Review: What to Expect When You're Dead by Robert Garland

When the Pope died in April 2025 and his body was put on display for members of the church and the public to pay their respects, I was reminded how jarring it is to today's sensibilities and thought it was a good time to listen to What to Expect When You're Dead - An Ancient Tour of Death and the Afterlife by Robert Garland.

Covering the time period in history 100,000 BC - 400 AD, this audiobook references ancient texts, artworks and archaeology at a level I was largely unfamiliar with. However I did enjoy some of the content, including this quote taken from Greek Playwright Aristophanes (446 BC - 386 BC):

"In Aristophanes Frogs, anyone who has harmed a guest, failed to pay a boy for his sexual favours, struck his mother, punched his father or sworn a false oath is consigned to a sewer full of turds." Chapter 5 Heaven and Hell

The beliefs of many ancient civilisations and religions were offered, in addition to their thoughts on the afterlife, how best to lay the dead to rest and how to honour their ancestors.

As a youngster I was interested in the history of Egypt, the pyramids and of course the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb. I was simultaneously disturbed by the fact mummified remains were once desecrated by grave robbers and disturbed in the 'modern era' by archaeologists, with artefacts removed to be sold to private collectors or displayed in museums. It shouldn't come as a surprise then that I relished the legend of the curse of Tutankhamun and enjoyed hearing more about Egyptian curses here:

"Thieves certainly weren't deterred by the stiff penalties they incurred if apprehended, death by impaling being a common punishment. Nor by the curses that the deceased promised to rain down on those who broke into their tombs. A typical Egyptian curse reads as follows: As for anyone who shall violate my corpse in the necropolis or shall damage my image in my chamber, the ka (spirit or soul) of Ra (sun god) shall abhor him. He shall not bequeath his goods to his children nor shall he be restful in life, nor shall he receive water in the necropolis. His ba (personality and soul) shall be destroyed forever.' " Chapter 8, Where to Deposit the Remains

Scary stuff! The book includes beliefs and practices from a range of ancient cultures and traditions, including Early Christian, Egyptian, Etruscan, Greek, Hindu, Islamic, Jewish, Mesopotamian, Roman and Zoroastrian. I'll admit I was in very unfamiliar territory here, however this did help to clarify that my interest in death rituals is anchored in Western culture closer to my own time. I've shared my interest in the mourning etiquette of the Victorian era in other reviews and have the current books on my virtual TBR to read at some stage in the future:

• Fashionable Mourning Jewellery, Clothing and Customs by Mary Brett
• Mourning Art & Jewellery by Maureen Delorme
• Death in the Victorian Family by Pat Gallant
• Childhood & Death in Victorian England by Sarah Seaton

Narrated by Zeb Soanes, What to Expect When You're Dead - An Ancient Tour of Death and the Afterlife by Robert Garland is recommended for dedicated non fiction readers with an interest in ancient history and ancient civilisations from 100,000 BC - 400 AD. I thought that was me but it turns out that it isn't.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Review: This is My World by Lonely Planet Kids

This is My World by Lonely Planet Kids was a delightful reading experience as 84 children from around the world tell us about their family, where they live, their hobbies and more. Each child enjoys a double page spread, and the eye-catching layouts include photos, flags, maps, fast facts and three adjectives they use to describe themselves.

Cleverly organised alphabetically by first name provides a stimulating criss-crossing of the globe instead of a dull trip alphabetically country by country. This also prevents readers from flipping pages to search for specific countries, although there is a handy index in the back.

Some of the entries are clearly written by the children while some have been helped by their parents, but all were informative, interesting and engaging. I loved learning new things along the way, for instance Noa (aged 10) lives in Japan and she says:

"I like this house because our living room is huge. There is a fireplace and horigotatsu (table-based heater) as well." Page 129

I didn't know what a horigotatsu was so put the book aside to find out and went down a lovely Japanese rabbit hole. They look super cosy and I really hope I get the chance to try one some day.

I was able to identify some similarities between the entries in that a lot of children fight with their siblings (who knew?), many have never seen snow and rabbits are a favourite animal for kids around the world.

