No. 118 (essentialsaltes) wrote,
No. 118
essentialsaltes

The Knights of the Cornerstone, by James P. Blaylock - and a little Number

I've enjoyed Blaylock's modern fantasies for a long time. The Knights of the Cornerstone is kind of a weaker entry. Nothing particularly wrong with it, but it seems largely devoid of Blaylock's usual humor, so it doesn't sparkle much. Southern California dude gets flirty-fished into a generational Crusader cult, and helps safeguard religious relics from the bad people. As one does.

I started reading John McLeish's Number, but I think I'm going to give up on it, as it's committed some errors and fostered some confusion in the first couple chapters that just make the whole thing suspect. One example that comes to mind is using the word quipu to indiscriminately refer to knotted strings used to carry numerical information, regardless of the civilization that created it. Speaking of a Chinese quipu just seems wrong. McLeish also credits the Venerable Bede for having "started the custom" of our current dating epoch, when that distinction belongs to Dionysius Exiguus. Other things about the presentation also bugged me. So I'm putting on my cranky pants and declaring this a bad book. Bad book!
Tags: book, math
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