Has anyone read Stephen Budiansky's new book, *Her Majesty's Spymaster*? The first paragraph in the Wall Street Journal's review made me desire it, and I had to actively restrain myself from going right to Amazon and ordering it, given the stack of books I already have in the pile by the bed. matociquala, have you read it, or heard anything about it? Is it worth buying in hardcover? Given your current reading regarding Christopher Marlowe, it seemed like it might be up your alley.

In other news, my nightmares continue, although they've reached an absurdist extreme. Early this morning, I dreamed that I was mistaken for a scientist targeted for burning at the stake by a bunch of angry citizens who blamed her for a huge, crippled space station that was due to crash into the earth. I can still smell the lighter fluid with which they doused me prior to dropping the match. Weird--I don't often have such strong olfactory impressions from dreams.