After getting bogged down in Dante (see this blog 29 March 2021), I decided to take a break and head for the open sea with David Abulafia.
Should one judge a book by its cover? This one quotes Peter Frankopan in The Sunday Times as saying the contents are "breathtaking"; Dominic Sandbrook, also from The Sunday Times: "dazzling"; and Simon Sebag Montefiore in The Daily Telegraph: "intense and thrilling".
All of which leads me to wonder if any of them have read it from the beginning...
Admittedly, I'm only 200 pages in – and it may get a bit livelier in the next 700 pages – but to me it feels like sitting in a history lesson where so many facts are being fired off at you that you're torn between trying to catch every word... and nodding off.
It may be about the story of humans and their vast watery planet – but it feels, well, so far rather dry...
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