Category: Recommendations

All recommendations, of whatsoever nature, are tagged thus.

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Memes Recommendations

Hamnet & Six Degrees of Shakespeare

Six Degrees Hamnet

It’s time for #6degrees. Start off from the same place as other wonderful readers, add six connected books, and see where you end up. Inspired by the Six Degrees of Separation Meme hosted every month at Books are my Favorite and Best.

January 2021’s book is Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell, winner of the 2020 Women’s Prize for Fiction. Hamnet is a fictional account of Shakespeare’s son, Hamnet, who died at the age 11 in 1596, and his wife Agnes, about whom we have heard so little.

Hamnet reminded me of all things Shakespeare; so for today’s Six Degrees, let’s travel today across works inspired by the Bard.

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Books Recommendations

Witch of the Glens by Sally Watson

There are some books that make me want to rub my hands in glee, and Witch of the Glens is one of them. What a charming book! I wish I’d discovered it when I was younger, I think I’d have adored it even more.

Witch of the Glens

Quickly, the Plot:

Kelpie has no memory of how she came into the hands of wicked Old Mina and Bogle. She plots an escape from her harsh gypsy life when the house of Glenfern takes her in (out of pity). Now she’s just waiting to steal a few bags of gold, not caring in the least about the war sweeping through the Scottish Highlands. But Kelpie has the second sight, you know, the real second sight (not the fake one that Mina pretends to have) … and soon Kelpie begins to see the human world in a new light.

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Best of List Memes Music & Poetry Recommendations

Favorite Books of 2020

Favorite Books of 2020 - Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by Jana over at That Artsy Reader Girl. Every Tuesday, you pick ten books on that week’s topic. And this week, we spotlight our favorite books of 2020.

This is a necessary ritual for wrapping up the year, and so here are my top ten reads for 2020.

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Recommendations Watchlist

Clue (1985 Movie): Witty Snarky Parody

Are you looking for a screwball murder mystery comedy? The 1985 movie Clue is just the right answer.

Clue

Based on a board game of the same name, Clue tells the story of six guests who are invited to the castle of an unknown host. Well, it doesn’t go the way of Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None, but there are six murders before the dinner is through.

The first half is all about getting to know the weird guests and their weird behavioral quirks. Carry on and you’ll be rewarded in the second half. Because when the laughs come, they will be dragged out of you suddenly, and repeatedly. The last whacky hour just whizzes by, as our crazy guests get curiouser and curiouser.

The movie also doesn’t lose track of the whodunnit … And the award goes to the butler for revealing what “really” happened. In that final climax scene of the movie, our butler (Tim Curry) presents three scenarios, and I DARE YOU not to roar with laughter.

I have seen comparisons of Clue with Murder by Death (starring Maggie Smith). But Clue, IMHO, is vastly more humorous and well-orchestrated.

Rating: 8/10. Highly recommended.

More “Funnies” here.
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Books Memes Recommendations

Classic Remarks on Cordelia’s Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold

I recently discovered the Classic Remarks meme, hosted by Briana and Krysta at Pages Unbound Reviews. I am very late to Classic Remarks, but it looks great and the topic for December 18 is very interesting:

Tell us about your favorite science fiction classic.

So, here it is: Cordelia’s Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold, my gateway read into science-fiction, way back in 2012. In many ways, it’s like stepping into the Star Wars world (the older Star Wars Episodes IV-VI, I mean). This is a repost of my review from that time, for this old favorite.

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Recommendations Watchlist

Hitchcock Movies: Shadow, Suspicion, Stranger, Lady & Sabotage

I binge-watched several Hitchcock movies this week: Shadow of a Doubt, Suspicion, Strangers on a Train, The Lady Vanishes and Sabotage. Time well spent, and here’s a quick sum-up!

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Books Recommendations

Half a Soul by Olivia Atwater: Charming Regency Fantasy

Half a Soul
Goodreads

Half a Soul by Olivia Atwater was such a charming book, more so because it was so unexpected. I found it recommended on a recent Twitter thread on Regency era books about warlords and wizards, and knew I had to give it a try too.

Theodora (let’s just call her Dora) has always lived in a dream-like state, disconnected from her emotions, unable to fully grasp the rules of polite society. You see, when she was just a wee scamp, a sinister Faerie lord tried to abduct her (unsuccessfully), and ever since then, she’s been only living with “half a soul”.

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Memes Recommendations Self-Help

#NonFicNov Week 3: Books on the Good Life

#NonFicNov

It’s #NonFicNov month: we’re encouraged to read non-fiction (or analyze past non-fiction reads). To ease the way, Shelf Aware, Doing Dewey, Julz Reads, and What’s Nonfiction have some cool weekly prompts to ponder.

This week we bring up books about any particular theme, and one theme I’m very interested in is: how to live a good, happy life.

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Recommendations Watchlist

Bringing Up Baby: Movie Review/ Funnies #1

Bringing Up Baby is a story about a missing intercostal clavicle, George the digging dog, and a Brazilian leopard named Baby. And what a madcap rip-roaring ROFL hysterical comedy this was!

Bringing Up Baby
Image Credits

Cary Grant plays an absent-minded museum director who just wants to polish off his gigantic dinosaur skeleton. But the harum-scarum Katharine Hepburn has other plans, and willy or nilly, Grant just HAS to help her out.

Oh, I felt so sorry for Cary Grant — who has trouble keeping up with all the stories and names people keep assigning to him. Hepburn gives him a really tough time, sending him running after golf balls, stolen cars, misplaced purses, escaped geese, musical leopards, hidden clothes, missing bones … I am laughing as I write this.

I never expected to like Bringing Up Baby so much. I went in thinking they were both an old married couple (they weren’t) who had decided to raise a leopard (not by choice!) and then squabbled over it (not precisely over the leopard).

I was so happy I took a chance on it. There was never a dull moment. No wonder this movie is considered one of the Top 100 Funniest English Movies of all time. Highly, highly recommended.

Watch the trailer HERE.

Rating: 10/10
Categories
Memes Recommendations

#NonFicNov Week 2: If you like… Book Pairings

It’s #NonFicNov month: we’re encouraged to read non-fiction (or analyze past non-fiction reads). To ease the way, Shelf Aware, Doing Dewey, Julz Reads, and What’s Nonfiction have some cool weekly prompts to ponder.

This week we pair up a fiction book with a related non-fiction one. Here are my suggestions!

#NonFicNov
#NonFicNov

If you like The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood …
… Try out Homer’s The Odyssey translated by Emily Wilson

Each one gives a different twist, a new perspective to the Odyssey, and uses a musical / poetic lens for that. Penelopiad gives voice to Odysseus’s neglected wife Penelope, and Wilson gives a new spin to existing biases in this Greek epic.

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