Trigger Warning: Short Fictions and Disturbances
8.8
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In Trigger Warning, global phenomenon and Sunday Times bestselling author Neil Gaiman returns to...
Underground Airlines
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"The most timely of alternate history novels. Ben Winters has created a spellbinding world that...
Monstress, Volume 1: Awakening
Sana Takeda and Marjorie M. Liu
9.2
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Set in an alternate matriarchal 1900's Asia, in a richly imagined world of art deco-inflected steam...
Nausea
James Wood, Robert Baldick and Jean-Paul Sartre
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Jean-Paul Sartre's first published novel, Nausea is both an extended essay on existentialist ideals,...
Eve Out of Her Ruins
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With brutal honesty and poetic urgency, Ananda Devi relates the tale of four young Mauritians...
KyleQ (267 KP) rated Halloween (2018) in Movies
Jul 20, 2020
Oddly enough, comedian Danny McBride was a writer, while director David Gordon Green (Pineapple Express) directed.
I blame much of my distaste on their overhyping it. They said this would be a slower movie focused on creating suspense ala the original.
In reality, this more than tripled the body count, even surpassing Rob Zombie's remake which was 10 minutes longer.
From the get-go, Michael just wanders about killing people, at one point we just follow him walking down a street randomly killing people. This has more senseless violence then Zombie's outings.
Another thing I didn't like was that, with this only following the original in which after escaping, he killed 4 people. It doesn't make sense that he would be this popular legend still talked about 40 years later.
Also, victims are idiots, it's no shock who gets killed. Honestly, Laurie (Jamie Lee Curtis) was the only likable character, and even she pushed it a bit.
For positives, Carpenter's score was great, I liked some of the camera work. Intro credits were cool, throwing back to the original. And Curtis was good returning as Laurie Strode.
I really wanted to like 2018's Halloween, but it lacked suspense, characters were dumb, it felt more like a senseless action/comedy than horror. This would've fit the Friday the 13th franchise better. I really hope that the sequels are better.
Christine A. (965 KP) rated Good Neighbors in Books
May 13, 2021
Good Neighbors by Sarah Langan is a difficult book to review in 200 words. There is so much I want to mention but need to limit myself. My review can be summed up in three words "read this book."
Maple Street is a perfect place to raise a family. The neighbors interact with each other as an extended family. They gather for barbeques, help each other, and look out for each other's children.
The new family is different. Arlo, a has-been rock star. Gertie, a beautiful ex-pageant queen. Julie, an intelligent preteen who curses like a sailor. Larry, an autistic boy who, along with his family, does not fit with the Maple Street image. The queen bee, Rhea, takes the family under her wing, and everyone welcomes them into the fold.
After a booze-fueled night, Rhea overshares to Gertie, which starts the Maple Street implosion.
Good Neighbors is a twisted story that takes its time to grow like the heat in summer. I recently read an ok writer cannot mess up a great plot while a great author will take a great plot and make it even better. Langan's writing and the great plot make for an excellent, well-written book.
This 200-word review was published on Philomathinphila.com.
Christine A. (965 KP) rated The Plot in Books
May 13, 2021
At what point does a good story idea become a person's own for them to write? When it is published? Merely written? Does anyone really own a plot? Those are the questions that surround the premise of The Plot by Jean Hanff Korelitz. However, The Plot is much more.
Jacob Finch Bonner, a once-promising writer, is now a failed author teaching third-rate MFA program when he meets Evan Parker, an arrogant student, who tells Jacob the plot of a story that is sure to become the next "big thing." Jacob waits for Parker's masterpiece, but it never is published. When Jacob learns Parker is dead, he writes Parker's plot. Everything is perfect, that is, until a troll posts Jacob stole the plot. Here the story becomes a mystery.
My problem with the audiobook was I wanted to finish it. However, it's challenging to listen while at work. I sat in my car to finish it before coming home and dealing with life.
The narrator, Kirby Heyborne, is considered one of the finest narrators working. Listening to him was like listening to Jacob tell his own story.
Heyborne's narration and Korelitz's plot make The Plot one of the best of 2021.
This 200-word review will be published on Philomathinphila.com.
Galileo
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Just over four hundred years ago, in 1610, Galileo published the Siderius nuncius, or Starry...
The Best Beer in the World: One Man's Global Search for the Perfect Pint
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What's the best beer you've ever tasted? What's your favourite beer? Where can I drink your...