The Friend
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What secret would you kill to keep? After her husband’s big promotion, Cece Solarin arrives in...
Chains (Seeds of America, #1)
7.0
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As the Revolutionary War begins, thirteen-year-old Isabel wages her own fight...for freedom....
Forever And A Day
7.8
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A spy is dead. A legend is born. This is how it all began. The explosive prequel to Casino Royale,...
Kill Shot (Spies R Us #2)
Book
Invited to speak for the United Nations, International Attorney Ashe Marcille is on the fast track....
Romance Suspense
ClareR (6241 KP) rated The Silence of Scheherazade in Books
Nov 29, 2022
We follow four families as their lives are changed forever when the Ottoman Empire is torn apart, and the city of Smyrna is at the front and centre of the trouble and violence.
This novel covers about 17 years from 1905, and follows four families from very different backgrounds: Levantine, Greek, Turkish and Armenian.
Scheherazade is born in September 1905, and never knows her mother as she is abandoned. An Indian spy (sent from the British) is who will tie them all together.
My thoughts:
I love an epic, sprawling story, and following the lives of four families certainly gives a lot of scope for that.
It was fascinating to learn about the different cultures of the four families, and of course Smyrna was a main character in itself.
It’s a book to be immersed in, with the sights and smells beautifully described.
Just my kind of book!
LeftSideCut (3776 KP) rated Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017) in Movies
Jan 6, 2022
Sadly, it's takes two hours of often fun, but definitely bloated runtime to get there.
It lacks the finesse and hard hitting impact of the first entry and it's memorable set pieces and doesn't feel as tight.
It's still entertaining mind, but the finished product comes across as a little wayward in it's pursuit of non-stop absurdity, and no amount of spy-fingering at Glastonbury Festival can mask that.
Charlotte Illes is Not a Detective
7.0
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For anyone seeking to satisfy their Harriet the Spy or Encyclopedia Brown nostalgia, this modern,...
Evan Smoak is taken out of a bad life in Baltimore at the young age of 12 and he is taken to DC where he is trained in a secret Government program to be an assassin. He is mentored by a man named Jack, who becomes a father figure to him. When this program is disbanded, Evan moves to California where he chooses to use these skills and the financial resources he is given to do good. Evan follows a series of commandments that he has learned from Jack to do these missions to help people who have no one else to turn to.
This novel will keep you guessing and make your heart pound! It twists and turns and WOW is it great!
Very Highly Recommended for thriller/spy/action lovers!
Mark @ Carstairs Considers (2585 KP) rated Spy Ski School (Spy School #4) in Books
Mar 9, 2018
While the target audience might be middle graders, this is a delightful read for anyone. The story is strong, the pace never lags, and we get some fantastic complications and nail biting action scenes along the way. The characters are fun as always, and we get some good growth in a couple of them. There’s plenty of humor as well.
Read my full review at <a href="http://carstairsconsiders.blogspot.com/2016/10/book-review-spy-ski-school-by-stuart.html">Carstairs Considers</a>.
Awix (3310 KP) rated Barry Lyndon (1975) in Movies
Jun 27, 2018
Sounds like a rollicking tale, but many will probably find the, erm, stately pace at which events unfold to be rather punishing; there's also the problem that Ryan O'Neal is basically just an absence of hiatus in the middle of the film - you never really care about Barry Lyndon himself. On the other hand, the film is stuffed with wonderful character cameos and subtly magical moments, and the appearance of the thing is utterly gorgeous. If you're prepared to treat the film essentially as a visual feast peppered with incidental pleasures such as Leonard Rossiter's dancing or the climactic duel, then you will probably find it rather mesmerising - as a conventional piece of entertainment, probably less so.