reviews

Susie Steiner “Missing, Presumed”

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Demolished this book in last two days at the cottage. The first few chapters are a tad slow, but only to establish the plot. Roughly 50 pages in, you will become hooked, so stay with it! I could not put the book down until I was done!

Missing, Presumed is a literary-crime novel written by Susie Steiner. Although the plot is based on the search for Edith Hind – a twenty-something graduate student at Cambridge whose father is surgeon to the Royal Family – the novel is more of a character analysis of DS Manon Bradshaw who struggles with her work & being lonely. In addition to Bradshaw’s development, the novel also takes place from many different viewpoints, which is a nice touch.

Overall, this is a brilliant novel with beautiful writing, many twists, and good character development.

“I sometimes think I don’t actually like anyone that much. That all I ever want is to be on my own. And then I can’t cope with it — with myself, just myself all the time, and it’s like I become the worst company of all 00 and there’s this awful realization that I need people and it’s almost humiliating,” – pg. 164 **big nod from me**

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Sarah Dessen “Saint Anything”

There’s something comforting in Sarah Dessen’s writing. Easy-reading for the summer.20160712_211216

Who doesn’t love some chick-lit?

Saint Anything regards all sorts of relationships. Family, friends, love, personal. This is laid out through the life of Sydney, who has always felt invisible. Her brother Peyton won the attention of many throughout their childhood. Peyton, however, begins to spiral out of control and finds himself in jail after a drunk-driving incident.

This leads Sydney switching schools and meeting the Chathams family after deciding to visit the local pizza place after school one day. There she learns more about herself and begins to realize that she too deserves to be heard.

The novel is perfect for anyone looking for a quick and easy ready.

“How a song can remind you of something specific in your own life, like it belongs to you. But how personal can it really be if a million other people feel the same way about it? It’s like a fake meaning, on top of a manufactured meaning, divided by a true.” page. 159.

BOOM. hit the nail on the head with this quote. cough “Do I Wanna Know?” Is the perfect example of this. scratch that. The whole AM album cough.

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KONGOS @ Velvet Underground

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Last night I went to the Velvet Underground to see KONGOS. It was my first time at this venue, and it was a pretty good setup. The only thing needed for the venue considering it holds up to 500, was A/C. The club gets pretty warm, so keep this in mind for dress attire.

Ascot Royals opened for the band, and they had a good set. They were able to get the crowd ready and have a style classified as “dance rock.” Their style kind of reminds me of the Boys Like Girls, Jimmy Eat World and Dashboard Confessional genre. Good sounds to dance and be ridiculous to.

KONGOS went on after 10pm. They opened up with “Hey I Don’t Know” off of Lunatic which is one of my favourite songs! It was a good start to the show to get everyone headbanging. They continued with a few more tracks off of Lunatic, then started incorporating new music from their newest album Egomaniac.

Egomaniac has allowed the band to explore new sounds, which I’m glad they are doing. There are too many bands that once they have a successful single, they become narrowed in on that sound. It’s clear Egomaniac drifts away from “Come With Me Now.” The whole album is supposed to be a commentary of their success anyway! The strongest track from Egomaniac is their single “Take It From Me” which reflects on the band making leeway into the music scene, followed by “I Don’t Mind.”

“Autocorrect” is a social commentary on the future of society, and adds a bit of humour to the world of the digital. Whereas, “Underground” is just a good groove-to song. The album is definitely better live, so I would recommend catching a show with them!

Ending conclusions: I loved the take on “Come Together” with Moezart, he is a super talented rapper. And the encore from KONGOS was great, loved that they played tracks from their father, John Kongos.

Long-live small venues. It gives a more personal and intimate setting where you can actually see the band and feel the vibes! Great night, great music.

Sherlock “The Abominable Bride” Review

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Sherlock is one of my most favourite series. It’s something about the cleverness of the cases, the update on Sherlock as a character living in the modern age, as well as the talented cast. Benedict Cumberbatch is of course a lovely feature within the series as his acting is superb. He’s able to portray Sherlock successfully by acknowledging that the character is removed from typical social interaction.

I also think Sherlock is successful because there’s anticipation leading up to each series. Between series one, two, and three there are roughly two years between each. Added to the suspension is that the fanbase is only granted three episodes per series. This allows each series to be crafted to near perfection. There’s more room for the production team to put effort within each episode. This effort is noticeable through the writing by blending Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s work with a modern touch, the cinematography gives you goosebumps, and the actors play their characters oh so very well.S_TAB_0325

“The Abominable Bride” comes two years after series three. Leading up to the Christmas special it feels like it’ll be a one-off episode that is purely a re-imagination of Sherlock during the time period it was written in. However, further into the episode it actually sets up the direction for series four. Given that series three leaves the audience witnessing the suspected return of Moriarty, the Christmas special deals with Sherlock working out how Moriarty survived his own death of quite literally shooting his brains out.

What I enjoyed of this Christmas special is that they did decide to take it back to it’s roots and set it during the 19th century. I also loved how they dealt with the suffragette movement during this time, (as our own generation is lacking an appreciation/motivation/difficultly coming to grips of what Feminism is.) Nevertheless, the way in which Moffat decided to go about displaying suffragettes is a tad cringeworthy — outfits are much like KKK and the fact that they are a murderous cult taking out husbands who are brute. Hmmm.

