If it were possible, and to be fair, she is only one woman (though an extraordinarily gifted one at that), it should be mandated that Jillian Bell be cast in as many movies as can accommodate her. There is something about this actress, who first made it on many peoples’ Continue Reading
Book review: The Funny Thing About Norman Foreman by Julietta Henderson
On title alone, you could be forgiven for thinking that The Funny Thing About Norman Foreman by Julietta Henderson is one of those deliciously escapist slice-of-life British adventures where idiosyncratically good things happen to people who really need some good to come into their beleaguered lives. And while, there is Continue Reading
Review of WandaVision episodes 1 and 2: Is this just real life? Is this just fantasy?
Fun and escapist and sometime extremely emotionally confronting though Marvel’s prodigious cinematic output is to watch, it is a rare thing indeed to think of them as daringly creative original in any way. Each and every movie, with some rare exceptions, follows roughly the same template, with an ever-escalating series Continue Reading
Book review: Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam
When you think of the end of the world, you picture it happening in colours bold and wild, events unfolding on screens before you, death and destruction beckoning, with streets filled with screaming people and sights beyond horrific imagining. But in Rumaan Alam’s intimately unnerving and gloriously beautifully-written novel, Leave Continue Reading
Graphic novel review: Lightfall (Book 1): The Girl and the Galdurian by Tim Probert
It’s no secret that life can be tough and unyielding at times, affording us precious little opportunity to push away reality away and pretend it simply doesn’t exist. Which is why inordinately delightful works like Lightfall (Book 1): The Girl and the Galdurian by Tim Probert are such a joyous Continue Reading
Book review: Euphoria Kids by Alison Evans
Being different is wonderful, amazing and thrilling. But when you are growing up, still trying find that authentic sense of self, it can be excruciatingly awful too, especially if you are alone in your arduous growing up journey and also beset by the usual unthinking torch-and-pitchforks mobs of idiotic bullies Continue Reading
Movin’ Right Along? Kermit and Fozzy find a way to keep things going (virtually) during lockdown #COVID19
SNAPSHOTJoin us as we all get Movin’ Right Along into 2021 with a song in our hearts, a banjo on our knee, and a bear behind the wheel. Happy New Year!!! ….from The Muppets. (synopsis via Laughing Squid) If ever there was a year that sapped, almost completely, our will Continue Reading
The short and the short of it: The beautifully affecting friendship of Chocolate Cake & Ice Cream
SNAPSHOT“My son, Trent, began spontaneously playing a sentimental tune on the piano. My twin brother, Scott, joined in with singing the words ‘chocolate cake and ice cream’. The silly words seemed to lighten our heavy hearts. I came alongside, and we all sang in harmony together. It was just a Continue Reading
Book review: The Philosopher’s Flight by Tom Miller
Flights of imagination are gloriously good and wonderful things. Flights of imagination that come with a fully-realised, beautifully rendered world, compelling characters and a bravely moralistic backbone that isn’t afraid to tackle some substantial issues are even better. Something like Tom Miller’s exquisitely good, The Philosopher’s Flight, a novel that Continue Reading
Star Trek: Discovery: “That Hope is You, Part 2” (S3, E3 review)
SPOILERS AHEAD … BADASSERY, BROKEN HOLOS AND THE POWER OF FOUND FAMILIES … Wow, well, the final episode of Star Trek: Discovery season 3 is utterly rip your heart out, put it in again brilliant with the humanity of the full speed ahead storyline so breathtakingly good that you have Continue Reading