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    The Courier-Mail Edition

    The Courier-Mail Edition

    News and Magazines & Newspapers

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    Experience today's Edition of The Courier-Mail, including The Sunday Mail, like never before, with...

    Art of War: Red Tides

    Art of War: Red Tides

    Games and Entertainment

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    Team up and battle against commanders from all around the world. In Art of War: Red Tides, victory...

The Accusation: Forbidden Stories from Inside North Korea
The Accusation: Forbidden Stories from Inside North Korea
. Bandi | 2017 | Fiction & Poetry
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Unflinching tales from North Korea
The Accusation shines a light on the dark half of the Korean peninsula with stories that are as readable as they are important. Written by a North Korean dissident still living in the country, the book is extremely unique - the manuscript having been smuggled out of the country by a fleeing relative.

Bandi, (not his real name) focuses on the period between 1989 and 1995 when Kim il-Sung and Kim Jong-il were in power. Seven short stories, each pointing an accusing finger at the ruling regime, shine a light on North Korea's truly fathomless darkness. While most of the stories are fictional, they are based on real events, but names have been changed to protect identities. It is almost Orwellian in nature, it's unbelievable that there is a place in the world where 1984 is a reality.

The seven stories aptly convey the hardships and constant trauma that people face in a country cut off from the rest of the world. Written with deep emotion and elegance. A sensational read.
  
Fight Club 2
Fight Club 2
David Mack, Chuck Palahniuk, Cameron Stewart | 2016 | Fiction & Poetry
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
I am Jack's emerging sense of Nerd Rage...

Firstly, WHY? Why on earth would you even think about writing a sequel to one of the best books ever written that spawned one of the best cult classic movies ever made?

Secondly, WHAT? I mean, I read it and all, but...

Thirdly, OH WOW.

This book will be polarizing for fans. You will either love it or hate it. Period. I doubt there will be any middle ground here. Some fans will argue that Palahniuk is spent creatively, or that this was a giant FU to the Tyler Durden fan club, or that it was just ill conceived all they way around.

Others will think it's the most beautiful messed up thing they've ever read.

At the moment, I fall very much into the later category, but I just finished this set, and the resonance of the final pages have left me a little shell shocked. I need to discuss this with friends, like NOW.

More to come as it unravels for me...
  
[Empire of Sin]by [Gary Krist] was an interesting account of the downfall of what I would have thought as the golden age of New Orleans. New Orleans was the last bastion of sin in the South during the Gilded Age in America. This was a time period when people were trying to live by Victorian standards and New Orleans went against them all. This was a war between cultures and depending who won, New Orleans was bound to be changed.

The book was well written. It started out really strong and the characters in the book were very colorful, more so knowing they were real people. This was a character driven non fiction which makes sense for New Orleans which had more than it's share. My only complaint was towards the end of the book [Krist] seemed to be quickly wrapping up some stories not giving the details that were present in the beginning.

I have recommended this book to quite a few people though. It was a much needed non-fiction fix.
  
Witchfinder General (1968)
Witchfinder General (1968)
1968 | Horror
8
8.5 (4 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Famously nasty cult horror movie looks a bit like another Poe-Corman-Price adaptation (and was marketed as such in the States) but is really the work of a much darker sensibility. No actual supernatural elements, just people being sadistic to each other in the middle of a vicious civil war.

The story is a pretty standard revenge melodrama, made distinctive by the sheer bleakness of tone throughout the movie. At a time when pretty much every Hammer movie concluded with the defeat of the forces of evil (at least until the next sequel) the sheer amoral nihilism of Witchfinder General is distinctive.

Notable for the closest thing to a completely straight performance you will ever find Vincent Price contributing as the star of a horror movie, and also for the censor-troubling levels of violence and general grisliness. As is standard for British horror films of this period, fun is also to be had spotting youthful appearances by people who went on to have rather distinguished appearances in less extreme material.