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| 1925950085
| 9781925950083
| 1925950085
| 4.41
| 90
| Apr 01, 2020
| Jul 01, 2020
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it was amazing
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‘’Ιt was late afternoon, with the sky already growing dark. At the bus stop opposite the crematorium gates a cold wind stirred flurries of fallen l
‘’Ιt was late afternoon, with the sky already growing dark. At the bus stop opposite the crematorium gates a cold wind stirred flurries of fallen leaves; no one else was waiting. Emily peeled off a glove and slipped a hand inside her bag to touch her rosary. The beads were made from real rose petals, and the faint perfume they transferred to her fingers was a familiar comfort. Large black birds flapped and shrieked in the treetops further along the road, as Emily said the Our Father and three Hail Marys for the dead woman.’’
In eight stories/snippets, Carol Lefevre allows us poignant glimpses into the lives of women whose fate has let them down in various ways. At the centre of each narration, we find Erris, a woman whose death has shocked everyone, a woman whose presence has left a deep mark on the lives of our eight protagonists. How did she die? WHY did she die? How can live our lives when others push us to betray ourselves? How can we heal the wounds of the past? How far can loneliness drive us to despair? ‘’Christ in every heart thinking of me, Christ on every tongue speaking to me, Christ in every eye that sees me.’’ After the Island : A woman who finds comfort in her own company, away from the clutter of the idiots, receives strange messages in the form of voice mails. The messages come from a woman who has recently died and they are disturbing, haunting. In addition to the mystery, Emily lets us into her mind and the memories of growing up sheltered and nurtured by the nuns with Christ as her source of strength and hope. This was my favourite narrator and the writing is outstanding. Little Buddhas Everywhere : Claire finds herself unable to withdraw from the clutches of her ex-husband’s second marriage and his strange, New-Aged crazed wife. But does she actually WANT to be free or does she keep on coming back because of some form of emptiness in her life following the divorce? ‘’It was half - past two on one of those dark Sunday afternoons when the house smelled of chimneys and hidden damp, and for the past hour she had been trying not to give in to gloom. The mood that tugged at her was as familiar as breath; it was not the kind that welcomed company. She looked around the first-floor sitting room, which in the aftermath of the ringing felt unnaturally quiet. Its tall unshuttered windows framed lengths of bruise-coloured sky, its lamps were still unlit, and everything looked slightly insubstantial in the dimness. From the street it would appear as if no one was home.’’ Beautiful writing is beautiful. Evening All Afternoon : Fiona becomes the trusted listener to a couple that goes through a rough patch in their marriage without letting anyone know about her own struggle with loneliness. This story is moving and quietly haunting and contains some of the finest descriptions of those end-of-summer afternoons that always hold a special place in our hearts. Just read the following extracts and you’ll see what I mean: ‘’It had been the tail end of the summer, with a breath of autumn in the late-afternoon air, and it was that smokiness of the season turning, the prospect of the winter to come, that had plunged Fiona into one of her blackest -ever bouts of homesickness.’’ ‘’It had begun to rain, and the sound of it beating against the window glass made the room and everything in it seem snug and secure, as if everything would be all right for as long as they remained safe within its sheltered warmth.’’ Glory Days : A mother who should not be called thus and the desperate choices Lazbie led herself into result in an uncertain future. All because of our inability to talk to others and to believe that a better version of ourselves exists within us. The Lives We Lost : Jeanie has always been the one who did everything right. Exemplary daughter, exemplary student, exemplary mother and wife. She has always been there for everyone. But what happens when everyone starts letting you down? When you realise that all your efforts have been to no avail and the comfort of a stranger is all you need? I fell in love with this story and the ending is pure brilliance. This Moment Is Your Life : Delia’s story is an ode to perseverance, to second chances and a moving account of facing the early stages of dementia. Murmurations : A young man meets a client who changes his life. Easy to walk into spoilers territory with this one so no further details. Paper Boats : The strange incident of a woman’s (suspicious?) death provides the inspiration for an aspiring writer to create the story that will probably be her breakthrough into the publishing world. I could write pages upon pages for this extraordinary Russian-doll novella. The writing is phenomenal, the scenery tranquil, yet ferocious in its simplicity. The four seasons are depicted to perfection and the quietness and clarity of the narrators’ voices is married to the calmness that comes from being fully aware of your fate and - possibly - accepting it. Because, sometimes, that’s all you’ll be allowed to do… *Side-note: Good Lord, this slim gem contains the finest Acknowledgements section I’ve ever read, and Carol Lefevre’s musings on how Edward Hopper’s masterpieces influenced her stories are perfection.* ‘’Fly away, Arthur. Fly far, be free. Erris.’’ My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jul 19, 2024
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Jul 25, 2024
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Jul 19, 2024
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Paperback
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| 1250781507
| 9781250781505
| 1250781507
| 3.89
| 678
| Mar 02, 2021
| Mar 02, 2021
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it was amazing
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‘’I will surround that town with death. I will wrap death around their hearts, and I will rip them apart. I will kill them all. Every one.’’ *Go, girl! ‘’I will surround that town with death. I will wrap death around their hearts, and I will rip them apart. I will kill them all. Every one.’’ *Go, girl! Leave not a sperm alive, that’s how you deal with terrorists. Don’t like the truth? I don’t give a fuck, stay away from my page.* Don’t let the pompous tags written by idiots on the back cover dissuade you from reading this gem. These tags are a hideous lip service to the minority who cries like a mob in a frenzy, the ones who support terrorists and the ones who believe that the words ‘’mother’’ and ‘’father’’ should be abolished from the vocabulary of every language in the world. I am not Jewish, I am not a ''feminist'', and I sure as Hell am NOT a leftist. Yet, this collection is one of the most difficult, demanding and memorable I’ve ever read. Forget about the aforementioned tags that would influence the narrow-minders, we are readers, honour our vocation. ‘’They made my father dance in thorns before they kill him. I used to think that this was a metaphor, that they beat him with thorny vines, perhaps. But I was wrong about that. They made him dance.’’ Among the Thorns: A story set in Germany becomes a metaphor for anti-semitism, the Nazi terror and the unyielding bravery of the Jewish people, along with the fire of revenge of a daughter whose unbreakable bond with her dear father was violently shuttered. ‘’It hurts to come back from the dead. And it hurts to bring someone back from the dead.’’ How to Bring Someone Back from the Dead: A haunting ode to the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice and the despair of losing the one you love. Alice: A Fantasia: A diving into the creation of the character of Alice by Lewis Carroll. ‘’They’ve got to hear us, Lucy. All the way to Mayfair and Parliament. Maybe all the way back to Ireland. That’d make old Parnell proud, wouldn't it?’’ Phosphorus: Based on Hans Christian Andersen’s Little March Girl, this a brilliant retelling of the deep wound left on the lives of the Irish people following the Great Famine and the appalling conditions in the factories of London. It reads like a nightmarish Dickens and it’s brilliant! Ballroom Blitz: Based on The Twelve Dancing Princesses -one of my favourite fairy tales- this is a modern retelling in which twelve boys and twelve girls carry on dancing in a bar that is both suffocating and enticing. The boys find themselves in a pretty bad shape but each morning they become healed in a tale that is tragic, slightly gory and ingeniously beautiful. No spoilers but Jake and Isobel are Perfection! ‘’Will you take the path of pins or the path of needles?’’ Serpents: A mystical, cryptic retelling of The Little Red Riding Hood. Emma Goldman Takes Tea with the Baba Yaga: So, when you vote for the Right, you are a fascist but when you vote Left you are a democrat? Are you familiar with theories on paranoia? I have no interest in anyone’s wounded pride in thwarted Communist dreams and the only Baba Yaga I like is found in Russian tales and the John Wick movies. I’ll just pretend this story never happened. ‘’But my gift to your child is pain. This child shall suffer and she will not understand why; she will suffer and she will always be alone in her suffering, world without end.’’ Rats: A nightmarish retelling of The Sleeping Beauty, set in a world of sex, drugs and Rock n’Roll that was poetically tragic but didn’t really make sense nor added any fresh breath into the original tale. I’ll stick with that, thank you. ‘’And I miss the light. I miss sunlight, candlelight, moonlight, starlight, streetlights, headlights, spotlights. All I have now are fluorescent lights, and I think they’re the reason that I vanished in the first place. They’ve turned my skin translucent.’’ Lost in the Supermarket: The Queen of Hearts has lured and imprisoned a girl in a supermarket. That is one of the most WTF stories I’ve ever read and I definitely enjoyed it. Swimming: Parents-in-law (God, how I HATE this term…) can be rather intimidating. But what happens when they are utterly weird and obsessed with creating a house to rival the Versailles? What starts as a humorously strange story becomes a poignant, haunting fable in its shocking end. ‘’The girl is gone from the castle and her stepmother wanders the corridors.’’ Lily Glass: A retelling of Snow White, set in the world of the Golden Age of Cinema. Three characters find themselves in the heart of a troubled and troubling relationship. One of the show-stoppers in the collection. The Revenant: The chronicle of a highly dysfunctional relationship told through the narration of a Revenant. Not a fan of this one despite the haunting writing. I was 18 once, but I wasn’t stupid and age should not be an alibi for degrading yourself. ‘’In America, they don’t let you burn. My mother told me that.’’ Burning Girls: The story of a Jewish girl who has immigrated to the USA is the tale told so many times about the hands that built America. Yet, it has never been said in such a haunting, terrifying manner. This is a gothic, mystical, haunting retelling of Rumpelstiltskin, it’s beyond gorgeous and THE best story in the collection. ‘’And I saw worse. The world around me teemed with flickering images, nightmarish visions of stone roads carrying metal beasts, of burning homes, of people pressed like livestock into mechanical carts, children crying, separated from their parents, toddlers’ heads dashed against walls, of starvation, and our neighbours turning on us, only too glad to agree to our degradation and murder. The visions persisted no matter where I turned my head, and there was no reprieve, nor any justice, no justice anywhere.’’ My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jul 17, 2024
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Aug 03, 2024
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Jul 17, 2024
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Hardcover
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| 1784630632
| 9781784630638
| 1784630632
| 3.63
| 75
| Jun 15, 2016
| Jun 15, 2016
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it was amazing
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I can't really explain except to say that night is my enemy. It's dark and terrible. Night whispers death. Every creature shrinks from it because
I can't really explain except to say that night is my enemy. It's dark and terrible. Night whispers death. Every creature shrinks from it because the dark wants us and we sense it will bite to kill. It will kill if it can. And somewhere this tiny voice I hear is reassuring me. It repeats that night is only a means to morning, and the morning will take away all my terrors and give me fresh hope, if I can get to Walsingham.''
