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Garthowen (A Story Of A Welsh Homestead)
8.0
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A classic story of life in Southern Wales, Garthowen is one of Welsh novelist Allen Raine's...
Classic Literature
The Dependents
4.0
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A wise and lyrical debut novel about a new widower confronting the truth about his long marriage. ...
Long Day's Journey Into Night
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A true modern classic from one of the twentieth century's most significant writers, Long Day's...
Tubi TV - Movies & TV Shows
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Watch amazing movies and TV shows for free on your iPhone or iPad. No subscription fees, and no...
Before I Let You Go
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The 2:00 a.m. call is the first time Lexie Vidler has heard her sister’s voice in years. Annie is...
The White Princess
7.6
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In a tale of power, family, love and betrayal, "The White Princess" -- adapted from Philippa...
Becs (244 KP) rated A Raisin in the Sun in Books
Oct 2, 2019
They honestly need more books like this. When my husband found out that I was getting A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry, he grew excited and he never does that unless it’s a science-related book. That was when I knew I was going to like this beautiful novel. When I started to read it, I rushed through it. Not in a “I just want to finish this book” way, more like “I FREAKING LOVE THIS BOOK AND I DON’T EVER WANT IT TO END” way. That says something, right?
A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry
Genre: Literary Classic, Play, Drama, Fiction
Synopsis: First produced in 1959, A Raisin in the Sun was awarded the New York Drama Critics Circle Award and hailed as a watershed in American drama. Not only a pioneering work by an African-American playwright – Lorraine Hansberry’s play was also a radically new representation of black life, resolutely authentic, fiercely unsentimental, and unflinching in its vision of what happens to people whose dreams are constantly deferred. In her portrait of an embattled Chicago family, Hansberry anticapted issues that range from generational clashes to the civil rights and women’s movements. She also posed the essential questions – about identity, justice, and moral responsibility – at the heart of those great struggles. The result is an American classic.
Audience/Reading Level: Middle School +
Interests: Plays, dramas, literary classics, racial segregation, women’s movement, 50s era.
Point of View: Third Person Omniscient
Difficulty Reading: Not at all, I rushed through it because I loved it so much! As in some of Shakespeares plays, you don’t get stuck on the general language of the era it was written, as it’s written close to a book you would get from this era.
Promise: “Award-winning drama of the hopes and aspirations of a struggling, working-class family living on the South Side of Chicago connected profoundly with the psyche of black America–and changed American theater forever.” – It did. 🙂
Insights: I love reading plays as it’s a way to step out of a comfort zone of reading Young Adult novels. It gives me a chance to dip into my theater/acting side and use what I’ve learned from theatre classes. A Raisin in the Sun is a well-written American classic that honestly should be read in every school from middle school and up. The lessens that are taught throughout the play are subtle yet obvious which creates a background that we can use in our every day life.
Ah-Ha Moment: The moment that Beneatha came into the picture and was a total feminist. Man, she’s my favorite character besides Mama (Lena Younger) and her little plant.
Favorite Quotes: “Beneatha: Love him? There is nothing left to love. Mama: There is always something left to love. And if you ain’t learned that, you ain’t learned nothing. (Looking at her) Have you cried for that boy today? I don’t mean for yourself and for the family ’cause we lost the money. I mean for him: what he been through and what it done to him. Child, when do you think is the time to love somebody the most? When they done good and made things easy for everybody? Well then, you ain’t through learning – because that ain’t the time at all. It’s when he’s at his lowest and can’t believe in hisself ’cause the world done whipped him so! when you starts measuring somebody, measure him right, child, measure him right. Make sure you done taken into account what hills and valleys he come through before he got to wherever he is.”
“Mama, you don’t understand. It’s all a matter of ideas, and God is just one idea I don’t acept. It’s not important. I am not going out and commit crimes or be immoral because I don’t believe in God. I don’t even think about it. It’s just that I get so tired of Him getting credit for all the things the human race achieves through its own stubborn effort. There simply is no God! There is only Man, and it’s he who makes miracles!”
What will you gain: A haunting yet revealing play that will be as fresh of a read today, as it was in the 50’s.
