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Syncplicity

Business and Productivity

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Syncplicity is an easy-to-use, enterprise-grade file sync and share solution that gives you access...

Soundtrap

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With Soundtrap you can make music and collaborate with others online! Use hundreds of software...

Texture Canada

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Texture is the only app that gives you unlimited access to over 200 top magazines. Enjoy full issues...

Ski Safari: Adventure Time

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Adventure Time meets Ski Safari! Shred the slopes of Ooo with Finn or BMO in this endlessly fun...

Suswatibasu (1701 KP) rated East West Street: On the Origins of Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity in Books

Dec 31, 2017

Outstanding insight, meticulous and moving

Other than historians and international lawyers you will not have heard of the lawyer Hersch Lauterpacht yet he is a very important figure in Philippe Sands' magnificent book.

East West Street is different and distinct in many meaningful ways, telling the fascinating story of the beginning of international human rights, but rather do so as dry legal history it focuses on two of the most significant individuals.

The author weaves the stories of Lauterpacht and Raphael Lemkin into Sands' own personal family story, which all tie into the 'city of lions' (Lviv/Lwow/Lemberg) in the first few decades of the 20th century. Both men and Sand's own family lived here, a place where East and West meet, hence the book's title.

It culminates into their assistance with the Nuremburg trials of ten senior Nazi figures, with Lauterpacht preparing the first drafts of the opening and closing speeches of the chief prosecution. Crucially he crafted the wording of Article 6 of the Nuremberg Charter, enshrining crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression into international law. Lemkin, in the same vein, constructed the concept of genocide, even coining the term.

And Sands discusses his detective work to find answers to numerous questions about his family. In the end his journey reveals tragedy, but a tragedy lightened by knowing the truth.

This is an outstanding book by a barrister, filmmaker and writer. It reeks of intellectual strength, and truly superb.

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BobbiesDustyPages (1259 KP) rated Scythe (Arc of a Scythe #1) in Books

Feb 7, 2018

Scythe (Arc of a Scythe #1)

Neal Shusterman | 2016 | Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult (YA)

9.0

(22 Ratings)

Book Rating

Thou Shalt Kill

I don't even know where to start when it comes to this book, Scythe really isn't like any book I've ever read it really makes you think about which side would I want to be on. Also, the characters are all so amazing and each one of them plays a part in the story but what really makes this book something special is the world building.

Scythe takes place in a Utopian future ruled by an all knowing AI called the Thunderhead that pretty much runs the entire world and surprisingly hasn't gone all HAL on the world. This is also a future where everyone has not only achieved immortality but they can also turn back the clock and return back to their 20's if they so please, but to handle the growing population certain people are chosen to be Scythes or a type of Grim Reapers for an age of immortality that are treated like celebrities but also feared like gods.

The story follows two teens named Rowan and Citra who are chosen to train as future Scythes a job neither one of them want, which is actually supposed to be a kind of requirement to becoming a Scythe. Throughout their training, we are introduced to different Scythes and what it means to be legal murders and how even a perfect world corruption and evil still manages to take hold.