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Seth Baumgartner's Love Manifesto
Eric Luper | 2010
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Seth Baumgartner’s Love Manifesto by Eric Luper
Genre: YA Fiction
ISBN: 9780061827532
Published: June 1st 2010 by Balzer + Bray
Rating: 4

Seth hasn’t had such a great love life in the past few weeks. His girlfriend dumped him, he saw his father with another woman, and he’s having some friendship problems with his best friend… add to that the fact that his father wants him to win a golf tournament that he really doesn’t care about, he can’t keep a job, and the most unexpected girl on earth starts having feelings for him. Seth starts an anonymous podcast with music and his opinions called The Love Manifesto where he talks about what love is, why we want it, and why we’re stupid enough to keep coming back for more… and he finds some pretty interesting things about love, friendship, family, and himself.

Seth Baumgartner’s Love Manifesto (and I thought my last name was hard to pronounce) was a fun read. It drew me in right away with the writing style and the witty characters. I loved the characters. Up until the end I wasn’t quite sure I really liked Seth that much, because he was doing some pretty stupid things… but in the end when he got his head back on straight and started making the right choices, I saw that he really wasn’t too bad after all. His best friend Dimitri was hilarious (I think he was my favorite… the description on the back of the book of “smut-minded” is pretty accurate.) and his sister Audrey was my kind of gal. You got to love Audrey. Obnoxious, sarcastic, but sweet on her man in subtle ways, and a very good kisser.

The plot was great: it had drama, mystery, and emotion without getting sappy or melodramatic. It takes the reader on quite a ride, so you don’t quite know who the good guy is, and you feel bad for Seth, but it’s not too depressing either.

Although Luper didn’t quite explain or define “love,” he did show it in the characters actions by the end of the story. Even though I was hoping for something a little deeper, he did end the story well and I was satisfied after finishing.

Good writing, great character, fun plot, awesome ending, (and I love the mp3-player cover!) this one will pull you in and keep you hooked from the first page to the last.

Content/recommendation: Some language and sexual innuendoes. Ages 15+

This review is copyright 2010 to Haley Mathiot and Night Owl Reviews.
  
Do Not Become Alarmed
Do Not Become Alarmed
Maile Meloy | 2017 | Fiction & Poetry
10
8.3 (3 Ratings)
Book Rating
Liv and Nora are cousins and practically sisters. They decide to take their families on a two week cruise down the coast of Central America. Both women cautious, they spend the first several days aboard the ship. When they finally decide to take an excursion, the men head for golf and the women take the kids on a zip line tour. This is when all hell breaks loose! From the bus breaking down, to six children going missing in a foreign country, this family vacation is definitely not going to plan. Told from the perspective of the children and the parents, as well other key characters that are introduced throughout, you dive deep into the story and it's hard to get drawn out!

This is the first book I've read by Maile Meloy, and I can't wait to read more! I think this is one of the very few times I have read a book with so many characters taking their turn to tell the story and not gotten confused by what is going on. The story flowed perfectly with the unbelievable around every turn.
 
I will say, not any of the characters in this story are likable, except for Nora's son, Marcus, but I don't think they need to be. You are still intrigued by what is going on and what is going to happen next. This does make you want to hug your kids a little tighter, if you have them. Tell them you love them no matter what and make you want to protect them even more than you already do. To me, this book was amazing and I highly recommend it!

Imagine, all your plans for the day going down the tube. Your tour bus breaks down, so you decide to wait at the beach while a new bus arrives. Then maybe you drift off to sleep while the kids are playing in the water near by. The kids are old enough to look after themselves and those who aren't, have the older kids to look after them. Now imagine waking up from what felt like just a moments rest, to find the children that were just there playing in front of you, have vanished. No where to be found no idea where they could have gone. What do you do, who do you call? You're in a foreign country and you opted not to get the international plan for you phone. Where are your children, and what is being done to them?
  
CO
Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare - Absolultion
Shooter
The third of a planned four content packs for Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare has arrived with Absolution. The collection was first available for the Playstation 4 system and was released for the Xbox One and PC platforms about five weeks later and contains the usual offerings of four new maps and a new chapter for the Zombie mode of the game.

