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Tiana Striplin (0 KP) rated Duolingo in Apps

Mar 21, 2018  
Duolingo
Duolingo
Education, Social Networking
7
8.4 (60 Ratings)
App Rating
Easy to use. Many languages to close from. (0 more)
English to Chinese has no explanations, they just start you off with learning both the symbols and words without knowing the English translations of them. Sometimes the app freezes in the middle of a lesson. (0 more)
I use the app on a daily basis to study French. Have dabbled in Swedish, Chinese, Japanese, Esperanto, Welsh, and Gaelic.
  
The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins
The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins
Irvine Welsh | 2014 | Contemporary, Fiction & Poetry
3
3.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Not a pleasant read
Having recently read and enjoyed Trainspotting, I decided to give this book a go as I was intrigued to see how Welsh writes when it’s not in Scottish. Sadly I think I prefer the Scottish!

This is not a pleasant read, in more ways than one. The main character Lucy is a horrendous person, which is intentional but it doesn’t make for a nice read. There’s nothing redeemable about her at all and the longer the book goes on, the more repulsed you become by her behaviour. She’s not meant to be massively likeable, but I really didn’t enjoy reading a book where the main character is that disgusting. It’s a shame as the actual plot itself is quite decent and has a lot of interesting aspects and developments. The problem though is the characters and the fact that this is far too explicit and crude, it’s entirely unnecessary. The writing style also grates a lot in this. It seemed to work for Trainspotting but in this it just seems inappropriate - why Welsh can’t write conversation and paragraphs with proper punctuation and paragraphs I’ll never know. And finally the ending in this is just laughable. After such a horrific story the ending seems so out of place and so undeserving for such characters. If you want to read Irvine Welsh, read Trainspotting. Don’t bother with this.
  
A Welsh Choral Spectacular by Dafydd Iwan
A Welsh Choral Spectacular by Dafydd Iwan
2012 | Classical
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

Yma O Hyd by Dafydd Iwan

(0 Ratings)

Track

"If you’re a fan of one of the Welsh rugby regions, then you’ll know this song. At Parc y Scarlets in Llanelli, this is what they come out to, and it’s amazing. The lyric is about the Welsh language and how it has withstood the Romans and English culture, but you don’t actually need to know that to appreciate the song. If you play it and it’s raining outside you can feel its spectral power. Dafydd Iwan had a long career in politics with Plaid Cymru but he is also a folk singer. I first heard it about 10 years ago when I went to see Cardiff Blues play the Scarlets. They came on to this song and it just hit me somewhere between my heart and my brain – the perfect place for a song to hit you. I wish I knew how to bottle the feeling this song gives me."

Source
  
Book #2 in the WISE Enquiries Agency series

When Henry, a Welsh Duke, decides to be married, there are a myriad of traditions that he is expected to uphold. One such tradition involves Morris Dancers leading the happy couple through town from the church back to the family’s estate. After one of the dancers vanishes, the WISE Enquiry Agency is hired to look into the matter.

I really enjoyed the team of women doing the investigating in this story. Their distinct personalities work well together, as each has her own strengths to bring to the group. That and the Welsh countryside as the setting made this a very enjoyable read for me.

Visit <a href="https://booksthething.com/2016/11/02/the-case-of-the-missing-morris-dancer-guest-post-and-giveaway/">my blog</a> for a guest post from Cathy Ace explaining just what Morris Dancing is!

<i>I voluntarily reviewed an advanced copy.</i>
  
AM
A Morbid Taste for Bones (Chronicles of Brother Cadfael, #1)
Ellis Peters | 1977 | Fiction & Poetry
4
6.7 (3 Ratings)
Book Rating
The first of Ellis Peters Cadfael Chronicles mystery novels, which it is no next to impossible to read without imagining Derek Jacobi in the lead role.

For those not in the know, Cadfael is a medieval Welsh Benedictine Monk, who has come late to the Order in life, and who proves rather adept at solving various mysteries, as well as looking after his garden. In this one, the mystery to be solved is just who murdered the leader of the opposition to his Orders plans to relocate the bones of a local saint from the sleepy Welsh village in which she is buried to the confines of his own Order of St Peter and St Paul.

If I'm honest, I actually found this quite hard going: it never really gripped me all that much, nor made me want to read on. Perhaps this kind of novel is just not my cup of tea!
  
