'Packed with deception and espionage ... Kent has become the British Baldacci, and there can be no higher praise.' Daily Mail
Don't miss Book 5 from criminal barrister and crime author Tony Kent: THE SHADOW NETWORK
How do you take down an enemy when no one believes they exist? When the lawyers of alleged war criminal Hannibal Strauss are caught up in a terror attack in The Hague, barrister Michael Devlin immediately suspects all is not what it seems. Teaming up once more with Agent Joe Dempsey, they…
Stealing technology from parallel Earths was supposed to make Declan rich. Instead, it might destroy everything.
Declan is a self-proclaimed interdimensional interloper, travelling to parallel Earths to retrieve futuristic cutting-edge technology for his employer. It's profitable work, and he doesn't ask questions. But when he befriends an amazing humanoid robot,…
I have been writing for many years, and my main preference is political thrillers with criminal overtones. I first became interested in politics when I worked at several political conferences in the 60’s and 70’s. I have been involved in several criminal cases, including my own, and within my family, I have a nephew in the police force. For many years I have had the opportunity to mix with the upper tiers of society as well as the criminal classes and this has given me great insight into creating my characters and plots.
I nearly put this book back on the shelf, but glad I didn’t. This is a brilliant plot about a missing spy and two operatives sent to find a captured colleague in MI6 amidst Chinese and Taiwan tension that might turn to war at any time.
I found it interesting that the author is a BBC Correspondent with bags of experience about eastern politics. His attention to detail is really good, and there is plenty of tension, action, and atmosphere. A good read for those who like plenty of informed detail in a good plot.
THE NEW LUKE CARLTON THRILLER.BBC Security Correspondent FRANK GARDNER'S thrillers are . . . 'Fast, taut, tense, accurate.' FREDERICK FORSYTH
'Utterly authentic.' DAILY MAIL
'Enthralling, intelligent.' FINANCIAL TIMES
'Nerve-shredding.' TONY PARSONS
'Heart-in-mouth.' i-NEWSPAPER
'Compulsively readable.' RADIO TIMES __________________________________________
The world is on high alert.
Across the Strait from Taiwan, China's armed forces appear to be readying for war. Could the People's Republic be preparing to invade its island neighbour?
Britain's Secret Intelligence Service has a mole deep within the Chinese Communist Party leadership - an individual in possession of intel that could defuse this fast-escalating situation. A 'collector' is sent…
I’m an avid reader of fiction and kind of a nerd, too, so I love books with science in them. I’m a scientist myself, now retired from a career in environmental and engineering geology. I am fascinated by the Earth and the geologic processes that shape it, from the seemingly mundane (like erosion) to the remarkable (like earthquakes, landslides, and volcanic eruptions). As a writer, I try to translate that wonder for non-scientist readers, all wrapped up in a compelling story. Each book on this list sure does that, weaving science into the fabric of a gripping narrative. I hope you’ll love them as much as I do.
I was on my way home from the grocery store, and I heard Naomi Alderman in an interview about this, her latest book, on NPR’s All Things Considered. It's a good thing I didn’t buy ice cream that day because I sat in the car in the driveway, listening until the end. Hearing her, I knew I had to read the book. And when I did, I couldn’t put it down (the reading equivalent of sitting in the driveway listening to the radio?).
Populated with extraordinary characters, from genuinely good to incredibly greedy, this book both frightened me and gave me hope, but it never let me go until, well, after the last page (yeah, there’s a little bit of a trick at the end).
Jeremy N. Smith is the author of three acclaimed narrative non-fiction books, including Breaking and Entering, about a female hacker called “Alien” and the birth of our information insecurity age. He has written for The Atlantic, Discover, Slate, and the New York Times, among other outlets, and he and his work have been featured by CNN, NPR, NBC Nightly News, The Today Show, and Wired. He hosts The Hacker Next Door podcast and lives in Missoula, Montana.