The maps are as follows…

Ember

This is a remake of the classic map “Resistance” From the castle lined landscape to the close-quarters fighting in rooms like gallows or a torture area this is a great map for those looking to run and gun.

Bermuda

This is a fun map based on a Shanty Town fishing village. There are locales ranging from a Fish Market to a Lighthouse and the mix of colors and action make this one really enjoyable.

Permafrost

This is a frozen landscape set in the ruins of a city. The map has several open areas where players can attack from above thanks to holes in the roof and streets. The debris strewn map offers plenty of cover but also numerous places for enemies to attack from all angles.

Fore

This is a large map that is so much fun to play. Set in a mini-golf course, players can run into the arcade, putting areas, and props to attack the enemy. There is plenty of cover and also terrain that is uneven giving a new and diverse set of challenges to players.

 

While the new maps are lots of fun, the main draw of the collection was the latest chapter in the Zombie mode where four aspiring actors are drawn into actual horror films by a demented Director.

The previous chapters have given us an 80s theme park, a 90s Summer Camp, and a 70s Disco Infused Martial Arts setting. This time out, Attack of the Radioactive things lets players play with and interact with Elvira in a 1950s Atomic Monster setting. The mode starts in Black and White before moving to color and even allows for a red tint Chroma mode.

Of course waves of Zombies and other terrors await and players must run and fight to survive.

This has been another winning collection for Infinite Warfare. While it does not offer anything radically new or different, it does offer plenty of fun and will increase your enjoyment of the game.

I am looking forward to seeing the final pack, around October ahead of the new Call of Duty: World War 2.

http://sknr.net/2017/08/13/call-duty-infinite-warfare-absolution-dlc/
  
The Courier (2020)
The Courier (2020)
2020 |
7
8.0 (4 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Cumberbatch is brilliant. (1 more)
Great real life history lesson
Buckley is good, but miscast. (0 more)
A peerless Cumberbatch and a miscast Buckley.
It's not to be confused with the Olga Kurylenko / Gary Oldman 2019 movie of the same title. But with a fresh Berlin current-day Russian spy scandal in the news this week, seeing the cold war spy drama "The Courier" is a timely thing to do.

Positives:
- Benedict Cumberbatch is outstandingly good in this. He could have been born to play the slightly bemused English gentlemen of the time. All golf, tweed suits and gentlemen's clubs. No spoilers, but there is a physical transformation as well that's impressive to observe. The film would have been decidedly so-so I think without that core central performance.
- The film is based on a true story. As someone who was born in 1961, it's a good reminder to count our blessings that you, me and everyone else are still around to live our lives at all. The world was on the brink of a precipice and learning the story of Wynne's part in this was insightful history.
- There's a nice catchy Russian-themed score by Abel Korzeniowski.

Negatives:
- I'm a big fan of Jessie Buckley. Really, I am. And to be fair to her, her performance is really good. I particularly liked a scene where she dismissed on the doorstep a local busybody. But I just didn't see her as Wynne's pearl-neckless-wearing wife in this part. Perhaps the problem is that although there's a 13 year age gap between the leads, I always imagine Buckley as being much younger that her 31 years. For whatever reason, the casting didn't work for me.

Summary Thoughts on "The Courier": As a true-life spy story, the movie is interesting and Cumberbatch's performance is brilliant. But I can't say that I was 100% grabbed by it. While having a few moments of high drama and tension - particularly one on a plane - I never felt that to be maintained for enough of the movie. Director Dominic Cooke has a limited filmography (with the Saoirse Ronan movie "On Chesil Beach" being his only other feature) and writer Tom O'Connor is the guy behind the more flippant "Hitman's Bodyguard" films. Perhaps a more experienced writer/director team would have elevated this to a higher level.

So it's eminently watchable but not memorable. Just a marginal hit in my book.

(For the full graphical review, please check out onemannsmovies on the web, Facebook and Tiktok. Thanks.)