Aesthetics: The entire play. The cover. The characters. The underlying meaning beneath it all. The era it was written and is based off of. Just everything about this little book.
“I want to fly! I want to touch the sun!”
“Finish your eggs first.”
A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry
Genre: Literary Classic, Play, Drama, Fiction
Synopsis: First produced in 1959, A Raisin in the Sun was awarded the New York Drama Critics Circle Award and hailed as a watershed in American drama. Not only a pioneering work by an African-American playwright – Lorraine Hansberry’s play was also a radically new representation of black life, resolutely authentic, fiercely unsentimental, and unflinching in its vision of what happens to people whose dreams are constantly deferred. In her portrait of an embattled Chicago family, Hansberry anticapted issues that range from generational clashes to the civil rights and women’s movements. She also posed the essential questions – about identity, justice, and moral responsibility – at the heart of those great struggles. The result is an American classic.
Audience/Reading Level: Middle School +
Interests: Plays, dramas, literary classics, racial segregation, women’s movement, 50s era.
Point of View: Third Person Omniscient
Difficulty Reading: Not at all, I rushed through it because I loved it so much! As in some of Shakespeares plays, you don’t get stuck on the general language of the era it was written, as it’s written close to a book you would get from this era.
Promise: “Award-winning drama of the hopes and aspirations of a struggling, working-class family living on the South Side of Chicago connected profoundly with the psyche of black America–and changed American theater forever.” – It did. 🙂
Insights: I love reading plays as it’s a way to step out of a comfort zone of reading Young Adult novels. It gives me a chance to dip into my theater/acting side and use what I’ve learned from theatre classes. A Raisin in the Sun is a well-written American classic that honestly should be read in every school from middle school and up. The lessens that are taught throughout the play are subtle yet obvious which creates a background that we can use in our every day life.
Ah-Ha Moment: The moment that Beneatha came into the picture and was a total feminist. Man, she’s my favorite character besides Mama (Lena Younger) and her little plant.
Favorite Quotes: “Beneatha: Love him? There is nothing left to love. Mama: There is always something left to love. And if you ain’t learned that, you ain’t learned nothing. (Looking at her) Have you cried for that boy today? I don’t mean for yourself and for the family ’cause we lost the money. I mean for him: what he been through and what it done to him. Child, when do you think is the time to love somebody the most? When they done good and made things easy for everybody? Well then, you ain’t through learning – because that ain’t the time at all. It’s when he’s at his lowest and can’t believe in hisself ’cause the world done whipped him so! when you starts measuring somebody, measure him right, child, measure him right. Make sure you done taken into account what hills and valleys he come through before he got to wherever he is.”
“Mama, you don’t understand. It’s all a matter of ideas, and God is just one idea I don’t acept. It’s not important. I am not going out and commit crimes or be immoral because I don’t believe in God. I don’t even think about it. It’s just that I get so tired of Him getting credit for all the things the human race achieves through its own stubborn effort. There simply is no God! There is only Man, and it’s he who makes miracles!”
What will you gain: A haunting yet revealing play that will be as fresh of a read today, as it was in the 50’s.
Aesthetics: The entire play. The cover. The characters. The underlying meaning beneath it all. The era it was written and is based off of. Just everything about this little book.
“I want to fly! I want to touch the sun!”
“Finish your eggs first.”
RəX Regent (349 KP) rated We Own the Night (2007) in Movies
Feb 25, 2019
Crime movie for crime movie fans
Contains spoilers, click to show
This is a crime film for crime movie fans. It has it all, from sex, violence, wires and gritty hits. But at its heart is family, here driven by the two leads, Mark Wahlberg and Jequium Phoenix, reunited in yet another of James Grey's films. The tone is dark, with a realistic look as we are taken on trip back to 1988 and a fictional cop family, led by the Deputy Chief Of Police (NYPD) Robert Duvall, who is the father to Wahlberg's up and coming cop, with Phoenix's nightclub manager, who is not a criminal as such, but is a disappointment to his family.