According to the Foreward:

"To create this book, we reached out to cattle ranchers in the Australian outback, inhabitants of a fishing capital in Greenland, city dwellers living among skyscrapers in Nigeria and many more families!"

Sounds great but I'd really like to know exactly how they did that. How many children submitted a response and how were these 84 profiles chosen? Some of the children stated their parents were teachers and I found myself wondering if Lonely Planet reached out to schools as part of this project. Not that it's important, I'm just curious.

This is My World by Lonely Planet Kids is a great book suitable for readers young and old and I can highly recommend it.

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Review: Mammoth by Chris Flynn

* Copy courtesy of University of Queensland Press *

Mammoth by Australian author Chris Flynn is like nothing I've ever read before, or likely to read again for that matter. Our narrator is a 13,000 year old extinct mammoth by the name of Mammut. It does sound crazy, but it also strangely works. The reader learns that as the bones or fossils of an animal (extinct or not) are unearthed, their consciousness returns to them and they can communicate.

Yep, you heard me right, this book has a cast of talking fossils. They talk amongst themselves by telepathy as they listen to Mammut's story of his life on earth and subsequent revival after his bones were discovered, dug up and sold.

I enjoyed the easy dialogue between the different creatures and their accents based on when and where they were unearthed and the humans they could listen in on. And boy did they have some things to say about we hominids.

What I didn't enjoy was the lack of punctuation for any of this dialogue. I was chatting with another booklover about this very thing last week, and it's an incredibly hard feat to pull off dialogue without punctuation. Unfortunately it slowed me down here and I frequently had to backtrack to find out who was speaking.

I enjoyed the majority of Mammut's story, however some parts of his story were too detailed and failed to hold my interest while others had me entranced. I wanted to learn more about the other fossils in the conversation, however I recognise the book wouldn't have been called Mammoth if that were the case.

Originality is hard to come by these days, and I take my hat off to Australian author Chris Flynn, because he's certainly achieved it here.

Carpe Librum!

My Rating:

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Review: Absolute Proof by Peter James

* Copy courtesy of Pan Macmillan *

Ross Hunter, Investigative Journalist learns there may be absolute proof of the existence of God and decides to investigate. Under serious threat from several organisations who seek the evidence Ross is gathering, Absolute Proof has been compared to The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. I loved The Da Vinci Code so decided to give this a go, however the only connection I could see was the concept of Jesus Christ's DNA being passed down to the present day. Despite the hieroglyphics on the cover, there are no puzzles or riddles to solve here. In fact, Ross's trip to Egypt was brief and hieroglyphics didn't factor in the story at all so I have no idea why they grace the cover.

Peter James is a bestselling author who has written a tonne of books but this was my first time reading his work. I found Ross's character to be a little irritating at times and I soon grew weary of wading through the endless descriptions of scenery and mundane tasks. Ross's ruminations also took up too much space and only served to recap his thoughts on the goings on; which is boring if you're the sort of reader able to keep up with what's happening.

And the ending? Where do I start? The ending left far too many unanswered questions. It was ambiguous and anti climactic and I expected more from an award winning author who has sold more than 19 million books. Absolute Proof was a meandering novel with some interesting points about religion but the unresolved ending left me underwhelmed and unlikely to seek out any of his other novels.

My rating = **

Carpe Librum!

Review: Built on Bones - 15,000 Years of Urban Life and Death by Brenna Hassett

RRP $19.99
Bloomsbury

* Copy courtesy of Bloomsbury *

I've always had an interest in archaeology. I don't mean fossils and dinosaurs, but the remnants of recent civilisations and those long buried and forgotten. When a new plague pit is discovered on a construction site or the long lost remains of Richard III were located in a supermarket carpark, I'm going to be there to read about it.

As the title suggests, Built on Bones by Brenna Hassett takes a look at 15,000 Years of Urban Life and Death. As an archaeologist she specialises in the human skeleton to look at whether the move towards an urban lifestyle results in an earlier death than the foragers and nomads of history. Hassett looks at the changes in skeletons - and teeth in particular - which provide plenty of interesting tidbits and conclusions.