One of the best instalments in the series. Highlights include: The Woman Who Lived in a Restaurant (Leone Ross): A woman ''haunts'' a restaurant in order to be close to her one true love. Extremely moving and haunting. The Politics of Minor Resistance (Jessie Greengrass): Working in a job that practically requires you to become a robot, a woman narrates her daily routine in a voice that cries in despair. Walsingham (Trevor Fevin): Such a mysterious, eerie story...A woman who has experienced abuse is making a pilgrimage to find peace. However, the omens she encounters foretell anything but. A masterpiece that hovers between Gothic terror and Folk horror. Mrs. Świȩtokrzyskie's Castle (Colette Sensier): A middle-aged woman becomes obsessed with an online RPG game. She falls (in dubious ways) for a man she has never seen and her actions result in strange repercussions for her children. Just how far can loneliness impact the weak-minded? A Leg to Stand On (Neil Campbell): An academic feud goes horribly awry... ''We came back as ghosts from the war, haunting the places we once called home, but they had changed utterly, or rather it was that trench foot, trench mouth, the dawn burst of star shells, had changed us. The things we'd seen meant that we could no longer step upon the same blithe pavements, could no longer hold the dry, decisive hands of older girls on summer evenings, could no longer look with the same eyes on the wainscoting and gambling, the ivy, the chimney-topped roofs of our homes. Now we live between London's boarding houses and cafes, her pubs and her parks, striding with collars up through the endless, pitiless rain.'' Wyndham Le Strange Buys the School (Alex Preston): Four veterans of WWI (who might or might not be ghosts...) return to their familiar grounds only to find that the world has changed beyond recognition. An ode to Checkhov and a lament to life. Song of the River (John Saul): Two young women move in a place near the Thames and we witness their almost whimsical conversations about strange dreams and music. 1961 (Greg Thorpe): A story of identity and stardom, using the icon that was Judy Garland, set in New York. The Staring Man (David Gaffney): A woman who makes models is visited by a mysterious old man, prompting her to create the figure of a staring man. She can't know that she has found herself a part in a tragic story. A beautiful dance between the supernatural and the real horrors in our lives. ''From the window at the sink I see blackbirds tapping the soil, early-morning spring thrushes, sheep at the fence. I notice the state of the clouds across the valley. Sounds I've made fill the room - the suck of water as it drains from the sink, mugs on their hooks chiming against each other, the end of conversation.'' My Husband Wants to Talk to Me Again (Kate Hendry): The disintegration of a marriage depicted through an absolute lack of communication. The Only Thing Is Certain Is (Thomas McMullan): A true masterpiece! A man faces the death of his child and the cruel task of a cremation gone wrong in a city that seems to have succumbed to a strange regime. Is it a hallucination or a coping mechanism? ''That was what Scottish Islands were, after all: heather and bracken, tumbledown crofts and Highland cows, solitary eagles, hovering over rugged grandeur. And water: streams to waterfalls, crashing waves - a lot of water.'' Distance (Janice Galloway): A mysterious woman, who is clearly facing psychological issues, is almost disappointed when she finds out that her illness is actually curable. A story with a protagonist whose motives are unclear and a highly troubling mother-child relationship. It is December now. Frost patterns the windows, shimmers on the roofs, making icicles of the towers. The weeds that smashed through the cellar door, that vined their way in through windows and shutters have died, leaving their yellow-brown corpses underfoot. The bats control the towers; further down the moths rustle and birds shriek and creak and cackle. Foxes scarper through the corridors, their swift brushes sweeping trails in the dust. There is an owl in the dormitory sitting watch over me as I sleep. Through the broken windows of the library, snow has blown, and banks up against the armchairs, the mildweed ottoman.'' ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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not set
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Jul 14, 2024
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Jul 14, 2024
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Paperback
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| 846666856X
| 9788466668569
| 846666856X
| 3.65
| 8,995
| Sep 29, 2017
| Oct 15, 2020
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it was amazing
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‘’-I need to read Alice, by Lewis Carroll. -In Wonderland or Through the Looking Glass? -I’d prefer at home.’’ In the Temple area, between Fleet Stre ‘’-I need to read Alice, by Lewis Carroll. -In Wonderland or Through the Looking Glass? -I’d prefer at home.’’ In the Temple area, between Fleet Street and the Embankment in the City of London, you’ll find a bookshop owned by a formidable gentleman -who is anything but gentle- Dickens would be proud to have conceived for one of his exceptional novels. This bookshop provides refuge for a boy whose head is not in the clouds but in the stars, an aspiring writer and a barefoot fairy from Spain who has dedicated her life to Antiquity and its enchantment. A bookshop that marries Aristotle, Plato, Voltaire to Tim Burton, Alphonse Mucha and Gustave Doré. Shelley and Byron, Shakespeare and Walter Scott, William Faulkner and Tolkien, George R.R. Martin and Jean Teule. You will meet a lady who has fallen passionately in love with reading and demands that Frodo not die, more chapters in a book already finished, and wishes to start a correspondence with fictional characters. Customers who think that a bookshop sells DVDs, and others who can’t tell the difference between a series and a stand-alone novel. No matter. There are scones, hot chocolate, and Earl Grey on the ready for the happy few who understand. Livingstone is cantankerous and charming. Agnes is the driving force of change, John Lockwood couldn’t be more different than his infamous namesake from Wuthering Heights, Oliver Twist (not THAT Oliver Twist) will form a true household in your heart. As you live day after day within the heart of this enchanting bookshop, you will experience London at its finest. The city of Literature is right there from St Pancras to Middle Temple Gardens, from Marylebone to the Tower of London and the Leadenhall Market. It has captivated your heart and will not let it go. In one of the most beautiful books you will ever read, Moonlight Books is there to make us dream and realise that books have the power to change is. Perhaps, only books can actually make a difference…An ode to courage, to London and its unique atmosphere, a hymn to TRUE Literature (and not the garbage advertised by the illiterate Karen, Sharon and Tracy of Instagram and TikTok) Do yourselves a favour. Go and read some REAL Literature. ‘’-Most people aren’t interesting. They are petty-minded. -Your dear Mr Livingsone began to think like that and look how he ended up. -How? -Living inside his books. -Then, he lives the best life.’’ *All extracts translated by yours truly, taken from the Greek edition translated by Kallia Tavoulari.* My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jun 08, 2024
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Jul 12, 2024
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Jun 08, 2024
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Paperback
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| 1784632481
| 9781784632489
| 1784632481
| 3.56
| 27
| unknown
| Oct 14, 2022
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liked it
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One of the weakest volumes in the series, filled with stories that felt focused on being gross and shocking, And NOT in a pleasantly literary way. Sto
One of the weakest volumes in the series, filled with stories that felt focused on being gross and shocking, And NOT in a pleasantly literary way. Stories like Sink Rate by David Frankel should come with a tiger warning and I am a sworn enemy to trigger warnings. However, some of us do travel a lot, others have experienced traumatic events related to flights. Why any editor would think this story should be included in the collection is beyond me. Others like RZ Baschir’s The Chicken and Will Wiles’s The Meat Stream were horrible, unreadable. If these writers have won ‘awards’ for their writing, I pity us all contemporary readers. When you only enjoy 10 out of 20 stories, the omens are not in your favour, right? On the bright side, these 10 stories are easily among the best I’ve ever read, born out of bold ideas and exceptional writing. How You Find Yourself (Sara Sherwood): A life narrated in relationships with acute remarks on womanhood and intimacy. Single Sit (Edward Hogan): The lightning relationship between an employer and an employee, set in the quietly haunting English landscape. Offcomers (Rosanna Hildyard): In a situation that mirrors the time of the pandemic, a couple (not a father and a daughter as an idiot below would have you believe…) tries to cope with the risks of farming. Except the husband is an absolute brute. Set in the rugged land of Yorkshire. ‘’A window a table a recess with a lamp. A window a table. A moon looking in.’’ Square/Recess/Moon (Ben Pester): A brilliant, evocative metaphor for the loneliness and frustrations of modern life. Extraordinarily beautiful writing. Sarcophagus (Alice M): A woman narrates her thoughts while being in an MRI scan machine. The Comet (Sonya Moor): A make-up artist narrates her meeting with Simone Veil, the French politician who survived the unimaginable horror of Auschwitz and went on to pass the legalization of abortion in 1975. Moving, poignant, the absolute gem in the collection. A Visit to the Bonesetter (Christopher Burns): This story scared the living daylights out of me. In a dystopian society, a married couple gets a taste of the authority’s desire to eradicate what makes us humans. An Easement (Paul Mcquade): A new life awaits the lovers of our story, yet new beginnings are seldom pleasant. An atmospheric story set in the rural landscape of the USA. New To It All (Sean Padraic Birnie): A body horror tale done right. Exquisitely disconcerting. Wild City (Sophie Mackintosh): A designer returns to a city that has decided to make the transition from urban to rural in a dystopian setting that looks eerily familiar. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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May 31, 2024
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Jun 06, 2024
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May 31, 2024
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Paperback
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| 1907519335
| 9781907519338
| 1907519335
| 3.84
| 220
| Oct 26, 2010
| Oct 26, 2010
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it was amazing
