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Added missing books

master 20190303
Julio Biason 6 years ago
parent
commit
b745f2a526
  1. 51
      content/reviews/books/handson-microservices-with-rust.md
  2. 37
      content/reviews/books/the-where-the-why-the-how.md
  3. 40
      content/reviews/books/the-wolfs-hour.md

51
content/reviews/books/handson-microservices-with-rust.md

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title = "Hands-On Microservices with Rust - Denis Kolodin"
date = 2019-03-03
[taxonomies]
tags = ["reviews", "books", "en-au", "rust", "microservices", "denis kolodin"]
+++
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{{ stars(stars=2) }}
The shortest and simpler way to describe this book is this:
```rust
let mut a = 1;
a = a + 1;
// increase a
```
Sure, increasing `a` may seem interesting, but where the heck is the
explanation on why you're increasing a?
The long version is this: this is an exact representation of what a Packt book
is. There are a bunch of grammatical errors from the half of the book to the
end, which should've picked by the editor; there are a bunch of weird
explanations and the incredible tendency of use a different package on each
project (one project uses Hyper, the other Rocket, the other Actix-Web) which
should've been picked by the reviewer; the whole book have a bunch of what the
code is doing, but not why it was designed that way.
So the whole thing feels rushed and without thought.
The "change package on each discussion" is also damming: you never really got
deep into a package, understanding its ins and outs, because it keeps changing
all the time (logs is another thing that keeps changing all the time in the
code, which seems really weird when you want to have a fleet of microservices
-- why would you use different packages on all of them; yes, you can do this
due the nature of microservices, but does it make sense?).
Also, no code is shown in completion. The book uses snippets all around instead
of showing everything. The full code is available on Github, but that means you
need to keep two sources open at the same time: one in the book, to follow
whatever the author is showing and the source code to understand where each
thing fall in the big picture.
Those two last points could be easily solved by starting with a simple code
(say, the Hyper that says "Hello world") and then, slowly, refactor it to reach
a fully asynchronous code, showing the full code with each refactor
highlighted.
Maybe this will be a good book in the 3rd edition.

37
content/reviews/books/the-where-the-why-the-how.md

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title = "The Where, the Why, and the How: 75 Artists Illustrate Wondrous Mysteries of Science - Matt LaMothe, Julia Rothman, Jenny Volvovski, David Macaulay"
date = 2019-02-17
[taxomonies]
tags = ["books", "reviews", "en-au", "science", "illutations", "matt lamothe", "julia rothman", "jenny volvovski", "david macaulay"]
+++
A science book like no other, The Where, the Why, and the How turns loose 75 of
today's hottest artists onto life's vast questions, from how we got here to
where we are going. Inside these pages some of the biggest (and smallest)
mysteries of the natural world are explained in essays by real working
scientists, which are then illustrated by artists given free rein to be as
literal or as imaginative as they like. The result is a celebration of the
wonder that inspires every new discovery. Featuring work by such contemporary
luminaries as Lisa Congdon, Jen Corace, Neil Farber, Susie Ghahremani,
Jeremyville, and many more, this is a work of scientific and artistic
exploration to pique the interest of both the intellectually and imaginatively
curious.
<!-- more -->
{{ stars(stars=3) }}
(This is getting quite common on my reviews but) This is a weird book.
Now, don't get me wrong: The idea the title gives is that they are going to
give you the where, the why and the how, but they actually mean the questions
"where", "why" and "how". A lot of the answers is, basically, "we don't know
yet" -- which, by the way, is completely fine, specially when dealing with
proper science.
Also, the questions are not really "trivia"-like: they go more deep than simply
"Why are plants green?" and the like. And, because you have no certain
questions, it gets even more nerd-like -- which, again, is completely fine.
(Also, the illustrations: meh)

40
content/reviews/books/the-wolfs-hour.md

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title = "The Wolf's Hour - Robert R. McCammon"
date = 2019-02-16
[taxonomies]
tags = ["books", "reviews", "en-au", "werewolves", "robert r mccammon"]
+++
Michael Gallatin is a British spy with a peculiar talent: the ability to
transform himself into a wolf. Although his work in North Africa helped the
Allies win the continent in the early days of World War II, he quit the service
when a German spy shot his lover in her bed. Now, three years later, the army
asks him to end his retirement and parachute into occupied Paris. A mysterious
German plan called the Iron Fist threatens the D-Day invasion, and the Nazi in
charge is the spy who betrayed Michael’s lover. The werewolf goes to France for
king and country, hoping for a chance at bloody vengeance.
<!-- more -->
{{ stars(stars=3) }}
This is truly a weird book.
So you take the idea of mythical creatures like werewolfs. And you take great
events in history, like World War II. And then you mix both.
In one hand, the book is almost silly in its premise. And, as if it was a 60s
spy movie, it makes the hero always get the girl -- which is narrated almost as
a horny teenage vision of what sex could be.
On the other hand, there is a bunch of what seems real information: Locations,
dates, aircrafts, guns you name it. It's almost as the author really did some
research on geography and history about WWII events.
This dichotomy permeates the book in every place. The very beginning of the
book reminded of a site that gathered the most absurd adverbs: "like a ghost in
the night" and the like. So, at the very start, it feels like it is a bad book,
but then you get what seems like real events happening (with a touch of what
was done in Assassin's Creed series of games) and then it seems like a real
book. And then you get the horny parts and it goes back to silly.
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