Overall I enjoyed the episode – it was nice seeing my boy Cumberbatch and hearing his delightful voice – and I am most definitely looking forward to series four!

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We made it to the finale, and oh boy were we left with questions. fsociety initiated their big hack, and it most certainly left people in trouble. Of course, the masses were happy because now they were living debt free… but for big corporations, they are now in deep shit.

Overall, this was a good opening season for Mr. Robot. Some episodes were super crazy with lots of information to process. There were many twists that I did not see coming, but there were also some parts in the series that were not so surprising (like Mr. Robot being a figment of his imagination).

It will be nice to see where they go with season two, as the audience is of course left on a cliffhanger.

It you are looking for an offbeat, smart show to bingewatch, Mr. Robot is the show for you.

All my reviews can be found under this tag.

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More spoilers in this review. I suggest watching this amazing series before proceeding.

mrrobotmirroringehhohhhhh calllled this from the beginning! Total Fight Club moment with Mr. Robot. Now, it was a big surprise when they dropped the whole “this is your dad” moment on us last episode at the last minute. This episode takes that major revelation, and runs with it. We learn that Elliot is not in a great frame of mind, and has had episodes like this before.

This particular episode deals with Darlene and Angela trying to find Elliot, after he obviously runs away. They finally discover him talking to himself at his father’s gravestone, moments after Elliot’s father tells him that they will only try to take him (Elliot’s dad) away from him (Elliot) again.

Everything is leading up the season finale. We are unsure just how long Elliot has been planning fsociety’s big plan to make everyone debt free.

On the other hand, Tyrell’s life is one big mess. His wife – fortunately – delivered the baby okay, but has decided she will be leaving Tyrell if he does not get things back in order. Tyrell has just been fired from E Corp, and the detectives are still on his case (rightfully so, as he did in fact kill her).

What a mess.

 

Doctor Who “The Woman Who Lived” Recap

906_21631“The Woman Who Lived” is somewhat of a conclusion to “The Girl Who Died.”

It was a pretty decent episode. Not bad. It was nice to see The Doctor on his own for this episode, I always like those one off episodes.

I am also thoroughly impressed by their cat makeup. Let’s all appreciate the hard work those make-up artists go through to provide us with great cat-like characters. *moment of silence*

This episode we find the sadness that comes with living for eternity. Ashlidr has lived a great deal since we last saw her. She writes in numerous diaries counting the many lives she has led. We discover she will no longer have babies, for the lost of these children is too great to bear.

She begs the Doctor to become a companion. He declines saying the two cannot spend eternity together, harsh bro.

Doctor Who “The Girl Who Died” Recap

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Let’s all appreciate that we had a Ten flashback. Doctor Who writers finally explained why Twelve’s face looks like the Caecilius’ from “The Fires of Pompeii.” I thought it was a nice touch to explain the resemblance, and work it into this week’s episode, and the importance behind it. It was the only scene in the episode that I truly appreciated.

Clara and the Doctor find themselves captured by Vikings. The Doctor thinks he’ll be clever when he pretends to be Odin, when from the sky the “real” Odin shows up. This Odin takes the best Viking warriors for himself. Turns out this “Odin” is the ruler of the Mire, and feeds off of Testosterone.

What you think is a one-off story, is actually part of a *gasp* two-parter. This is my only critique of Series Nine, as so far all the episodes have been two parters.

Then again, nice to see Maisie Williams.

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Warning: This review will most definitely contain spoilers.

Damn. This episode was full of unraveling. DID NOT SEE that one coming at all. Elliot has a sister? And Darlene is this said sister? WHAT? Now this makes the beginning of the episode clear. Of course Angela and Darlene know each other, because they would have been childhood friends as well.

Now I think Elliot’s father – previously known as Mr. Robot now known as Elliot’s father – is still dead I reckon. Because Angela explained that they only knew each other out of support from losing their parents. Sooooo Elliot’s father must still be a figment of his imagination. I guess we’ll know for sure in the final two episodes, but I just can’t see him being alive.

In regards to Tyrell and his wife, boy are they something else, eh? Tyrell’s wife is super sly and I think even more psychotic than Tyrell. Possibly endangering the life of your unborn baby JUST TO protect Tyrell from the detectives? Man. That’s intense.

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*cringes*

Dean Koontz “Odd Interlude”

Oh20151024_104219 (2) wow. I love that feeling when a book is so good that you read at any moment you can. This is Odd Interlude. A short side-adventure, but wow, what a ride.

The chronological order for this book fits between Odd Apocalypse and Deeply Odd. Odd Thomas and his new companion Annamaria find themselves drawn to Harmony Corner where something is not right.

I loved how this book included a new perspective, that from Jolie. It was a nice inclusion and her account of the events flowed nicely with Odd Thomas.

It is now upsetting that only one book remains in this series. I’m suspecting Odd Thomas will die, as the title of the book is Saint Odd. We shall see, I guess.