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‘’Passengers are advised to board while the train is still in existence.’’ If we come to think of it, we daily commuters live in a softened, less thre ‘’Passengers are advised to board while the train is still in existence.’’ If we come to think of it, we daily commuters live in a softened, less threatening (hopefully…) kind of transportation loop. I have been coveting this collection for three years and although we got off to a rocky start, I soon realised that we were simply meant to be. From the eerie feeling of being alone on the platform, closely listening for the sound of the train that will surely carry you home (or will it?) to the congestion that grows and grows like a deranged Hydra, this volume gives voice to each and every fear of the commuter. From Prague to New York, Paris and - naturally -London, these are 19 little horrors for the daily commuter to despair upon. All aboard… Bullroarer (Paul Meloy): There’s nothing extraordinary in this…thing. It is a stinking pile of utter bullshit and one of the most disgusting stories I’ve ever read… The Girl in the Glass (John Llewellyn Probert): A young woman finds himself haunted by a girl who hovers between life and death. Quite unique this one… The Lure (Nicholas Royle): Sensual, tense, elegant. Like a haunting tour of Paris. A young teacher falls prey to the desires of a strange couple. This story needs to be made into a film. 23:45 Morden (Via Bank) (Rebecca Levene): I can’t begin to count the number of shocks my brain was subjected to while reading this extraordinary story of a life turned upside-down in the most horrible way imaginable. End of the Line (Jasper Bark): A story of time loops and psychogeography that could have been better developed. Interesting, nonetheless. The Sons of the City (Simon Bestwick): An interesting premise focusing on the futile efforts to create an Underground in Manchester, drawing parallels on how technology disturbs the creatures of the Old World that quickly lost momentum. It contains a few scenes of absolute horror, though. The Roses that Bloom Underground (Al Ewing): I don’t know what is more disturbing. Things growing out of the walls or happy commuters trying to accommodate each other… Exit Sounds (Conrad Williams): Mysterious and fascinating, this story has the old glory of the Cinema and the unnerving setting of the nightly Tube walk hand-in-hand. ‘’Where would you like to go that we’ve never been before?’’ Funny Things (Pat Cadigan): An extraordinary piece of writing, one of the best stories I’ve ever read! The agonizing battle of a woman against sudden loss and unbearable grief. An elegy of eerie coping mechanisms, a real Odyssey accentuated by sorrow and loneliness. Simply mindblowing! ‘’You might be on holiday, but some of us have to get to work, dear.’’ On All London Underground Lines (Adam L.G. Nevill): Accidents, incidents and malfunctions keep on happening and the narrator finds himself in a terrifying loop. As if Kafka wrote about life in the Underground, this story is the definition of life as a daily commuter. An all too familiar masterpiece and may I say that the protagonist is my spirit animal, trapped in an endless There and Back Again. P.S. Bloody tourists… Fallen Boys (Mark Morris): A teacher finds herself in an eerie tale while on a school field trip in an old mine. A beautiful, sad story that follows the good old tropes of a quintessential British ghost story. Furthermore, it felt oddly relatable since I am a teacher who has had her share with what others would deem as ‘’troubling students’’. In the Colosseum (Stephen Volk): A hedonistic, hallucinatory nightmare exposing all the layers of human cruelty. The Rounds (Ramsey Campbell): An outstanding, heart-pounding story with the epitome of the Unreliable Narrator. Is he paranoid or is he really trying to save his fellow passengers? Missed Connection (Michael Marshall Smith): A man is trying to go shopping before Christmas but is unable to escape the claustrophobic boundaries of the Underground. All exists closed, the city is different and the nightmare is never-ending. Siding 13 (James Lovegrove): A passenger is trapped in a train that becomes more and more and more and more congested. I got claustrophobic just by reading this masterpiece! Diving Deep (Gary McMahon): What if Antarctica had its own underground transport system? Yes, I can’t say I liked this one… Crazy Train (Natasha Rhodes): An intriguing heroine (I ADORED HER!!) and an ode to the dark stories of Rock music, set in LA. ‘’The ground couldn’t hold him.’’ All Dead Years (Joel Lane): A psychologist is trying to help a woman who has experienced manipulation and abuse but the tunnel seems endless. With traces of the myth of Persephone and Hades, this story is exquisitely elegant. ‘’He once read that those who die by the hand of another are the easiest to see. At the far end of the scale are those who die natural deaths - they can never return. But what about the ones whose departures are simply accidental? What does it take to see them?’’ Down (Christopher Fowler): An Underground worker helps victims of the past find their way through the labyrinth of the Tube. Whether those who perished during the Blitz or in tragic accidents, the spirits need a guide. A shuttering ending and if this story doesn’t bring wailing tears in your eyes, then you are Satan! ‘’He turned the corner onto something so unexpected that he stopped dead in his tracks. In front of him were the steps which he knew led down onto the southbound platform of the Northern Line. They did not lead down into the usual shuffling malee of irritable shoppers, however. They led down into total darkness.’’ My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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May 30, 2024
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Jun 09, 2024
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May 30, 2024
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Paperback
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| 1915368480
| 9781915368485
| 1915368480
| 3.70
| 892
| May 16, 2024
| May 16, 2024
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it was amazing
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‘’Emma Green is boldly hale Her house is warm but narrow On scattered grass until she dies She’s wide awake in sorrow.’’ ‘’Anna Green is old and frail ‘’Emma Green is boldly hale Her house is warm but narrow On scattered grass until she dies She’s wide awake in sorrow.’’ ‘’Anna Green is old and frail Her house a warmer borrow Her scattered ashes, unbidden eyes Still wide awake and hollow.’’ Always look both ways when you cross the street. Don’t go anywhere near pylons. Don’t ever go to Almanby. Almanby is the Other. Its name is uttered in frightened whispers, the place of mystery, terror and fascination for the youth who is constantly being flooded with the cautionary tales of the adult world. But what if there is actual truth in those tales? What if some places ARE the Other that must be avoided at all costs? Three young adults, Heather, Rachel and Antonia, must go to Almanby to find Heather’s boyfriend. Many of their friends have disappeared never to be seen again. And this is how a summer Odyssey of mystery, despair, deceit and obsession begins… And this is how one of the most beautiful and unique books you’ll ever read is born… ‘’Front doors changed colour overnight, their locks fit different keyes, they opened outward instead of inward. Pets changed colour, or were slightly larger or smaller than before, or they changed sex. Light switches inverted, windscreen wipers swapped sides, fridge magnets demagnetised, televisions detuned, piano keyboards swapped ends with the high notes on the left and the low notes on the right. Beyond the rash of wild conspiracy theories, nobody had a good suggestion, either for the changes or the ghosts. The best anyone could come up with was that reality itself had become sick.’’ First of all, this astonishing novel contains some of the BEST first pages I’ve ever read. We’re talking true, pure Masterpiece Material! Adam S. Leslie has created a dystopia unlike any other and breathed new life into a much-abused genre. The summer seems endless, voices are heard through radio waves, people wither, die and become ghosts. Ghosts lurking in the fields. Ghosts wandering, lost and sad. Ghosts banging on your windows. Ghosts trying to attack you and kill you. This is a land where danger is constant, unpredictable and unbeatable. Your dead relatives will hurt you, silently whispering, watching with dead eyes and lethal intentions. And Almanby is always there, the destination that seems to resemble a different Hell on Earth. And the Earth itself has changed… ‘’Six years of summer. Six years without grey skies or snowdrifts or icy northerly blasts. Six years of sweltering in the same gelatinous humidity.’’ ‘’Six years ago, a different kind of pollen drifted in on the summer winds.’’ It is a world of suffocating beauty. A world of summer afternoons and silent interactions, where ‘’the grass smelled of evening.’’ A land of abandoned cars in the fields, of empty towns, of sighs containing terrifying lullabies, of empty funfairs and maypoles moving on their own. A time when you can sit on the grass and let the meadow hear your cries on the way to your meeting your Fate with a sad soul. ‘’Dusk was Rachel’s favourite time of day. The heady stink of night-time plants, still hot from the day’s glare, filling the atmosphere now with their aromas. Everything red and purple and lavender, at once insubstantial and supremely solid. Nothing was quite real at twilight.’’ ‘’[...and the sun had baked the sky cobalt blue and naked, burnt all its clothe off. Now just a tortoiseshell of fields lay ahead of them, as flat as the ocean or an alien world, and impossibly green. Woodland, misted blue by the distance, stretched out to their left - and even against its furthest flank, Heather could make out the pinprick- small presence of ghosts. Tiny moments of black and white.’’ The way the writer shocks us in the middle of a ‘’simple’’ paragraph is nothing short of outstanding. Using references to fairytales and folklore, he has composed a dark folk song, steeped in the light of the midday sun, equally scorching and hypnotising. This is Folk Horror at its finest, and a genuinely BEAUTIFUL novel. ‘’Emerald green the boat that sails The mouse will surely borrow On shattered glass ‘neath stars he cries To guide this day to sorrow.’’ My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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May 27, 2024
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Jun 30, 2024
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May 27, 2024
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Paperback
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| B0CF7F9HJ9
| 3.79
| 78
| May 02, 2024
| May 02, 2024
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really liked it
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''Don't worry, this house is safe from 'demonic forces'. Except the ones you already left in.'' A dangerous seance goes horribly wrong. A girl carri ''Don't worry, this house is safe from 'demonic forces'. Except the ones you already left in.'' A dangerous seance goes horribly wrong. A girl carries out a tricky mission of revenge and retribution. A young member of a coven in Salem tries to become accepted and resurrect her lover in a story with a unique feeling, whimsical, gothic, haunting. A tender boy, quiet and kind-hearted, is fascinated by the peculiar behaviour of a strange classmate with an unnervingly special family. A girl without a shadow tries to face a world suspicious and enticing. A woman suffering tremendous personal trauma is in need of new skin. A heavily wounded man struggles under the psychological abuse of his mother-in-law (well, aren't we all...?) A dollmaker creates comforting likenesses of the beloved deceased. An Angel of Death finds prey in a bar. Dark stories (some of them will be really hard to stomach) where the supernatural meets the REAL terror of physical and emotional pain. A few of the stories may seem too confusing, disjointed, lacking a clear direction, but others are simply literary gems. Definitely difficult, undeniably unique. Many thanks to Serpent's Tail and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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May 25, 2024
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May 30, 2024
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May 25, 2024
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Kindle Edition
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| 1662513135
| 9781662513138
| B0BZ566L2F
| 3.54
| 6,571
| Feb 01, 2024
| Feb 01, 2024
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it was amazing
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‘’I always wonder, isn’t being a good listener worth anything? Can’t you do something good for the world without standing in a crowd or shouting fr
‘’I always wonder, isn’t being a good listener worth anything? Can’t you do something good for the world without standing in a crowd or shouting from a podium?’’