A highlight for me was on Page 49, where Hassett explains that with the move to agriculture and 'slurpable foods,' there was less work for our jaws, therefore less muscle, and as a consequence our jaws and faces have shrunk in size. This explains a great deal of the dental crowding and associated problems we see today.

I enjoyed learning more about the history and symptoms of urban diseases including syphilis, smallpox, leprosy and TB and Hassett also piqued my interest on Page 153 when she wrote about the practice of burying criminals in embarrassing positions.

Ultimately though, Built on Bones was a whole lot more academic than I was expecting. For a complete novice it was tough going at times and quite scientific. What made this somewhat harder were the infuriating footnotes on every other page. The majority of the footnotes were jokes and comic asides which kept drawing me away from the text and disrupting my rhythm. Well, why didn't you just ignore them I can hear you ask. Well, I couldn't ignore them because occasionally there would be an absolute gem* I didn't want to miss, so I had to persevere.

Built on Bones by Brenna Hassett is recommended for armchair archaeologists, scientists, doctors, medical professionals, historians and devotees of Darwinism.

My rating = ***

Carpe Librum!

* Brenna shared the case of the Rising Star Cave, where a call-out was made for skinny and small archaeologists able to squeeze through a gap in a cave just 18 centimetres wide to excavate a collection of hominid fossils. Wow.

Review: Ink and Bone - The Great Library by Rachel Caine

The Great Library of Alexandria was the greatest and most significant library in the world, however 2000 years ago the library and thousands of priceless scrolls were destroyed by fire.

In her novel Ink and Bone, Rachel Caine has imagined a world where the Alexandria Library wasn't destroyed and remains a prominent force in society.

For some reason, I mistakenly thought this book was an historical fiction novel, and it took me a while to adjust my expectations to what I consider to be a YA fantasy novel.

With students going through a somewhat gruelling selection process to become a librarian, it had a very YA / Harry Potter vibe.

Ink and Bone has automatons and alchemy and book lovers will no doubt enjoy the references to 'the library' but will need to keep an open mind with regard to the world-building.

Ink and Bone is the first in a series of more than 3 books, however the world-building just wasn't what I was expecting and I never really felt 'at home' so I won't be continuing any further with the series.

Ink and Bone by Rachel Caine is recommended for fans who enjoyed the dark side of Harry Potter and YA fantasy.

My rating = **1/2

Carpe Librum!

Review: Thursday At Noon by William F. Brown

* From author for review *

This is my third book from author William F. Brown, having previously read and reviewed The Undertaker (4 stars) and Amongst My Enemies (3 stars). Each novel has been a stand alone and unique from the one before it and Thursday At Noon covers new territory again.

Set in Cairo in the early 1960s, Richard Thomson is a disgraced CIA agent after a failed mission in Damascus. He is having a drink in a bar when he is approached by a man with some photographs to sell. After refusing to buy them, the man is later beheaded, the photographs disappear and Thomson is suspected of his murder. So the story begins.

Thursday At Noon is a spy thriller involving the CIA, and the fate of Egypt with a military plot and the future being decided on Thursday at noon.

I was particular drawn to the character of the Chief of Homicide Police in Cairo, Captain Hassan Saleh, injured and now with a withered leg and walking with a cane. His character was incredibly intriguing to me and way more interesting than that of the main character Thomson. Wearing pristine white suits, and arriving at his destination early so that others wouldn't see him walking with such excruciating pain was incredibly moving. I'd love to read a novel where he was the central character, solving crimes in Cairo.

Moving on though, the romance Thomson developed towards the end of the novel however was completely laughable and not necessary to the plot development. I'm a female reader and not really into spy novels, and this romance didn't do it for me; it would have been better not to have been there at all. And the "Richard Richard" dialogue when the character had been referred to as Thomson throughout was jarring for the reader and felt very out of place, being the most exciting part of the storyline.

I recommend this novel for male readers who enjoy spy thrillers peppered with CIA hierarchy relationships, Nazis working on a secret project, gun fights, car chases, goons, and the occasional political/military coup. You will be crying out for more!

My rating = ***

Carpe Librum!