The Boys Volume 8:  Highland Laddie
The Boys Volume 8: Highland Laddie
Garth Ennis | 2011 | Comics & Graphic Novels
9
9.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
If Irvine Welsh wrote Oor Wullie
Highland Laddie sees Hughie leave The Boys and head home to his Maw and Paw for some peace and quiet. He soon finds that his home town has barely changed and the nostalgia wears off quite quickly.
It turns out Hughie was something of an amateur detective in his youth, and stopped a minor smuggling ring. He starts to uncover something again in this story, while also being unknowingly mentored over his troubles by a mysterious gentleman.
This story is hilarious, and like a cross between an Irvine Welsh/Chris Brookmyre book and an issue of Oor Wullie/The Beano. The old Scots angle (wee dugs, mince and tatties, everything being braw), combined with more modern Scottish ideas (inventive swearing and heroin) makes for a laugh-out-loud tale. We also see Hughie start to come to terms with the revelation from the previous volume, and consider rejoining The Boys.
  
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Morgan Sheppard (926 KP) created a post

Feb 4, 2020  
Fire in the Rain finds trouble once more in the island of Wraidd Elfennol. Will the Chosen of Fire and Water succeed? Or is the Island of Wraidd Elfennol doomed to live forever beneath the shadows of Cysgod?

Full of myth and magic, with a strong Welsh theme, Fire in the Rain brings to a close the Fantasy series set in the imaginary world of Wraidd Elfennol.

#Epic #Fantasy #Myth_and_Magic

https://books2read.com/FireintheRain
     
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Morgan Sheppard (926 KP) created a post

Jun 10, 2020  
Fire in the Rain finds trouble once more in the island of Wraidd Elfennol. Will the Chosen of Fire and Water succeed? Or is the Island of Wraidd Elfennol doomed to live forever beneath the shadows of Cysgod?

Full of myth and magic, with a strong Welsh theme, Fire in the Rain brings to a close the Fantasy series set in the imaginary world of Wraidd Elfennol.

#Epic #Fantasy #Myth_and_Magic

https://books2read.com/FireintheRain
     
40x40

Morgan Sheppard (926 KP) created a post in Bookworms

Jun 10, 2020  
Fire in the Rain finds trouble once more in the island of Wraidd Elfennol. Will the Chosen of Fire and Water succeed? Or is the Island of Wraidd Elfennol doomed to live forever beneath the shadows of Cysgod?

Full of myth and magic, with a strong Welsh theme, Fire in the Rain brings to a close the Fantasy series set in the imaginary world of Wraidd Elfennol.

#Epic #Fantasy #Myth_and_Magic

https://books2read.com/FireintheRain
  
Tacsi i&#039;r Tywyllwch by Geraint Jarman
Tacsi i'r Tywyllwch by Geraint Jarman
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"I could name a whole lot of well-known artists from anywhere in the world who have made great records but maybe it's more interesting if I pick up on things that I've grown up with that, for geographical reasons, aren't known much outside this particular Welsh language culture. These records aren't talked about everyday in the English language. Someone like Geraint Jarman, with Datyblgu, might be the most powerful Welsh language music [of its time]. He is from a generation earlier [to Datyblgu] and started releasing solo albums in the mid-1970s. He was part of the folk movement in the late-1960s and was in a band with Meic Stevens and Heather Jones called Baramenyn. They were making almost pastiche folk music that was critical of folk music but the records were really popular! They were almost like Os Mutantes without the fuzz! Geraint was a poet first and wrote really good poems like Gil Scott-Heron. He had those skills which he applied to rock music in the mid-1970s. He also had an amazing band who could record an album in a couple of days and an amazing guitarist called Tich Gwilym. This album is like a mid-1970s rock album but informed by punk - Television are in there, too - but it's got that grounding in songwriting from the folk days as well. You can get lost in the guitar playing as well and the lyrics are risqué for the community he was singing to at the time - Wales was quite a religious place in a non conformist way. But it's not kitsch music, it's very much engaging with its day and Geraint grew up in urban Cardiff in a Welsh speaking family but with connections to the Romany world. Like a lot of bands from elsewhere in Wales at the time, he was part of a multi-cultural society, a lot of his friends from school were in reggae bands and he gradually got more and more into reggae. You can hear this in this record but it's also a rock record. By the end of the 1980s, he was playing at Reggae Sunsplash so it's interesting...he was still [singing] in the Welsh language! He's still singing and putting records out. He also pioneered a Welsh television show called Fideo 9 which was like Snub TV or something and he put a lot of energy into that. He was also the voice of the cartoon character Super Ted!"

Source