In a future that may not be as distant as we’d like to think, Alma returns to the island of her childhood, in East Canada, to find solace following a personal tragedy that has left her empty. In the company of the islanders and her aunt’s family, she tries to heal the wounds that have been created by loss and grief. But Nature has decided differently for the small community of Violette has been plagued by strange phenomena. Moths swarm the land, terrible storms strike hard, breaking windows, streetlamps and every glass in every house, lights flash without cause, closed flower buds open. What is worse, residents fall dead without cause and they immediately become forgotten by everyone, even their closest relations. Everyone, but Alma who has a rare gift. She can experience other people’s feelings, going through their fears and hopes, carrying their burdens on her shoulders. And all the while, the old radio tower is looming and the community is filled with the Echoes of the past, voices coming through electric appliances. As the sea level rises and rises, Alma must find the key to heal others and herself. This is one of the most unique, haunting novels you will ever read… ‘’The sky darkened, and there was the unmistakable calm in the air, the way it felt before a storm. Another storm, right on the tail of the last one, seemed unlikely. But so far nothing about this place was predictable. An owl startled her, flying so close she felt the brush of its wings on her forehead. It landed on a branch with the body of a red squirrel clutched in its talons. The frantic silhouettes of brown bats flitted through the trees, snapping up the abundant mosquitoes.’’ I can’t say much for fear of spoiling a reading experience that must be ‘’lived’’ to become fully understood. Apart from the fact that every single paragraph is written to perfection and the characters jump right through the pages, the themes of this novel are universal and strike straight to the heart. Loss, sorrow, despair, the urge to help, the fight to heal yourself and others, the feeling of hopelessness when you know that you are battling against an enemy that cannot be defeated. And yet, you refuse to give in. You write stories to make the lives of others known, to preserve their existence, to understand your own course through the journey of a community trying to swim against a vicious current. ‘’How many times did you sit in a room and try and fail to understand yourself? A hundred? A thousand? You felt your own energy, your thoughts and emotions, all bouncing around, seemingly disconnected vibrations, and you could never quite pin them down or predict what they would do next. You could never tell when they would begin, or from which direction they would come, or when they would fade, or if they would simply cease abruptly, without warning.’’ ‘’Sometimes the impossible still happens to be the thing that makes the most sense.’’ Alma is Latin for ‘’soul’’ and she is the soul of this beautiful novel. Observant, sensitive, quiet, astute, deeply compassionate, intelligent, she is the perfect main character and our guide in this special journey. Her strength makes her a true example to be followed. It is such a joy to witness her determination to narrate the stories of her friends, to keep their memory alive amid bitter goodbyes and growing uncertainty while searching into the void for her beloved without losing her shrewdness and her kindness for a single minute, something so rare in today’s literature that wants the majority of ‘heroines’ behaving as stupid as it gets to make them ‘strong’ and ‘feminist’. Spare us…Alma is not afraid to assert her right to fight against time and space - quite literally - and refuses to accept defeat. The end may be inevitable but what better way to exit according to our rules? The rest of the characters are also a joy to read, deeply humane, kind, realistic. A cast that is a breath of fresh air, despite the ‘heavy’ themes of the novel. ‘’The past is where I live and I like it that way,’’ she said flatly. ‘’Everything that really matters to me is in the past.’’ At times reminding me of the excellent film Frequency, starring Jim Caviezel, this novel is a tranquil, tender, bittersweet whisper into the void that has been Contemporary Literature of late. Without the need for gimmicks, rich in an unsettling, eerie - almost supernatural - feeling guided by incorporeal voices and the wings of Death that we cannot escape, Jessica Bryant Klagmann has written an elegy for a planet on the verge of destruction and a hymn to the fighting spirit, the resilience and the gentleness of the human soul. ‘’We heard it, and we felt it, the pulse of a dying planet that had stories it could no longer tell on its own. It was beautiful and comforting, that rhythm - suffused with pieces of everyone and everything we had loved - but it was also broken.’’ Many thanks to Lake Union Publishing and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Apr 20, 2024
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Apr 21, 2024
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Apr 20, 2024
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Kindle Edition
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| 1529079934
| 9781529079937
| 1529079934
| 3.46
| 1,147
| unknown
| Jul 02, 2024
|
it was amazing
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‘’A blackbird in the hawthorn in the spring. That’s what she wrote about in her essay.’’
‘’A fresh wind blew in and shook the early blossoms off ‘’A blackbird in the hawthorn in the spring. That’s what she wrote about in her essay.’’ ‘’A fresh wind blew in and shook the early blossoms off the trees in the garden and everything in my house was beautiful and well made, and I saw it all with her eyes before I left to meet her.’’ Mother’s Day : A woman meets her mother at a gallery as they both find themselves at opposite points. A tender, yet sad story about the fragile bond between mothers and daughters and the complex consequences when money enters the picture. Beautiful writing, rich in the quiet nostalgia of days gone by… My First Marina : A young woman, haunted by the death of her friend, finds ‘solace’ in promiscuity. However, passing from bed to bed will not bring you comfort. Blackbirds : In this almost unbearably tender story, two siblings lead vastly opposite lives, but their unique bond remains unbreakable. Quietly haunting, extremely poignant. Feathers : A despicable young woman (who thinks someone in their mid-thirties does NOT have the right to be pretty…) is taught a valuable life lesson by a spirited Frenchwoman. It is a token of a talented writer to make you care about a character you want to slap dead. ‘’It was early summer, the dusk was blue and long. He drove his small car to the outskirts of town. They would sit and eat ice creams, jelly sweets, the doors wide open, the grass wet and humming, the river nearby full and swollen and brown.’’ First Time : A soft, whimsical story of teenage shenanigans and the unavoidable repercussions of rebellious, young love. Childcare : What can you do when the most important person in your life - your mother - is the most inadequate guardian, solely focused on satisfying her huge ego? You thank God for your grandmother. And you pray to become a grown-up as swiftly as possible. A story about an issue that is getting more and more common in today’s society. The Doll : A doll becomes a projection for complex relationships, impulses of youth, mental health, and the havoc that comes with immature - can we ever call it such a name? - love. ‘’I yearn for answers but there is no space here. I cannot hear myself, you say. I have all the answers you need. But you need to find the right questions, your mother says.’’ Currency : Six pages of an emotional rollercoaster of a story in which a teenage girl pines for a boy, resorts to witchcraft and regrets her actions. Is first love bound to fail and become lost in oblivion? Good For You, Cecilia : What started as a fascinating story about performing live, serving your art, dancing and overcoming your fears, ended up being a libel against religion, thanks to its obnoxious, idiot ‘protagonist’. Atheism is not a fashion, it is not progress, it is a token of you being a coward and an idiot. Hearts and Bones : ‘’- that in the words Jesus uttered on the cross, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me, he was telling us it was okay just to feel sadness, just to feel confusion. To have faith is to stay with this confusion, to not understand, to not want to understand.’’ No summary is needed… This collection is like the soft rays of light entering a room on a spring’s afternoon, like the serenity of a summer’s hazy evening during blue hour. Dealing with difficult subjects, yet never becoming verbose, preachy, or ‘’too’’ darκ. It’s like a discussion between family members who have finally resolved their problems. Sadness and hope walk hand-in-hand in life, as do the innocence of youth and the corruption of adulthood. ‘’Outside, the dead of night. Revellers. Moonlight. Noises. You are happy here. You are happy because you do not have to speak.’’ My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Apr 15, 2024
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May 05, 2024
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Apr 15, 2024
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Paperback
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| 1035901099
| 9781035901098
| B0C4Y1LLYM
| 3.71
| 264
| Jan 18, 2024
| Apr 11, 2024
|
it was amazing
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‘' Ι don’t do Audrey Hepburn or Liz Taylor to order. I’m Ruby Devereaux, and this is what you get.’’
