##45-47: Blink, Burma Boy, The Girl from HOPPERS

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45: Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
On instantaneous decision-making and the ways in which it can be better than carefully-thought-out rational choices, as well as the times when it can go badly wrong. Interesting and entertaining, with some solid insights into the ways in which prejudice works; sometimes a bit glib, though, and frankly not quite substantial enough to justify its length. I think Gladwell is better at article length than book length.

46: Burma Boy by Biyi Bandele
A novel about a 13-year-old boy who enlists in one of the Nigeria Regiments during the Second World War and is sent to fight the Japanese in Burma. Frequently very funny; equally often horrific and tragic. Very well-written and utterly gripping.

47: The Girl from HOPPERS by Jaime Hernandez
I enjoyed this more than the first volume, Maggie the Mechanic, which was just all over the place, but even though this volume's considerably less scattershot in approach, it didn't always click with me. There are some stories that I adored, and others that just didn't work for me. Hernandez is a superb artist, there's no denying that, but his way of telling a story is somehow a few angles off from what I seem to expect, which leaves me feeling confused a lot of the time. Still, I'm glad I read it.