Hackers is a classic account of the computer revolution, centered on the pioneering tinkerers, gamers, social theorists, entrepreneurs, and other explorers who made military and corporate technology personal. These are not hackers in the criminal sense most people understand the term today, but men (and a few women) like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and others far less famous. Their interwoven biographies are brilliantly researched and reported, underpinned by what Levy calls a common “hacker ethic” whose tenets dominate our economy, politics, and culture today.
Steven Levy's classic book about the original hackers of the computer revolution is now available in a special 25th anniversary edition, with updated material from noteworthy hackers such as Bill Gates, Mark Zukerberg, Richard Stallman, and Tim O'Reilly. Hackers traces the exploits of innovators from the research labs in the late 1950s to the rise of the home computer in the mid-1980s. It's a fascinating story of brilliant and eccentric nerds such as Steve Wozniak, Ken Williams, and John Draper who took risks, bent the rules, and took the world in a radical new direction. "Hacker" is often a derogatory…
Nature writer Sharman Apt Russell tells stories of her experiences tracking wildlife—mostly mammals, from mountain lions to pocket mice—near her home in New Mexico, with lessons that hold true across North America. She guides readers through the basics of identifying tracks and signs, revealing a landscape filled with the marks…
I’m a novelist and game designer from Bangalore. I’ve been a lifelong reader of science fiction and fantasy. Growing up, I almost never encountered futures that included people like me—brown women, from a country that isn’t the UK/ US, and yet, who are in sync with the rapidly changing global village we belong to. Over the last decade, though, I've found increasing joy in more recent science fiction, in which the future belongs to everyone.The Ten Percent Thiefis an expression of my experiences living in dynamic urban India, and represents one of our many possible futures.
The year is 2095, and human beings must take performance enhancement pills to compete with automated systems. The future in Machinehood could be ours tomorrow.
Welga and Nithya, the novel’s protagonists, are constantly on the verge of burnout while pushing themselves to perform. A mysterious terrorist organization called the Machinehood turns up to demand equal rights for AI, and that humans put an end to pill manufacturing, triggering events around the world. Parts of the novel are set in Chennai, India, and despite all its futuristic advances, the city retains its present day identity. Machinehood also portrays women in technologically-driven spaces, which is something I'm always rooting for.
From the Hugo Award nominee S.B. Divya, Zero Dark Thirty meets The Social Network in this science fiction thriller about artificial intelligence, sentience, and labor rights in a near future dominated by the gig economy.
Welga Ramirez, executive bodyguard and ex-special forces, is about to retire early when her client is killed in front of her. It's 2095 and people don't usually die from violence. Humanity is entirely dependent on pills that not only help them stay alive, but allow them to compete with artificial intelligence in an increasingly competitive gig economy. Daily doses protect against designer diseases, flow enhances…
I’m a philosopher, writer, and illustrator from Wales, UK. I grew up on ’70s sci-fi—Star Wars (the original trilogy!), Battlestar Galactica (the original series!), The Black Hole (Remember that?! No? Oh well…). Space travel, flying cars, sassy computers you could banter with, cute robots who would be your best friend—it was a time when the future seemed just around the corner. But now, as these things finally start to arrive, I feel I’ve been mis-sold. Data theft? Mass surveillance? Killer drones? Election manipulation? Social media bot farms? This isn’t the future I signed up for! Or maybe I should have read the terms and conditions…
Technology is always moving on. And so it should be forgiven the author that many of the concrete examples in this book are now somewhat dated. They provide some interesting insight into the history of computing and media technology, but the real value of Roszak’s argument lies in his analysis of how—thanks to computer technology—society has become obsessed with “information”. It’s almost a cult. But information is not knowledge, data does not in itself provide understanding. In fact, in a peculiarly paradoxical way, the more information we have, the less we actually know. Thirty years later, as we swim daily in the disinformationof the murky waters of social media and disappear down Youtube rabbit holes, Roszak’s point seems more pertinent than ever.
