Much of the dialog and characters' thoughts in The Book of Dave are written in Mokni, a mostly-phoentically-spelled derivative of Cockney English. A glossary is available to explain some of it, and most of the rest is understandable with a little bit of background in contemporary Cockney dialect,...

The Third Servile War or War of Spartacus inspired several novels, including Arthur Koestler's The Gladiators, published in English in 1939. In the 1930s, Koestler worked mostly as a journalist, regularly reporting from abroad (wherever "abroad" is for someone who moved from Hungary to Austria to...

Carbide by Andriy Lyubka Tys came home trailing a wake of aromas that stung Marichka's eyes, but a demented smile adorning his face. That may account for why his wife thought he was still hammered. But that wasn't the case - he'd only drunk one bottle of vodka, two, max, and it's not like he'd e...

In chapter 55 of Great Expectations, Wemmick invites Pip to go on a morning walk with him. As they are leaving Wemmick's house, Pip narrates that: I was considerably surprised to see Wemmick take up a fishing-rod, and put it over his shoulder. “Why, we are not going fishing!” said I. “No,” retur...

I’m thinking of books such as Consider Phlebas by Banks. The book was big in sci-fi and launched a ten-novel series, but you would never know what the heck the title is about. How is that allowed to happen and was the author just lucky to be successful with such a title?