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David McK (3600 KP) rated Dragon Day in Books

Aug 26, 2025

This is an Audible original, which I'd heard - pre-listening - as probably best described as "World War Z, but with Dragons"

Which did prove to be pretty much spot on.

Like World War Z, this takes the form of epistolary storytelling: all presented as if audio recordings of interviews (and personal journals) of journalist Neve Pride, as she witnesses the 'eruption' of Dragons from the earth, and the devastation that follows.

As epistolary storytelling, I found certain sections to be slower than others - I also find that, as it is presented as interviews post events, I also miss the immediacy of the action. That, I find, is a drawback of this type of storytelling device.

Still, at least I can now say I'd listened to it ...

Kudos

Pep Confidential: The Inside Story of Pep Guardiola's First Season at Bayern Munich

Marti Perarnau

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Book

'Access inside the changing room and behind the scenes that any journalist or writer would kill for...

Erika (17789 KP) rated Profile (2018) in Movies

Aug 8, 2021

Profile (2018)

2018 |

8.0

(1 Ratings)

Movie Rating

Profile is based upon a true story of a French journalist who went undercover online to report on how ISIS recruits young, recently converted, European women to the jihadi cause. This film uses the same narrative style as Searching, everything is witnessed via screens, and it really works for this story.
In Profile, the journalist is English and called Amy. She’s portrayed as pretty desperate in general, and this story is her chance to become a fulltime employee at a random, unnamed news outlet. Her recruiter, Abu Bilal, reaches out to the false profile of ‘Melody’, almost immediately and starts chatting with her and sets up a Skype date. Now, the obvious happens, Amy gets wrapped up in this whole thing, and journalistically compromised by falling for this guy. I do have to admit, the actor they chose to play the recruiter/terrorist was incredibly attractive. I’m assuming this was done on purpose, to demonstrate how these guys convinced all these women to go over to Syria. Personally, I couldn’t believe anyone could buy what the recruiters were saying, but it happens all the time.
The tension was high and lasted until the very end, with a good pay-off. It kept me engaged mentally the entire time, which is rare for me. That’s when I know I truly like a film.
As I mentioned, the screen narrative style worked, I was constantly on edge, wondering if the ruse would be spoiled by someone walking behind her, or something like that. This film also took place in 2014, and I found it amusing that they thought to include the authentic, annoying lag that occurred a lot at that time.

Kudos

Voice Recorder HD

Business and Utilities

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App

It is a full featured best voice recorder application with stunning interface for business, audio...

David McK (3600 KP) rated Marvels in Books

Jan 30, 2019

Well, that was … different.

By now, we're all used to witnessing the current Superhero phenomenon - Spiderman, The Fantastic Four, The X-Men, etc - from the point of view of those characters, drawn (predominantly) as larger-than-life.

This eschews all that, focusing instead on the point of view of a bystander on the street (photo journalist Phil Sheldon), with the characters drawn in an almost photo-realistic manner. As such, this deals more with how the public (would) view those characters and the massive property damage than inevitably follows one of their battles, picking and reinterpreting various scenes - Captain America at war, Mister Fantastic and Sue Storms marriage, The X-Men and the Sentinels, Spiderman and the death of Gwen Stacey, etc - from the decades of comics now available.