As the trio become embroiled in an organised crime syndicate, they find themselves under a very personal attack and must take down the mob boss to save their lives. The problem with this film is that it plods its way through, lacking enough tension or high key performances to carry, what to me, should have been a taunt screenplay. Instead, it's a bit flat, with Phoenix's trademark sleepy performance. On the other hand, it's quite good, driven by real motivations and characters, is what saves this from 5/10 rating is a fantastically low-key car chase which looked and felt phenomenal, ending with tragedy which would drive the story in a more dubious direction.
Phoenix will end up being granted special dispensation to become a cop in order to track down the mobster, a plot point that I found to be a little far-fetched, though maybe this sort of thing has happened, I don't know but it just tipped the film over the edge of plausibility. I feel that We Own The Night, the motto of the now disbanded NYPD Street Crime Unit, which is headed up here by the fictional Captain Joseph Grusinsky (Wahlberg) thinks very highly of itself as a top quality crime drama, up there with the likes of The Godfather (1972) and Heat (1995), but it is not. It's good and better if you like the genre, but this is a film set in the late 80′s, made in the style of The Godfather light, which was a quintessential 1970′s movie. It needed to pack more of a punch or have some of the style which films such as those of Michael Mann or Martin Scorsese.
A decent story, good cinematography and noble effort but failed to blow me away.
As the trio become embroiled in an organised crime syndicate, they find themselves under a very personal attack and must take down the mob boss to save their lives. The problem with this film is that it plods its way through, lacking enough tension or high key performances to carry, what to me, should have been a taunt screenplay. Instead, it's a bit flat, with Phoenix's trademark sleepy performance. On the other hand, it's quite good, driven by real motivations and characters, is what saves this from 5/10 rating is a fantastically low-key car chase which looked and felt phenomenal, ending with tragedy which would drive the story in a more dubious direction.
Phoenix will end up being granted special dispensation to become a cop in order to track down the mobster, a plot point that I found to be a little far-fetched, though maybe this sort of thing has happened, I don't know but it just tipped the film over the edge of plausibility. I feel that We Own The Night, the motto of the now disbanded NYPD Street Crime Unit, which is headed up here by the fictional Captain Joseph Grusinsky (Wahlberg) thinks very highly of itself as a top quality crime drama, up there with the likes of The Godfather (1972) and Heat (1995), but it is not. It's good and better if you like the genre, but this is a film set in the late 80′s, made in the style of The Godfather light, which was a quintessential 1970′s movie. It needed to pack more of a punch or have some of the style which films such as those of Michael Mann or Martin Scorsese.
A decent story, good cinematography and noble effort but failed to blow me away.
Billie Wichkan (118 KP) rated The Wife's Shadow in Books
May 22, 2019
Every woman has a secret...
From one of Elle magazine's 'authors to watch' comes a suspenseful and emotionally fraught novel about how little we really know the person we marry. For fans of The Affair and Dr Foster.
Everyone admires Suzy and her doll's house life. She has a gorgeous family, a beautiful home and a successful business. But Suzy hasn't always been in control. In her past lies a shadowy tale of fear and instability - a life that she once ran away from, and has hidden from ever since.
When Suzy starts being followed, she fears that her past may finally be catching up with her. And when she finds herself unable to do what to her is the most important thing - keep her loved ones safe - she has to decide how far she'd be willing to go to win everything back.
Even if it means sacrificing everything she knows and loves...
This story is about Suzy a married mum of two who is the breadwinner of the family. Her husband had to leave his job as a police officer as he injured his leg. Her husband Mike has taken on the role of a stay at home dad. Suzy starts finding things subtly left around that relates to her dad. Suzy and her mum fled from due to his violence. Suzy's mum has not long died and Suzy wonders if there is somebody watching her or is it just down to her grieving for her mum.
Imagine a small dream snowballing into an even bigger nightmare! That's what Kath Weeks made happen to Suzy Taylor. Big time!
This book, although it comes under women's fiction, I would say has a thriller edge to it as well. It's a story that keeps you on the edge of your seat, wondering what will happen on the turn of the next page, it's full of suspense and drama, lies and deceit and definitely had me gripped from beginning to end.
My thanks to Little, Brown and Netgalley for an advanced copy.
From one of Elle magazine's 'authors to watch' comes a suspenseful and emotionally fraught novel about how little we really know the person we marry. For fans of The Affair and Dr Foster.