12 men become Ruby’s vehicle as she creates he ‘' Ι don’t do Audrey Hepburn or Liz Taylor to order. I’m Ruby Devereaux, and this is what you get.’’ 12 men become Ruby’s vehicle as she creates her swan song, her memoir narrating a turbulent life, a journey through decades, adventures, relationships. But do not make the mistake of thinking that her affairs define her. Never. Not even for a moment. Her father, her editors, her assistant, and her lovers, all become companions in a fascinating odyssey. London. New York. Berlin. Paris. Saigon. Budapest. Stops in the course of Ruby’s amazing journey. Through her travels and relationships, not only do we witness a woman blazing her path through life but we delve deep into the ways our world changed from the end of WWII to our days. The Cold War and the endless espionage game, the conflict in Vietnam, the political upheaval brought on by the vile Communist regime, the socio-political issues that erupted during the 80s, all seen through the eyes of a writer who jumped into the fray and darn the consequences. We are also allowed valuable glances into the publishing world and the acting industry - no less a battlefield - and the story becomes even richer with literary, film, and music references. Ruby’s fascinating character shares her thoughts on womanhood, motherhood, sexuality, secrets, shocking losses, the bond between fathers and daughters, and naturally, relationships. The relationships that shaped her life, but not her character. It is a token of an excellent writer to create a story told through the point of view of a single person with men as the narrative focus and not turn the novel into a hopelessly boring romance. If you expect endless rumpy-pumpy, you’ll be disappointed. This novel is sensual, yet never sexual in the sordest ways possible. What we find here is a story, told to perfection, a hymn to a woman who lived life by her own rules, from the last traces of young innocence to the days when age catches up with us, when memories become confused, yet even more acute. This is a beautiful novel with an enticing, moving heroine, in every sense of the word. ‘’Lord knows who wants to read the ramblings of a grumpy old woman about to die. It may be feast or famine, but it is you, reader - always my eternal employer who will decide. Welcome to my life in twelve men. Enjoy. Because I very much did.’’ Many thanks to Aria and The Pigeonhole for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Apr 14, 2024
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Apr 28, 2024
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Apr 14, 2024
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Kindle Edition
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| 1035023431
| 9781035023431
| 1035023431
| 3.95
| 21,157
| Sep 20, 2021
| Sep 06, 2023
|
it was amazing
|
‘’So, there’s nothing one could do to change the present?’’
In the fourth instalment of our beloved Tales From the Cafe series, the focus turns on ‘’So, there’s nothing one could do to change the present?’’ In the fourth instalment of our beloved Tales From the Cafe series, the focus turns on family, parenthood, the relationship between daughters and parents, and the regret that comes to haunt our step once our bond with those we love- be it kin or lovers – is shuttered by misunderstanding, prejudice or plain denial to accept the truth. ‘’You cannot change the present no matter how hard you try…what a cruel rule.’’ The Husband : A rather inquisitive professor wants to return to the time when his wife was healthy, for there are things left unspoken…What do you do when you know the future and the misery it will bring? Do you tell or keep everything locked within you, suffering in silence? The Farewell : We often overlook the special bond, the adoration even, between a human being and their pet. In this moving episode, a woman visits the past to face her regrets over the death of her pet. The Proposal : In an unexpectedly sad story, a young woman wants to meet the boyfriend whose marriage proposal she refused. One of the most moving moments in the entire Funiculi Funicula series. The Daughter : This moment was equally heart-breaking and infuriating. A daughter who treated her father in such a manner makes it difficult for me to understand her. Making amends? There would be no need for that if you had tried to listen to your father and care for his feelings instead of being a megalomanic selfish shrew. I am sorry if I sound cruel but honesty always comes first. Yes, Toshikazu Kawaguchi and his treasures keep breaking our hearts, but the hope, love, and sense of freedom surrounding you when you read his books last long after your coffee gets cold. Within these pages, Life awaits. You don’t want to miss it… ‘’When our action brings about an unexpected result, how can we not experience huge regret? After all, do we ever get another shot?’’ ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Apr 11, 2024
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Apr 17, 2024
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Apr 11, 2024
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Paperback
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| 0349140383
| 9780349140384
| 0349140383
| 4.14
| 572
| Jun 03, 2014
| Jan 01, 2012
|
it was amazing
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‘’A sweet, spring darkness and the cherry blossom smelling in all the pleasant gardens. The blossom whitened in the April evening. In some rooms in
‘’A sweet, spring darkness and the cherry blossom smelling in all the pleasant gardens. The blossom whitened in the April evening. In some rooms in the decorous streets lights were coming on. In some - really rather prettily, she thought, ‘I don’t know why I ever despised them ‘ - the lights of television sets flickered blue. Dark as it was someone was giving his patch of grass the first mowing of the year in St Agnes Road and the wet, summer, heartbreaking smell of the sap hit her as she stepped from the cab at the door of the church. It seemed the smell of all her life - the essence of the best of all her life - a new moon, she thought, suburban grass and summer coming. She thought how happy she had been in this place.’’
I am ashamed to admit that I had never explored Jane Gardam’s work before this collection attracted my attention. Its cover spoke to me. It felt so contradictory, yet genuinely ‘English’, not to mention that short stories melt my reading heart. It was one of the wisest reading choices I’ve ever made because this collection is pure gold and Jane Gardam is one of the genre's queens. ‘’She had left London with the grass on Barnes Common brightening and long and all the candles shining on the avenue of chestnuts that crosses the pretty railway line. London had had the smell of summer - airy and fresh. Here there was grit in the air and rubbish blew about the streets like rags.’’ In the extraordinary, heart-breaking Hetty Sleeping, a young mother meets the man she has never forgotten while on vacation with her children and in the deliciously British Gothic story A Spot of Gothic a newcomer to a picturesque village has to come to terms with the suspicious friendliness of its inhabitants and its ghosts. The Pig Boy makes poignant remarks on the way a wife has to put up with loneliness and cultural shock while waiting for her husband to ‘come and rescue her’, in a land where the ‘foreign’ city, its ugliness and the isolation within the crows come in stark contrast to the familiar warmth of London. But is she really unhappy or has she found the means to fight the feeling of Otherness? At first glance, Rode by All With Pride is about the dreams and aspirations parents project on their children and their disappointment when their offspring stick to their own choice but this story delves deeper and deeper until its dubious ending. ‘’Perhaps, thought Veronica, if you live so closely, so densely together, you have to develop this isolation. Nobody noticed her, walking, walking, marching, marching. And, she turned off into a side street for no real reason and marched on she realised that she had stopped being unhappy.’’ The Easter Lilies contains some of the most beautiful, moving descriptions of calm, spring evenings while The Pangs of Love is a spirited, subversive retelling/continuation of Andersen’s The Little Mermaid through the eyes of the youngest mermaid who didn’t have the chance to meet her legendary sister and tell her what a fool she was to sacrifice everything for the sake of a mere man. Stone Trees is a moving study of bereavement, set on the Isle of Wight and An Unknown Child is a heartfelt account of a miscarriage that threatens to tear a couple apart, set in the mysterious land of Northern Italy. ‘’We are the elect. By many we suppose we are considered dreadful. We are all true blue, even if we are radicals, or the odd eccentric socialist. We are staunch, we are loyal, we are innocent in a way, bless us. We are rather happy people and when bad times come we comfort one another.’’ Swan deals with the unique cruelty of children and Damage is a confession of family issues, language and regrets. Groundlings is an elegy for a bygone era of British Theatre in a country where the greatest of visual arts is a universe on its own. In Light, Gardam narrates a legend from the Himalayas, vastly different to the subtle sarcasm and sadness communicated in the quintessentially British Miss Mistletoe. From London to Cremona, Telegony is an acute apology for the well-known, criticised Englishness that can drive you mad. ‘’It was January. The park was cold and dead. The grass was thin and muddy and full of puddly places and nobody in the world could feel the better for seeing a blade of it. Plants were sticks. There were no birds yet about the trees, and the water in the lake and all round the little island was heavy and dark and still, like forgotten soup.’’ Gardam uses Magical Realism at its finest in The Boy Who Turned Into a Bike, a story of young love and regrets, while family issues become prominent once again in Missing the Midnight but with a rather hopeful outcome. The Green Man pays homage to one of the longest-standing British traditions, the Green Man, the protector of Nature, the one who watches all, the misunderstood. It is a true masterpiece of a story. Tragic and moving and poignant as is Soul Mates, a tale of mystery, eerie and complex. ‘’In winter all the lights are out along the river - only the occasional window shining high up in the Shell building and the odd street-lamp on the bridge. As the dawn comes up somebody, somewhere switches on long necklaces of light-bulbs, pink and gold, all along the riverside terraces. They come on as it gets light.’’ This is only a handful of the beautiful stories included in the collection. Jane Gardam writes about everyday people, people like you and me, caught in the risks of what we have come to call ‘’our daily life’’, situations that are potentially trickier and more sinister than the uncunniest of tales. In ‘ordinary’ tales that are odes to human emotions, set in a plethora of places from London to Tibet, from Italy to Hong Kong, The Stories has earned its place in my most treasured short stories collections. ‘’He will watch in secret. You can see carvings of him in churches like this. Watching you. It has always been so. He has always been there. Sometimes he is a leaf-mask on a frieze. Sometimes he looks like leaves only.’’ ‘’Human beings, it seems to me, are dependent on story - stories - painted on cave walls, sung on jangling instruments, chanted or spoken in lullaby from their beginnings. Children deprived of stories grow up bewildered by their own boredom.’’ Jane Gardam My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 22, 2024
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Apr 13, 2024
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Mar 22, 2024
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Paperback
| ||||||||||||||
| 0063394057
| 9780063394056
| 0063394057
| 4.06
| 26,151
| Apr 23, 2024
| May 28, 2024
|
it was ok
|
I won’t waste your time with a synopsis. The blurb is there for all to see and it’s quite accurate. One Day is one of my favourite novels and I was be
