George Lucas, A Life
Brian Jay Jones
George Lucas was born to an average family and was expected to follow in his salesman father’s footsteps. Instead, Lucas survived a horrific car crash, went to film school and created the iconic Star Wars.
For an unauthorised biography, this was pretty damn good! I found myself quoting weird things I learnt about George Lucas for ages afterwards. When I went to see Rogue One in the cinemas, I could pick out points that I knew Lucas wouldn’t have wanted Disney to do.
It was quite slow going at times and I picked it up and put it down over the course of about a week. I needed time to digest each of the facts. In fact, I found myself wishing I knew more about the other filmmakers that are referenced in the novel, and experienced more films. I haven’t even see Jaws, which was a friendly rivalry between Steven and George.
I wouldn’t reread it, I in fact passed my copy on to my father who partially started my own love of Star Wars. If you have a Star Wars lover in your family, and you have no idea what to get them, this novel offers you the perfect solution to your problems.
This sequel to 
I’m not exactly certain what to say about this book. It looks quite unflinchingly at the conditions at some chicken and pig primary production farms, but also shows the positive side of eating meat! I felt like I was wandering around the English countryside with Louise the whole way, which was fascinating just in itself.
So you might think I have given away the whole novel with my opening paragraph – but in fact, you know all of that information almost from just reading the blurb and reading the first chapter. That alone would have killed the novel for me.
Honestly, I think if I had paid for it, I would be asking for my money back. I’m not even certain it’s good enough to give as a present. There are heaps of little books like this that claim to change your life for you by just a little message here and there, and I’m not buying it.
The first half of the novel kept me enthralled, but this petered out in the second half. I was fascinated by the gymnastics, not by the politics. In the end, I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to take away from the novel. Translated from French, I think this novel may have lost some of its charm.
As long as you can get past the extreme amounts of explicit swearing in the prologue and first chapter, you’ll be golden for reading this novel. If that sort of thing bothers you, I advise skipping straight ahead. I put the book down and tried to take a nap instead of keeping reading at that point. Anyway, I persevered and it got better from there.
This book was actually enjoyable. I was hesitant. As I say though, Reed is from the people angle. After his son’s accident, he’s one of the people who have pushed forward from the ground up to make a difference in politics to change ordinary people’s lives. As a geneticist, this gets into all sorts of ethical ideas and messes, some of which are discussed here.
What I loved was that the blending of fact and fiction made me feel at home in the novel. I didn’t object that I never really understood everything behind Lord’s motives. I didn’t mind that there was no happy ending.
As always, I preferred the personal stories rather than the advice given in this novel. I think if you are going for a more ‘traditional’ career (not a university and teaching focussed career like mine) this novel is going to be perfect for you. I’d choose it as a gift for someone just starting out at their first job.