Everyone admires Suzy and her doll's house life. She has a gorgeous family, a beautiful home and a successful business. But Suzy hasn't always been in control. In her past lies a shadowy tale of fear and instability - a life that she once ran away from, and has hidden from ever since.
When Suzy starts being followed, she fears that her past may finally be catching up with her. And when she finds herself unable to do what to her is the most important thing - keep her loved ones safe - she has to decide how far she'd be willing to go to win everything back.
Even if it means sacrificing everything she knows and loves...
This story is about Suzy a married mum of two who is the breadwinner of the family. Her husband had to leave his job as a police officer as he injured his leg. Her husband Mike has taken on the role of a stay at home dad. Suzy starts finding things subtly left around that relates to her dad. Suzy and her mum fled from due to his violence. Suzy's mum has not long died and Suzy wonders if there is somebody watching her or is it just down to her grieving for her mum.
Imagine a small dream snowballing into an even bigger nightmare! That's what Kath Weeks made happen to Suzy Taylor. Big time!
This book, although it comes under women's fiction, I would say has a thriller edge to it as well. It's a story that keeps you on the edge of your seat, wondering what will happen on the turn of the next page, it's full of suspense and drama, lies and deceit and definitely had me gripped from beginning to end.
My thanks to Little, Brown and Netgalley for an advanced copy.
Sophia (Bookwyrming Thoughts) (530 KP) rated Dare to Dream in Books
Jan 23, 2020
<i>Dare to Dream</i> isn't so much as horrifying as to a novel aimed at a younger audience rather than the upper teens running amok from book to book behind Bookwyrming Thoughts (and of course, their own blogs). Simply put: Ella will butcher this, Lupe will make this sprout unicorns, Rundus will dissect this in a manner as seriously as possible, and Sophia might do a combination of blandly blunt dissection while trying to sprout at least one unicorn so no one (hopefully) will get a headache in the process.
But of course, the very last reviewer might be exaggerating a little. She may also be hitting the truth button at the exact same time she decided to press the "write a review in the third person" button.
In this ever so "blandly blunt dissection" of a mini-review, <i>Dare to Dream</i> is essentially divided into two parts: the first part is before the apocalypse, and the second part is the aftermath. It is really just a book that has a main character with a broken family, cries often (well, she is fourteen), and finding her place in the world all while receiving dreams of the end of the world in the same way nightly and finding out it's in connection to the demise of Stonehenge. Oh, and it is also a day by day play of events that feels more proper in a sleeptastic documentary.
Basically, it's just tales of family drama from a fourteen-year-old British schoolgirl. The whole apocalypse thing? It might as well be a subplot until you get to the second part, where the primary purpose is surviving it day by day. But the point is, middle school Sophia might like this better than high school senior Sophia, who actually likes the whole Stonehenge aspect.
<a href="https://bookwyrmingthoughts.com/chibi-views-dare-to-dream-by-carys-jones-and-red-queen-by-victoria-aveyard/"; target="_blank">This review was originally posted on Bookwyrming Thoughts</a>
But of course, the very last reviewer might be exaggerating a little. She may also be hitting the truth button at the exact same time she decided to press the "write a review in the third person" button.
In this ever so "blandly blunt dissection" of a mini-review, <i>Dare to Dream</i> is essentially divided into two parts: the first part is before the apocalypse, and the second part is the aftermath. It is really just a book that has a main character with a broken family, cries often (well, she is fourteen), and finding her place in the world all while receiving dreams of the end of the world in the same way nightly and finding out it's in connection to the demise of Stonehenge. Oh, and it is also a day by day play of events that feels more proper in a sleeptastic documentary.
Basically, it's just tales of family drama from a fourteen-year-old British schoolgirl. The whole apocalypse thing? It might as well be a subplot until you get to the second part, where the primary purpose is surviving it day by day. But the point is, middle school Sophia might like this better than high school senior Sophia, who actually likes the whole Stonehenge aspect.
<a href="https://bookwyrmingthoughts.com/chibi-views-dare-to-dream-by-carys-jones-and-red-queen-by-victoria-aveyard/"; target="_blank">This review was originally posted on Bookwyrming Thoughts</a>