
Experience Design: Concepts and Case Studies
Book
How can we design better experiences? Experience Design brings together leading international...

Regarding Manneken Pis: Culture, Celebration and Conflict in Brussels
Book
Manneken Pis, a fountain featuring a bronze child urinating, has stood on the same Brussels street...

Yona of the Dawn, Vol. 1
Book
Princess Yona lives an ideal life as the only princess of her kingdom. Doted on by her father, the...

A Girl is a Half-formed Thing: Adapted for the Stage
Book
Winner of numerous literary awards including the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction, the Geoffrey...

Brett Anderson recommended The Trials of Van Occupanther by Midlake in Music (curated)

Lenard (726 KP) rated Midsommar (2019) in Movies
Aug 26, 2019

Whatchareadin (174 KP) rated A Highlander Walks Into a Bar in Books
Aug 5, 2019
Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read and review this book.
I was really excited to read this book when I first received it. I have been reading a lot of really steamy romance this summer and I was sure this one was going to be the same. Overall, I enjoyed the book, but it left me a bit confused by the language used. The book is set in the South in the US, with ties back to Scotland, but a lot of the wording made me believe that this book was written by a British author. I am also reading an Advanced Copy, so maybe some of that wording will be changed in the final copy.
All the characters in this book are ones I can see myself hanging out with. Izzy is a clumsy woman who is just trying to figure out the life she's living. Whether it brings her joy or if there is something else she can be doing to be happy. Living with her mother and taking care of their home, and being in charge of the festival are all noble deeds, but are they making her happy. When Izzy meets Alasdair, at first she isn't sure how to feel about him. Yes, he is attractive with a deep Scottish accent, but she isn't sure of his true intentions. The same is true of Gareth, although most of her feelings toward him seem to stem from not seeing her mother with anyone else besides her father.
Both of the Buchanan women need some change in their lives. Will these Scottish men be the ones to bring it to them or will they both be left heartbroken?
The book leaves you knowing there is going to be more to this story and I'm interested to find out what is going to happen next.

Laura Doe (1350 KP) rated This Party’s Dead in Books
Mar 8, 2021
In an idea to cure her agoraphobia and the death anxiety she has developed since her father-in-law-to-be passed, the author (Erica) decides to visit festivals around the world that celebrate rather than mourn death.
We start of in Mexico at the colourful Day of the Dead celebrations, and we are taken through the story behind La Catrina and the traditions that aren’t normally seen by tourists because it isn’t the party side. Next we are taken to Nepal and the Gaijatra festival which is led by a cow (or if a cow is unavailable a boy dressed as a cow). Next, we go to Sicily where there are biscotti specially made to represent bones and sugar knights. Madagascar’s Famadihana involves families “turning the bones” where they take their ancestors from the crypts and rewrap them and put their names on them before putting them back. China’s tomb-sweeping festival (Qingming) where they burn paper effigies of iPhones and money is next on the tour and then swiftly onto Japan’s Obon festival where they spend three days visiting their ancestors and honouring them with offerings. Finally we stop at Bali, where they can have a corpse resting in their house for years until family arguments are settled and they also will take them out of their tomb and hang out with them. Finally, we go back to the UK where Erica and her husband finally scatter her father-in-laws ashes.
Erica takes us through a journey of learning to accept death (unless you’re of the transhuman persuasion) and gives us a book full of humour whilst doing it. It’s definitely made me realise death shouldn’t be such a taboo subject and gave me a lot to think about. You can also visit her Instagram @thepartysdead for pictures of her journey!

Gareth von Kallenbach (980 KP) rated Tonight You're Mine (2012) in Movies
Aug 7, 2019
Like a sharply cut YouTube video, “Tonight You’re Mine” is quick-paced, jostled, and deeply impacted by the music in the background. The film is scattered with songs to represent all musical genres found at the giant Scottish music festival that serves as the film’s sole environment. Moreover, this continual musical metamorphosis helps to skirt the fatigued plot: of a boy who dislikes a girl until they fall in love.
But the film avoids the image of squeaky-clean new lovers by literally marching the leads through the muddy grounds of the festival. The expansive habitat invites the characters to be odd and open to rapidly changing experiences, sounds, and obstacles. The empowered characters take advantage of the freedoms offered by the concerts, filling the scenes with gritty honest language that pokes fun, sling insults, and express emotions directly. The result is a film that is as hip and likeable, just like Adam and Morello.
While you know better than to root for a perfect ending, “Tonight Your Mine” has the draw of an indie “High School Musical”; the love story is so far-fetched that you can’t help but hope it will all turn out in end.
The single night adventure film spun around, “Tonight You’re Mine” provides audiences with characters who are more engaging, slightly darker, and quickly established as too cool to care what their critics think. The result is a film that is honest and very likeable even when the plot is one you already know by heart.

Neil Jordan: Interviews
Book
These interviews cover the career to date of Neil Jordan (b. 1950), easily the most renowned...