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Mark @ Carstairs Considers (2204 KP) rated A High-End Finish (A Fixer-Upper Mystery, #1) in Books

Mar 9, 2018

Shannon Hammer loves her life and her job of working on the many Victorians in Lighthouse Cove. She’s agreed to go on a blind date with Jerry Saxton, but he turns out to be a complete jerk. To Shannon’s horror, she finds his dead body in one of her houses a couple of days later. With the police looking at her as the prime suspect, she has to build a case against someone else. There are no shortage of suspects, but who did it?

More than a mystery with clues and red herrings, this book is a series of mysterious events, with Shannon reacting to the latest. There are some interesting twists, but the lack of true investigation bothered me. Still, the book does come to a logical climax. I loved these characters. Shannon has a strong group of friends and family, and I really liked them.

Read my full review at <a href="http://carstairsconsiders.blogspot.com/2017/02/book-review-high-end-finish-by-kate.html">Carstairs Considers</a>.

Kudos

Panzer Commander: The Memoirs of Hans von Luck

Hans von Luck and Regina von Luck

(0 Ratings) Rate It

Book

Panzer Commander is one of the classic memoirs of the Second World War. A professional soldier, Hans...

Blood of the Mantis

Adrian Tchaikovsky

9.5 (2 Ratings) Rate It

Book

Following on from Empire in Black and Gold and Dragonfly Falling, Blood of the Mantis is a vivid...

Mister Pip

Lloyd Jones

8.0 (1 Ratings) Rate It

Book

Bougainville, 1991. A small village on a lush tropical island in the South Pacific. Eighty-six days...

Awix (3310 KP) rated La Flor (2018) in Movies

Nov 2, 2019

La Flor (2018)

2018 | Drama, Horror, International, Musical, Thriller

6.0

(1 Ratings)

Movie Rating

How can one rating do justice to film-making on this scale? The simple numbers involved are staggering: the film lasts thirteen and a half hours, took nine years to make, is composed of six different episodes comprising many more sub-narratives. It's usually shown over three or four days, for obvious reasons. Even the closing credits last for over forty minutes (yes, I stayed: my thought process was basically 'Well, I've come this far..).

There's at least one horror movie in the mix, along with a musical melodrama, a sprawling existential spy thriller, and a metafictional self-parody. Characters include archaeologists, witches, Casanova and Margaret Thatcher. Just about the only thing holding it together is the presence of the same four actresses, who play significant roles in almost every episode. It begins very generic, but becomes increasingly strange and avant garde as it progresses. One would say it has become completely unravelled by the end, but it's not as if it was ever very ravelled. Parts of it are indisputably brilliant and highly accomplished, others are kind of indifferent; some of it is actively irritating. In the end it is a gargantuan, self-indulgent oddity. Some of it is definitely worth watching, but the whole thirteen hours...? I'm not sure. Maybe wait until it comes on TV.