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A Clash of Lions (100 Years War, book 2)

AJ MacKenzie

5.0 (1 Ratings) Rate It

Book

1346: Sent back to England in the wake of the tremendous victory at Crécy, Simon Merrivale is at...

Mark @ Carstairs Considers (2436 KP) rated Murder by Moonlight in Books

Jul 8, 2025

Murder by Moonlight

Freddie Archer is working as the nightlife columnist for Gotham Magazine in 1925 New York City. She loves her job, but things take a surprising turn when she runs into a boy she knows out on the street. She quickly realizes he’s in great danger trying to earn some money. Can she find a way to help him before it’s too late.

This is a short story designed to introduce us to the star of author Julie Mulhern’s new series. And it’s a good introduction. I really liked Freddie, and I’m looking forward to spending more time with her. The story was a bit simple, even by short story standards, but it was still entertaining. The story is currently free from the author’s newsletter. It took an hour or so to read. I’m looking forward to spending more time with Freddie, and after reading this story, I’m sure you will, too.

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Suswatibasu (1703 KP) rated The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone in Books

Sep 25, 2017

Hauntingly poignant, such a great exploration into loneliness

Such a fabulously enticing book exploring the 1970's and 1980's New York scene while revealing the writer's own issues of dealing with loneliness. From the introvert but flamboyant Andy Warhol, to the artist David Wojnarowicz's AIDS activism, Olivia Laing brings to light the spaces between people and the things that draw them together.

The chapters on painter Edward Hopper and Henry Darger are particularly poignant, especially as Darger was practically invisible, and only known after his death as his paintings were discovered in his accommodation. The author's own story remains mysterious. The book epitomises loneliness, despite the bright lights of the big city.

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Dean (6927 KP) rated The Lifeguard (2013) in Movies

Jun 30, 2017

The Lifeguard (2013)

2013 | Comedy, Drama

5.0

(1 Ratings)

Movie Rating

Kristen Bell (0 more)

Slow and predictable plot (0 more)

Midlife crisis drama

I don't think I would have heard or seen this film other than Kristen Bell is in it. She has a midlife crisis and leaves her job in New York to head back to the small town where she grew up. She takes up her old job as a lifeguard and falls into a pattern of her teenage years. Including a fling with college student. It's quite dull and predictable for the most part only broken up with a few raunchy scenes along the way. A bit taboo but it's been done plenty of times before to a better standard. No wonder it went off the radar.

Kudos

The Craggus (360 KP) rated Greta (2019) in Movies

Apr 25, 2019

Greta (2019)

2019 | Drama, Thriller

6.2

(15 Ratings)

Movie Rating

The performances (0 more)

Greta (2019) is a dark urban feminist fairy tale masquerading as a B-movie potboiler.

Neil Jordan has taken the streets of New York City and turned them into the sinister forest of a dark urban fairy tale only this time, it’s the evil witch herself leaving the trail of breadcrumbs across the city – in the form of emerald green handbags – all the better to lure the unwary children to her home for (spiked) milk and cookies. It riffs on fairy tale tropes from Hansel and Gretel to Sleeping Beauty, with the magnificent (maleficent?) Isabelle Huppert weaving her terrible and terribly camp spell at the core of this poisoned Big Apple...

FULL REVIEW: bit.ly/CraggusGreta

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David McK (3632 KP) rated Zootopia (2016) in Movies

Dec 31, 2019

Zootopia (2016)

2016 | Action, Animation, Comedy

8.5

(129 Ratings)

Movie Rating Watch

Known as Zootropolis in the UK, this Disney animation is set in a world where talking animals have evolved and live in peace and harmony, with the city of Zootroplis the New York (or London) of that world.

While they may have evolved, most animals still fall into several roles: the police (or security) forces, for instance, are nearly entirely composed of predators, with this film following the ZPD's first Bunny recruit as she attempts to solve a mystery around a missing person (animal) case, and ends up teaming up with a street smart, wise talking fox.

With an underlying theme of racism, the message, in short, is that anyone can be anything they want to be!