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![]() ![]() ![]() The whole novel hinges upon his grief at the death of his wife, but I can’t imagine a charming, pleasant person like Sonja marrying an obnoxious asshole like Ove. There is absolutely nothing likable about him. The problem is that life is so bad with Ove around. In between yelling at people for driving into a no-vehicle area, obsessively checking the neighborhood for burglaries, and shouting about how the world is trying to cheat him, Ove learns to open up to the people in his life and realize that maybe life isn’t so bad after all. Distraught at her loss, Ove attempts on several occasions to commit suicide, only to be interrupted by various neighbors-chief among them a pregnant Iranian named Sarvaneh, who is new to the neighborhood-who need him to fix something for them or drive them somewhere or adopt a cat. The novel follows a grouchy old man called Ove whose cheerful wife Sonja died six months previously. I wrote very in-depth discussion questions for book club that you can check out here. I have absolutely no idea why, and I’ve thought a lot about it. A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman is an inexplicable bestseller that receives almost unanimously rave reviews. ![]() ![]() By spring 1943, there were 300 miles of paved roads and 55 miles of railroad tracks within the valley that could only be accessed through seven gates. Kiernan’s story is about the central role of women in establishing a sense of community in a place that didn’t exist before the war, where people from many differing social backgrounds had to work together to make successful a project that none of them actually knew what they were creating, and that ultimately the conclusion of the war depended upon: the uranium enrichment facilities at Oak Ridge, Tennessee.Ĭodenamed Site X, work on the Clinton Engineering Works in a 17 mile-long valley in rural Tennessee originally envisioned the creation of a town of 13,000 people when General Leslie Groves ordered construction to begin in September 1942. One of the more recent and interesting books on this theme is Denise Kiernan’s The Girls of Atomic City: The Untold Story of the Women Who Helped Win World War II. ![]() As we celebrate women in World War II, it is a time to recognize their often overlooked contributions in our history. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Quite by accident, the alien soon finds himself learning more about the professor, his family, and “the humans” than he had ever expected. Yet, things are never that simple, especially not such a bizarre world like Earth. Sent to Earth to destroy any evidence of Andrew Martin’s greatest achievement the solution to the most difficult mathematical problem faced by humans to date, The Riemann Hypothesis, to halt human progression, his job was meant to be a quick and simple task, it was meant to last only a few days, it was meant to be a punishment. ![]() This revelation soon strikes the alien impostor, from a (very very very very very…very) distant planet known as Vonnadoria, as a shock as he is now the sole occupant of the recently deceased professor’s body. However, it quickly becomes apparent that the dear professor wasn’t a particularly redeeming character– in fact, he was downright awful and that’s putting it mildly. Our (supposed) hero, Professor Andrew Martin, is already dead before the book even begins. 2: The Humans by Matt Haig, while delightful contains reference to infidelity and suicide, read at your own risk. “The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience.”― Emily Dickinson ![]() ![]() ![]() Deliver Us From Evil gets itself caught up in cop drama cliches that it’s never able to overcome. The decision to turn Deliver Us From Evil into a cop drama with elements of horror is what helps the film to differentiate itself from other exorcism films but it also ends up being its downfall. ![]() ![]() He joins forces with a jesuit priest, who is schooled in rituals of exorcism, to combat the evil that is terrorizing the city. ![]() Similar to The Exorcism of Emily Rose, Derrickson approaches Deliver Us From Evil by combining the horror genre with another one, a cop drama.ĭeliver Us From Evil follows the real life story of NY police officer Ralph Sarchie (Eric Bana) as he investigates crimes that look to be supernatural in nature. That film combined a traditional court room drama with the conventions of a horror/exorcism film. His first big budget film was The Exorcism of Emily Rose, a film that divided audiences when it was first released. Nonetheless, no one loves exorcisms as much as Scott Derrickson. It’s still chilling to watch an exorcism take place on screen but we can always predict the elements involved. Well damn, another exorcism movie! We’ve seen so many movies and shows approach this concept without offering anything new to the formula. ![]() ![]() To even stand a chance at surviving their freshmen year, the trio must join