I won’t waste your time with a synopsis. The blurb is there for all to see and it’s quite accurate. One Day is one of my favourite novels and I was beyond excited to read You Are Here. When I was approved for an ARC, I began to read immediately, literally devouring the short chapters. Unfortunately, it was a thundering disappointment. Marnie initially came across as a character of my heart. Bookish, stuck in a job which gives her little satisfaction of late, cherishing her independence, with a deep love for London. I mean come on, she carries her much-loved Wuthering Heights paperback everywhere. This alone should have been enough to make me adore her. And I did, I swear to God I did, until she started to make an utter fool of herself. She became insufferable. The way she throws herself into a heinous secondary character is embarrassing. Her bimbo-girly giggles at the most inappropriate of times. I am sorry to say that she acted like the exact type of woman I loathe and she ruined the entire novel for me. After all, when you have a weak main character in a story of 300+ pages and a cast of two characters (almost exclusively…), the odds are not in the reader’s favour. I actually felt sorry for Michael for having to deal with three banshees. Marnie, Nat and Cleo. Their characters were sex-starved hyenas. No, thank you. I am a scholar, not an idiot. Now Michael seemed to me as the driving force of the novel. A man in love with his loneliness, insecure but true to his principles, condemned to meet women who want to change him because THEY ARE WOMEN AND THEY ARE ALWAYS RIGHT, DAMN IT! I am so tired of this bloody trope in Contemporary Literature. Just stop. In fact, I felt that poor Michael put up with Marnie’s idiotic irony for far too long. But then again, we teachers are blessed with endless patience when dealing with all kinds of idiots. In any case, these two are important contestants in the competition for the most boring, lifeless, irritating couple in literary history. Characterization in combination with dialogue that seemed straight off the cheesiest Hollywood rom-coms made for illiterate zombies turned this novel into a nightmare. It’s a pity. It truly is because Nicholls excels in creating atmosphere and in communicating the sense of place through vivid descriptions. I could ‘’see’’ London, the moors and the rugged beauty of the British coast. Even the various hotels and B & Bs. And then, you have a short scene describing an unnecessary, shocking death and Marnie’s response was so inappropriate I would have slapped her right there and then had she been an actual person crossing my path. Girl, you want to open your legs, we get it. Have some decency, for God’s sake! Find a bush or something. So, 300 + pages of two cardboard boxes walking and walking. And talking and talking. Do I need pages after pages after pages of interactions that make me vomit and a female protagonist who embarrasses herself every time she opens her stupid mouth? I certainly don’t. For me, this novel is easily included in the disasters of this reading year. Many thanks to Hodder & Stoughton and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 16, 2024
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Apr 08, 2024
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Mar 16, 2024
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Hardcover
| ||||||||||||||
| 1784631124
| 9781784631123
| 1784631124
| 3.33
| 122
| Jun 15, 2017
| Jun 15, 2017
|
it was amazing
|
''After the rain, the last of the daylight came riding over Mynydd Mawr with the crows. The mountain choked on torrents of white water and the brac
''After the rain, the last of the daylight came riding over Mynydd Mawr with the crows. The mountain choked on torrents of white water and the bracken smelled of its colour. From the shadows of the sycamore tree, the old horse emerged and nibbled at the edges of the puddles. The world had awakened again just in time for dusk.''
One of the best volumes of the series. These are my favourite stories in the collection. General Impression of Size and Shape (Rosalind Brown : An adultery leading to break - up, narrated within the context of birds and their symbolism. A story written in haunting language. When the Nightjar Sleeps (Andrew Michael Hurley) : A young boy is haunted by the death of his father and the mysteries of the moors. The Sea In Me (Krishan Coupland) : The whimsical, bittersweet story of a young girl who tries to survive her mother's fixation on her future career. A tender tale, told in the distinctive, gloomy British style I adore. Safe (Vesna Main) : A violent, yet extremely poignant story of abuse and revenge Never Thought He'd Go : Four youths must face the consequences of the tragic mess they've created. Later he heard of men seeking him by the fields and the canal, all the way to the river. It was lugged up with leaves, rotting pieces of wood from old boats, heads of elderflower glowing their clouds of white, cartons, dust, shadows and leaves, floating downstream.'' The Wind Calling (Deirdre Shanahan) : An atmospheric tale with a Romani touch of first love, summer freedom and the dreams of youth that are seldom fulfilled. Is-and (Claire Dean) : The best story in the collection. A modern twist to the legend of the Changeling. What a terrific short film this would make! This Skin Doesn't Fit Me Any More (Eliot North) : A mysterious story of a family that hides more than meets the eye and a deeply disturbed boy. Language (Daisy Johnson) : Daisy Johnson creates one more masterpiece in a story of infatuation, motherly love, selfishness and the denial to move on. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 11, 2024
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Mar 17, 2024
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Mar 11, 2024
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Paperback
| ||||||||||||||
| 1662514832
| 9781662514838
| B0CLVQYLPG
| 4.10
| 1,960
| Jun 11, 2024
| Jun 11, 2024
|
it was amazing
|
Matt and Julia have more in common than meets the eye. Both use their careers as an anchor to the reality around them, both have been facing family is
Matt and Julia have more in common than meets the eye. Both use their careers as an anchor to the reality around them, both have been facing family issues all their lives and both have grandmothers in an assisted living home. There is one more problem, though. They have never met each other. When the intertwined fates of their relatives bring them together through cardboard boxes and a few agitated phone calls, a tender story of love and grief unfolds. To say this is a beautiful love story is an understatement. Matt and Julia’s stories evoke routes through difficult paths. Love, loss, grief, despair. The ever-problematic question of the family that should have been a shelter instead of a prison. The daily nightmare that is Alzheimer’s when you witness your loved one wasting away, all memories lost. And this accidental meeting (or phone call…) that might - just might- change your life. With traces of Magical Realism used to perfection without being a cheap, fashionable gimmick and a poignant approach towards sensitive subjects like Alzheimer's and suicide, Kerry Lonsdale creates a story to be remembered. Many thanks to Lake Union Publishing and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 03, 2024
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Mar 13, 2024
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Mar 03, 2024
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Kindle Edition
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| 1782117164
| 9781782117162
| 1782117164
| 3.78
| 1,071
| 1981
| Jul 07, 2016
|
really liked it
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‘’God?’ The voice was shaky, close to tears. ‘Are you there? Can I talk to you?’ There was a pause while God and the other child both held their breat ‘’God?’ The voice was shaky, close to tears. ‘Are you there? Can I talk to you?’ There was a pause while God and the other child both held their breath, then nothing. God had lost him. God jumped up and stood on his chair, putting his face close to the planet as it hung there. Even in the darkness he could see the white of the poles, some jet-streams, clouds. He could not, of course, see the boy who had whispered to him. ‘Hello,’ he whispered back, his lips touching the exosphere. ‘It’s me. I’m right here.’ Some Rain Must Fall: As a teacher whose students primarily belong to the ages of 6 and 12, this story struck a particular chord. Frances is called to substitute a teacher who left her position due to mysterious (for us readers) circumstances. Her calm manner and kindness for the children provide the shelter the little ones desperately need. And all the while, the rain falls and falls…A tender and shocking story. Fish: A mother and a daughter try to survive in a post-apocalyptic world that puts their lives and their relationship at risk. Faber turns a world where fish float in the air into a masterpiece of psychological horror. In Case of Vertigo: A nun living alone in absolute isolation shows us the beauty of Life and the merciless presence of Death. Toy Story: In a moving, bittersweet story, God-child discovers the Earth in the discarded junk of an abandoned universe. Miss Fatt and Miss Thinne: Miss Fatt is a voluptuous aspiring actress and Miss Thinne is a slender, polite nurse. Best friends for years, they excel in their respective fields. Until one day, Miss Fatt decides to eat more and more and Miss Thinne decides to stop eating altogether. And their world crumbles… Half a Million Pounds and a Miracle: A quirky duo is in charge of the renovations in St Hilda’s church in Scotland. But what happens when the statue of the Virgin Mary is smashed beyond repair? The Red Cement Truck: In a brilliant story that will make you extremely uncomfortable, a woman haunts her murderer in the most unusual of ways. Somewhere Warm and Comfortable: An eleven-year-old, who is too eager to become a man, is initiated into the world of teens and their irresponsibility the hard way… Nina’s Hand: In a touching story, Nina’s right hand chronicles her emotional demise. The Crust of Hell: What happens to a raindrop after it hits the soil of the desert? This is the beginning of Ivan’s research in Africa as we witness the dynamics in his family, in a place forgotten and - potentially - hostile. The Gossip Cell: This story was disappointing. I have no time to care about the hysterics and sexual frustration of a family of utter idiots. Accountability: A thirteen-year-old girl tries to save herself and her grandmother from the abuse of her stepfather. Set in a city close to Melbourne, this story will make your blood run cold. Pidgin American: In a poignant story full of wit and bittersweet nostalgia, we follow a young Polish woman’s observations of London, Poland, and questions of cultural identity. A marvellous example of remarking without ‘preaching’. The Tunnel of Love: Two people with troubled troubled pasts and troubling presents try to make ends meet in the toxic field of the sex industry. Sheep: Five artists are practically imprisoned in a remote estate in the Scottish Highlands by an ‘’Art Lover’’. It pains me to say that this story felt incomprehensible and devoid of any meaning whatsoever. Not the best way to end an, otherwise, memorable collection… Recently, Ralph Fiennes, one of the greatest actors to ever grace this miserable planet, received the venom of woke fiends, pseudo-feministic Meanads and the rest of the illiterate TikTok mob who have the notion they belong in the human race. Why? Because he claimed that having trigger warnings in Theatre is completely pointless, that the audience of today has gone all soft, naive, and frankly, unable to think straight. Same goes for the readers of today. Short stories are meant to make you uncomfortable, to question everything. Don’t like it? Don’t read it! Don’t watch it! Leave the rest of us (who are the VAST majority) to enjoy it. And have a bath. Or two. You stink stupid. In other news, Faber’s debut collection showcases his unique talent. My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Feb 25, 2024
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Mar 03, 2024
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Feb 25, 2024
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Paperback
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| 1101946164
| 9781101946169
| B06WP988TB
| 3.42
| 45,584
| Oct 17, 2017
| Oct 17, 2017
|
it was amazing
|