As we devote ever-increasing resources to providing, or prohibiting, access to information via computer, Theodore Roszak reminds us that voluminous information does not necessarily lead to sound thinking. "Data glut" obscures basic questions of justice and purpose and may even hinder rather than enhance our productivity. In this revised and updated edition of "The Cult of Information", Roszak reviews the disruptive role the computer has come to play in international finance and the way in which "edutainment" software and computer games degrade the literacy of children. At the same time, he finds hopeful new ways in which the library and…
I was a business school professor for 38 years, always fascinated by how organizations could (or couldn’t) adapt to their changing environments. Over the course of my career, I observed and studied how organizations sought to adapt to major disrupting forces such as new information-processing technologies, internationalization, downsizing, new organizational forms, digitization, and artificial intelligence. Today’s global business environment is complex, dynamic, and highly interconnected. The only way to adapt is through collaboration–organizations must be able to quickly respond to any environmental change by identifying appropriate resources wherever they may exist and efficiently marshaling them into a desired response and eventual solution. In competitive terms, this is called a “relational advantage.”
Nothing in the past few years has disrupted the operations of business firms more than artificial intelligence. This book marks the age of AI with the emergence of a business environment shaped by digital networks, analytics, and artificial intelligence. It gives a credible account of how fast-moving digital firms in many sectors are disrupting traditional firms and upending the existing rules of business.
I love how this book gives examples of digital firms we’ve all heard of–Netflix, YouTube, Airbnb, etc.–and clearly explains how these firms rapidly achieve scale and become strong competitors. AI is becoming increasingly impactful, and all firms must learn how to use AI if they want to remain competitive.
AI-centric organizations exhibit a new operating architecture, redefining how they create, capture, share, and deliver value.
Marco Iansiti and Karim R. Lakhani show how reinventing the firm around data, analytics, and AI removes traditional constraints on scale, scope, and learning that have restricted business growth for hundreds of years. From Airbnb to Ant Financial, Microsoft to Amazon, research shows how AI-driven processes are vastly more scalable than traditional processes, allow massive scope increase, enabling companies to straddle industry boundaries, and create powerful opportunities for learning--to drive ever more accurate, complex, and…
The Bridge provides a compassionate and well researched window into the worlds of linear and circular thinking. A core pattern to the inner workings of these two thinking styles is revealed, and most importantly, insight into how to cross the distance between them. Some fascinating features emerged such as, circular…
I am a scientist, educator, successful entrepreneur, and author. I believe that human civilization is threatened by the wonderful and dangerous technologies that we created in the last two centuries: fossil fuels, nuclear weapons, gene editing, AI, and social media. As a creator of technologies, I feel responsible that more hasn’t been done to properly control them. My current mission is to sound an alarm about the potential tyranny of technology through my novels, 100 Years to Extinction and the sequel, 12 Years to AI Singularity, on my website and on social media. While the recommended books on my list are nonfiction, my fictional story presents the science and technology accurately as nonfiction would.
I believe the artificial intelligence Singularity is coming and is super important.
The recent essay by Matt Shumer, Something Big Is Coming, that got 84 million views, highlights that importance. I love futurist author Ray Kurzweil’s book that describes that future. Kurzweil predicts the Singularity will occur in 2045. I believe it may be sooner.
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei called AI "the single most serious national security threat we've faced in a century, possibly ever." I love how Kurzweil’s book lays out the issues we will face. He predicts AI will expand human intelligence a millionfold and change human life forever, including our employment.
I believe we need to understand and be prepared for how that future will unfold, and his book helps us do that.
In this visionary and fundamentally optimistic book, the legendary oracle of technological change explains how AI will transform our species beyond recognition.
'The best person I know at predicting the future of AI' BILL GATES 'A fascinating exploration of our future' YUVAL NOAH HARARI 'Essential reading to understand our exponential times' MUSTAFA SULEYMAN
Within our lifetimes, we will be able to connect our brains directly with AI, enhancing our intelligence a millionfold and expanding our consciousness in ways we can barely imagine. This is the Singularity. Ray Kurzweil is one of the greatest inventors of our time with over 60…
