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The First Lady
The First Lady
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
It's four weeks until the election for the new President. Current President Tucker is enjoying himself at a hotel in Atlanta with his girlfriend, while his wife and first lady, Grace Tucker, is fulfilling the duties of her office. When the President leave the hotel with his mistress, all hell breaks loose. There are reporters everywhere, there to catch the scandal. It's all just too much for the First Lady to handle, so she retreats to one of her favorite places and then, she turns up missing. Sally Grissom is the Secret Service Agent in charge of the presidential detail and doesn't know how the First Lady going missing isn't something she is told. Until she is called into the President's office and is asked to look for her secretively. What is going on? Something isn't right. And Sally has her eye on the President's Chief of Staff and his strange request. But Sally doesn't work for him, she serves the Office of the President and she will find the First Lady, no matter what.

This is a book I really enjoyed. It captured my attention from the start and had some twists and turns, I didn't see coming. There was only one drawback from this audio version of the book, the narrator. She did a fine job of reading the story and the voices, but her pronunciation drove me crazy. If you're not from the Washington, DC area, you might not notice, but it is so obvious. Pronouncing Maryland like Merry-Land. Potomac like Pot A Mack, and Arapaho like Air a pay ho. I cringed every time.

Imagine in this day and time with smart phones everywhere if the First Lady went missing. It would be all over the news. Why doesn't the Chief of Staff want to share this with the world, to help find her? Why isn't the FBI involved? Something is going on in the White House and Sally doesn't know if the President is aware at all. Or is his mistress and the election much more important to him than finding his wife.

Sally is going to do all she can to do her job even when she is asked to stand down. Even when it seems like there is always an obstacle there to stop her. Will she find the First Lady before it's too late? You'll have to read the book to find out.
  
Cold Hearted
Cold Hearted
10
9.0 (2 Ratings)
Book Rating
When you’re eight books into a series such as the Villain Tales by Serena Valentino you would think that I wouldn’t be smug anymore! You would think that I wouldn’t go into the book saying “I won’t end up feeling sorry for this villain”.

You would also think that I know I am always wrong!

Lady Tremaine is one of the easiest villains to hate in the Disney universe: she worked Cinderella to the bone, denied her a decent party and then locked her in the attic for good measure! These are hardly the actions of some misunderstood soul.

Until Serena Valentino comes along of course! Valentino has a truly unique way of humanising these characters that we love to hate and, with the help of the Odd Sisters, proves to us time and time again that there is more to our fairytales than meets the eye.

The previous book in the villain tales, Evil Thing, took the reader outside of the Many Kingdoms for the first time. Valentino takes advantage of this, neatly using Cold Hearted to join together Lady Tremaine’s life in London with both the Fairylands and the Many Kingdoms. This timeline means that the readers meet Lady Tremaine before her role as stepmother: we learn of her worries over indulging her two daughters and her unwillingness to move on after her husband’s death.

Cold Hearted skips time periods slightly so the reader is actually experiencing Nanny and the Fairy Godmother reading Lady Tremaine’s story. Don't worry: this doesn't mean we are deprived of our favourite creepy sisters, although this book may have you looking at the Odd Sisters in an entirely new light.

The 8th villain tale continues Valentino’s reign of brilliant, alternative views of our villains. Lady Tremaine was to be the heroine of her own fairytale; all she wanted was her own happily ever after. Where did it go so wrong?
  
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Lee (2222 KP) rated A Star Is Born (2018) in Movies

Oct 6, 2018 (Updated Oct 6, 2018)  
A Star Is Born (2018)
A Star Is Born (2018)
2018 | Drama, Romance
Bradley Cooper (1 more)
Lady Gaga
Disappointing
Last night I took Mrs B along to see this, much anticipated, much hyped movie. And to say we came away disappointed is an understatement.

Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga are both amazing in this, particularly in the early parts of the movie as we're introduced to both characters - music legend Jackson Maine and aspiring singer/songwriter Ally. The songs they sing, the story of them meeting up, falling in love and touring together, it's all good. But then things begin to go downhill for Jackson, while Ally gradually becomes more and more like Lady Gaga. There are some great moments in the latter half of the movie, but it's mostly Jackson slurring his words while you try and work out what he's saying and Ally doing choreography with her dancers and playing big gigs. And it drags, it really drags.

I actually heard some people behind me in the cinema complaining how boring it was. That's a little unfair, but there are certainly a lot of boring moments and I didn't feel it was worthy of all the hype.
  

"I liked My Fair Lady, though I thought Dr. Strangelove was a much more adventurous, subversive film that year, and should have won the Academy Award — listen to me talking like a Hollywood insider — but I loved that musical. So it beat Dr. Strangelove which is one of the most important films ever to me."

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