“In her living room she opened the windows to get a bit of breeze. The sun had set, so the first fireflies of the evening would begin to flare in a bi
“In her living room she opened the windows to get a bit of breeze. The sun had set, so the first fireflies of the evening would begin to flare in a bit. She sat on the windowsill and enjoyed the cold, shaped pineapple and watched as squirrels ran along the telephone wires, perfect sine waves with their bodies and tails. Sitting there, she had her second ice pop as well, until the fireflies began to float magically above the patches of grass and sidewalk.” I’m not a Hollywood fan, nor I enjoy watching films all that often. My tastes lean more on British and European Cinema. I don’t read actors’ biographies or books written by celebrities. However, in the case of “Uncommon Type”, it’s Tom Hanks we’re talking about. I can’t think of another actor who makes you feel as if you actually know him, as if every role of his is performed for each and every member of the audience. He is widely loved in Greece, he is widely loved everywhere and quite a few of his films are considered classics of the 7th Art. This collection of short stories is written in a simple, eloquent, flowing writing style. Humane, immediate, confessional. It is a brilliant token of the distinguished American writing, it is the voice of Tom Hanks, the Everyman, and if you don’t like it, well….you need Jesus in your life. In 17 stories, Tom Hanks creates characters out of life. The inspiration seems to be the types of New York (mainly) residents, even some of the roles he has performed in his astonishing career. Each story is embellished with the photo of a typewriter that plays a characteristic part in many of the stories. The importance and joy of writing is everywhere, the need to communicate feelings and thoughts first to ourselves and to the people around us. His themes are universal and relevant to our daily lives. Love, companionship, the errs and joys of the past, self – dignity, immigration, togetherness and a deep, acute feeling of nostalgia. A journey through USA, with the metropolis of New York ever present, in one way or another. So, without further ado, the 17 stories are: Three Exhausting Weeks”: Two best friends decide to become an item, but they seem to be highly incompatible. Poor guy starts feeling as if he has signed for the Olympics preparations or the NASA training. Anna is one of the most authoritative people to ever grace a book and this story is hilarious and nostalgic at the same time. “Christmas Eve 1953”: A beautiful Christmas story that takes us back to 1953 and to 1944, the D-Day, its aftermath and the wounds, physical and psychological that are inflicted upon those who survived the inferno in the shores of Normandy. “A Junket in the City of Light”: A story about a rising Hollywood star and the ordeals coming from exhausting press junkets and over-demanding studios. Paris, during the night, provides the beautiful setting. “Our Town Today with Hank Fiset- An Elephant in the Pressroom” : A glimpse into the conflict between the printed version of a newspaper and the coldness of reading your newspaper on a digital device. “Welcome to Mars” : A sad tale of the bonding between a father and a son, a story full of the sun, the sea and surfing. “A Month on Greene Street” : A story set in the sleepy suburbs, during the dog days of August. A divorced mother of two starts a new life in a welcoming, peaceful neighborhood. This is a text filled with the laughter of children, the soothing early evening atmosphere, and a certain kind of hope for starting anew. “Alan Bean Plus Four” : We revisit our unique couple of “Three Exhausting Weeks” in a story that brings “Apollo 13” to mind. “Our Town Today with Hank Fiset- At Loose in the Big Apple” : A celebration of New York in the form of an account from our grumpy (but sweet) journalist with a tiny bit of nostalgia for a more innocent era. “Who’s Who?” : The Big Apple is the city where dreams are supposed to come true. However, young Sue from Arizona, an aspiring actress who can act and sing and dance finds her dreams crushed all too soon. Until, a sudden appearance proves that possibly, dreams can still become reality…A beautiful story of youth and aspirations set in 1978. “A Special Weekend” : The story of a boy who loves typewriters and airplanes, living a difficult life after the divorce of his parents. I confess that the end gave me chills… “These Are the Meditations of My Heart” : A story of impeccable writing and immense beauty that reminded me -once again – how much I love typewriters. “Our Town Today with Hank Fiset- Back From Back In Time” : Our favourite reporter takes a trip down memory lane escorted by his trusted typewriter. “The Past Is Important to Us” : This story was a true surprise. A combination of Historical Fiction and Sci-fi where a scientist travels back to the 1939 for the sake of a woman. An impressive look into a potential future and a tale that shows how closely linked the past and the present actually are. “Stay with Us” : This story is written in the form of a film script and therefore, it really flows. Departing from Las Vegas, a wealthy, kind hearted businessman and his personal assistant find themselves in the middle of nowhere and change the lives of the residents, while finding a new meaning in their own. This is a story full of happiness, camaraderie and trust. “Go See Costas”: In this story, Mr. Hanks celebrates diversity, multiculturalism and companionship, without whitewashing the problems and the fears faced by the immigrants. His love for Greece is more than well-known, and here we find Greeks, Cypriots, Bulgarians. Set in the heart of the era of immigration to New York, this story is a hymn to the abilities and persistence of hardworking people who desire a better life, without forgetting their principles and without resorting to shady means. A tale that shows that people may come from different backgrounds (economical, educational, ethnic), but these factors mean very little when we are faced with adversities. In the end, it is the heart that matters. A story that couldn’t be more relevant to the chaos and conflicts of our times. “Our Town Today with Hank Fiset- Your Evangelista, Esperanza” : The grumpy reporter gives the spotlight to Esperanza who reminds us that there is actually life without a smartphone, Facebook and the like. “Steve Wong Is Perfect” : The last word belongs to the insane gang of the beginning and to bowling. Hilarious and nostalgic. This is a collection to be cherished and kept as a good friend to whom we may return when in doubt and in need of comfort. Not because the writer is named Tom Hanks and heralded as one of the finest actors to ever grace our screens. This is a book of simple, unpretentious beauty. 17 stories of people who could be our neighbours, our friends, our lovers, our parents, written in the immediacy and clarity that characterizes the majority of American Literature, a trustworthy volume like a trustworthy Royal typewriter. Let it carry you away…. Many thanks to Penguin Random House, Tom Hanks and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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not set
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not set
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Feb 11, 2024
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ebook
| ||||||||||||||
| 0008523851
| 9780008523855
| 0008523851
| 4.15
| 593
| Feb 29, 2024
| May 21, 2024
|
it was amazing
|
''I read somewhere once that grief is like weather. As in: constantly changing, impossible to predict. You might be expecting clear skies but instead
''I read somewhere once that grief is like weather. As in: constantly changing, impossible to predict. You might be expecting clear skies but instead you get storm clouds. That seems about right. But I'm not sure how much longer I can go on, never knowing exactly when I'm going to get caught in the pouring rain.'' Will and Annie have found themselves at a crossroads. Which way are they going to follow? Will wanted to become a rock star. That’s all gone now. Now, he works in a shop that is barely functional and volunteers at a crisis line where he gives hope to those who need it most. If only he could see it…Instead, he has chosen to live in the past, fighting the same terrible demons day in, day out. Annie works in a job that doesn’t meet her wishes and talents and has to put up with an insufferable boyfriend as she struggles to overcome her grief for her father’s death and her anger towards her family. One day, Annie decides to call Green Shoots. And everything will change as two strangers open themselves to each other in the blink of an eye? But are they strangers? Without further ado, this book is perfect. The writing is impeccable. Modern but not cliched, vivid but not cringe-inducing as most contemporary novels have become. The characters of Will and Annie are outstanding. Tangible, sincere, acting as actual human beings would act when hopelessness, exhaustion and apathy take over. Their concerns and fears can be found in every single one of us and their voices are distinct, kind and memorable. Tom Ellen manages to turn London and Paris into characters and the descriptions of each city are so lively that you feel yourself walking (and recognizing) the streets, the alleys, the parks, the buildings. Excellent characters aside, the real strength of the novel lies within the use of its main themes. Loss, disappointment, grief, misunderstandings. How do we cope with the loss of the most important person in our life? How do we manage to get up and walk when we feel that this bereavement came to be through the inertia of others? How do we forgive? And how do we forgive ourselves when we feel that we are the cause of our pain? Tom Ellen’s novel is a breath of fresh air. It is a contemporary masterpiece. Some have mentioned that it is the British You’ve Got Mail. As much as I love this film, The Lifeline is a gazillion times better. Many thanks to HQ and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.word... ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Feb 04, 2024
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Feb 22, 2024
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Feb 04, 2024
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Paperback
| ||||||||||||||
| 006285643X
| 9780062856432
| unknown
| 3.43
| 14,537
| Oct 16, 2018
| Oct 16, 2018
|
it was amazing
|
‘’Look! It is winter in Prague: night is rising in the mother of cities and over her thousand spires. Look down at the darkness around your feet, in a
‘’Look! It is winter in Prague: night is rising in the mother of cities and over her thousand spires. Look down at the darkness around your feet, in all the lanes and alleys, as if it were a soft black dust; look at the stone apostles on the old Charles Bridge, and at all the blue-eyed jackdaws on the shoulders of St John of Nepomuk! Look! She is coming over the bridge, head bent down to the whitening cobblestones.’’ A manuscript that finds its way into Helen’s hands. Helen. A woman that is in a self-inflicted limbo, punishing herself, trying to appear unnoticed through the shadows of a city where mysticism has woven an eternal veil. A woman of mystery, a tale of a dark presence lurking a little behind of all of us, waiting for the moment of the great fall, of despair and cruelty and sorrow. This is Melmoth by Sarah Perry. The finest book I’ve read this year. The closest to my heart, following Wuthering Heights. When I turned the last page, I found I had tears in my eyes. I couldn’t speak. The reasons are many, I won’t add them here but the moving beauty of Perry’s writing cannot leave you indifferent. This is a hymn, an homage to the unique, magnificent city of Prague, a capital very dear to me. A city of culture and spirit. A city where light and darkness battle with each other, its corners the habitat of legends and ghosts. Try walking in its cobblestones streets during the night. Even the most skeptical of you will start looking around and behind in apprehension, hearing footsteps perfectly synchronized with yours. The Vltava, the Old Town Square, the astronomical clock and Charles Bridge. The Black Lights shows, one of the most well-known cultural attractions of Prague. A city that is probably the most haunting in Europe, along with Edinburgh. Having visited Prague twice, I can say that Perry’s nightly descriptions are so vivid and frightening. The city becomes a major character in this outstanding story and I can think of no better setting for Melmoth’s field of action. ‘’It is for the Wanderer’’, he said. ‘For the Witness- for she who is cursed to walk from Jerusalem to Constantinople, from Ireland to Kazakhstan; she who is eternally lonely, who is excommunicated from the grace of God and the company of men; she who watches, whose eyes are upon you in your guilt and transgression.’’ But who is She? What is this presence that causes such terror? Melmoth the Witness. A fascinating legend of a woman who sees the empty tomb following Christ’s Resurrection. Unlike the other women, she lied about what she had witnessed and was condemned to roam the earth with her bleeding, bare feet, witnessing the despair and cruelty of the human race, forever lonely, feared and despised. This is the figure that haunts Helen’s steps… ‘’She finds herself unwilling to raise her head to the window, as if she might see beyond the glass a face with an expression of loneliness so imploring as to be cruel. (And since she will not look, you must.) ‘’ In chilling, eerie sentences, Perry creates a kind of atmosphere unlike anything I’ve ever read, dearest friends. She transforms windows into threatening objects due to the darkness that is lurking behind them. I never liked windows when the curtains were drawn aside. My mother has told me that even as a baby I would nail my gaze to the window, unblinking. When I grew up, I always asked for someone to close the curtains. I still do that, even in gloomy, wintry mornings. So this fact alone in the novel brought me in a state of serious terror. I genuinely avoided reading it unless I had company in the house. Even at noon, I found myself nervously looking around me or at the window. I had goosebumps. The combination of windows and black cladded figures had me shivering. I know, I’m weird…. ‘’Brother, didn’t you expect to find me here? Don’t you know me? Don’t you know my name? I, who was your mother’s pain as she gave birth? Didn’t you see my shadow on the page as you went about your work? Didn’t you feel me at your shoulder as you sharpened your pens into knives?’’ ‘’Do you think you can atone for all you’ve done? Do you think there’s enough blood in you to settle the debt?’’ Melmoth is there to witness the cruelty, the ultimate violation created by the human race, all the wars and genocides over the centuries. My favourite story-within-a-story was Josef Hoffman’s. Josef and his family are German living in Prague, devoted Nazists due to their maddening notion of lineage and supremacy. The Second World War comes and goes and the time of the reckoning is at hand. Melmoth jumps to the calling. There were many devastating descriptions of the city during the era of the occupation by the Nazi monsters. The events that influenced Josef’s family are powerfully described and yet, I couldn’t feel a single ounce of sadness over their fate. Often, you get what you deserve and the blood of millions of innocents cried for justice. Melmoth’s words at that point are Truth personified. ‘’Sir, have a care, lest her eye be on you,, for her loneliness is terrible, and she will not withstand it.’’ Perry breaks the Fourth Wall throughout the course of the story. Her writing style isn’t easy. This isn’t a mere thriller like the ones that are nowadays mass-produced, devoid of any substance. It requires patience, the right mentality. It requires attention and thought. It requires patience. This is what happens with Literary Fiction, it prevents us from becoming lazy readers. Why complain about a book with many characters and multiple narratives? This is what makes a book rich, challenging, meaningful. Many times, Perry’s exquisite writing reminded me of Oscar Wilde’s apocalyptic, breathlessly dark descriptions. The spaces, the rooms, the settings are outstanding. She creates anticipation, sheer terror by a simple description of the shadows of the curtains and the furniture in a hospital room… This is how perfect a writer she is. Any references to Dvořák’s Rusalka always melt my heart. Also, as in her masterpiece The Essex Serpent, there is a very balanced, very interesting focus on religion and the way it is perceived by each one of us in our daily lives. Read these quotes and immerse yourselves in absolute beauty: ‘’ Look! It is evening now, and no snow falling: the cobbles on Charles Bridge and in the Old Town Square are glittering and treacherous and every minute someone somewhere falls. Master Jan Hus in his winter cloak looks silently over the crowd: you might think, were you so inclined, that he is recalling how once he wore a proper hat on which painted devils danced, and walked to where the fires were banked to burn him.’’ ‘’A minute passes and an eerie sound rises from the east of the river, then from the west; from behind the National Theatre with its golden crown, from the ticket booths and pizza stalls, from the Black Lights theatres and the library at the Klementinum, where a student at desk 209 turns the pages of a textbook. It is a low note, melancholy, ringing up from the pavements and down from the eaves of apartment blocks.’’ I cannot say much about the characters because it would a major spoiler in itself but know this: I seldom find a novel where each character could have been the protagonist of a new book. Helen will stay with you for a long, long time. If she doesn’t, you need to pay attention, I’m sorry to say. In the end, words cannot possibly convey the bonding between this novel and me. We are made for each other, I cried upon reaching its final pages, its outstanding last four paragraphs are an example of the finest Literature I’ve ever encountered. I have loved Melmoth so much that I’ve placed it in a very special place in my heart, side-by-side to Wuthering Heights. Those of you who know me well, know what this means. Melmoth is a book unlike any other. A place where darkness, despair, hope, and endurance form a masterfully choreographed danse macabre. It came to find me in a very particular moment in my life. I cannot thank it enough… ‘’And I saw what you did when you shouldn’t have done it – I know what thoughts plague you most, when you cannot keep hold of your mind – I know what you cannot confess – not even alone, when all the doors are bolted against your family and friends! I know what a fraud you are, what an impostor – you never had me fooled.’’ Many thanks to Serpent’s Tail and Edelweiss for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. ...more |
Notes are private!
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not set
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Oct 2018
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Jan 07, 2024
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Audiobook
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my rating |
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| 4.41
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it was amazing
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Jul 25, 2024
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Jul 19, 2024
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| 3.89
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it was amazing
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Aug 03, 2024
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Jul 17, 2024
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| 3.63
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it was amazing
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Jul 14, 2024
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Jul 14, 2024
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| 3.65
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it was amazing
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Jul 12, 2024
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Jun 08, 2024
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| 3.56
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liked it
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Jun 06, 2024
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May 31, 2024
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|||||
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| 3.84
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it was amazing
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Jun 09, 2024
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May 30, 2024
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|||||
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| 3.70
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it was amazing
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Jun 30, 2024
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May 27, 2024
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|||||
|
| 3.79
|
really liked it
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May 30, 2024
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May 25, 2024
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| 3.54
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it was amazing
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Apr 21, 2024
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Apr 20, 2024
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| 3.46
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it was amazing
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May 05, 2024
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Apr 15, 2024
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| 3.71
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it was amazing
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Apr 28, 2024
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Apr 14, 2024
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| 3.95
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it was amazing
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Apr 17, 2024
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Apr 11, 2024
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| 4.14
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it was amazing
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Apr 13, 2024
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Mar 22, 2024
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| 4.06
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it was ok
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Apr 08, 2024
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Mar 16, 2024
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| 3.33
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it was amazing
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Mar 17, 2024
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Mar 11, 2024
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| 4.10
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it was amazing
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Mar 13, 2024
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Mar 03, 2024
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| 3.78
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really liked it
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Mar 03, 2024
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Feb 25, 2024
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|||||
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| 3.42
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it was amazing
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not set
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Feb 11, 2024
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|||||
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| 4.15
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it was amazing
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Feb 22, 2024
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Feb 04, 2024
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|||||
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| 3.43
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it was amazing
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Oct 2018
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Jan 07, 2024
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