forces as they navigate a bullying culture dominated by administrators like the once popular Ms. But within this desperate place, Peter befriends fellow freshmen Noah Stein, a volatile classmate whose face bears the scars of a hard-fighting past, and the beautiful but lonely Lorelei Paskal -so eager to become popular, she makes only enemies. On his first day, tensions are clearly on the rise as a picked-upon upperclassmen finally snaps, unleashing a violent attack on both the students who tormented him for so long, and the corrupt, petty faculty that let it happen. With a plunging reputation and enrollment rate, Saint Michael's has become a crumbling dumping ground for expelled delinquents and a haven for the stridently religious when incoming freshman Peter Davidek signs up. Three freshmen must join forces to survive at a troubled, working-class Catholic high school with a student body full of bullies and zealots, and a faculty that's even worse in Anthony Breznican's Brutal Youth ![]() ![]() ![]() Sylvia loves to paint so Audrina hires an art teacher to come to their home but that doesn’t go as planned. ![]() ![]() Audrina keeps trying to be a good wife and take care of her sister. When Audrina’s father passes away the home becomes even more unhappy. Her marriage is crumbling because of her infertility and because her husband has grown cruel and self centered as the years have gone by. I felt like this might be just a money grab by Andrew Neiderman, the ghost writer for Andrews, like he’s been doing lately with all of the Flowers in the Attic sequels and unfortunately after reading the book I’m even more sure of that.Īudrina Adare is a young, married woman still living in her childhood home with her husband, Arden, her mentally disabled younger sister, Sylvia and her father. My Sweet Audrina was released in 1982 while Whitefern wasn’t released until 2016. Eventually I’m sure I’ll backtrack and review it here. The link above will take you to the My Sweet Audrina Wikipedia page or you can read the book yourself, which I recommend. I do not review books that I haven’t recently read. It is the sequel to My Sweet Audrina and I usually would not review a sequel before the first book, however, I’ve read My Sweet Audrina around three times and I just wasn’t in the mood to read it again right now. ![]() With that being said, Whitefern is one of the newer releases that I really wanted to read. This genre of books (drama) are something I have to really be in the mood to read. I have been on a VC Andrews kick here lately. ![]() ![]() ![]() Deep down in their souls, they can feel they are the same.īut when Catherine's father dies and the household's treatment of Heathcliff only grows more cruel, their relationship becomes strained and threatens to unravel. Catherine knows she must mold herself into someone pretty and good and marriageable, even though it might destroy her spirit.Īs they occasionally flee into the moors to escape judgment and share the half-remembered language of their unknown kin, Catherine and Heathcliff come to find solace in each other. Her father is grooming her for a place in proper society, and that's all that matters. ![]() ![]() ![]() As the abandoned son of a lascar-a sailor from India-Heathcliff has spent most of his young life maligned as an "outsider." Now he's been flung into an alien life in the Yorkshire moors, where he clings to his birth father's language even though it makes the children of the house call him an animal, and the maids claim he speaks gibberish.Ĭatherine is the younger child of the estate's owner, a daughter with light skin and brown curls and a mother that nobody talks about. Sometimes, lost things find their way home. Two British Indian teens cut off from their heritage find solace in each other in this gothic Wuthering Heights YA remix that subverts the default whiteness of the original text. In the Remixed Classics series, authors from marginalized backgrounds reinterpret classic works through their own cultural lens to subvert the overwhelming cishet, white, and male canon. ![]() ![]() ![]() The story was first serialised from March to July 1844, during the July Monarchy, four years before the French Revolution of 1848 violently established the Second Republic. However, Dumas also frequently works into the plot various injustices, abuses, and absurdities of the old regime, giving the novel an additional political aspect at a time when the debate in France between republicans and monarchists was still fierce. Like the other two films, the screenplay was written by George MacDonald Fraser. It is the third Musketeers film directed by Richard Lester, following 1973's The Three Musketeers and 1974's The Four Musketeers. ![]() In genre, The Three Musketeers is primarily a historical and adventure novel. The Return of the Musketeers is a 1989 film adaptation loosely based on the novel Twenty Years After (1845) by Alexandre Dumas. ![]() Although d'Artagnan is not able to join this elite corps immediately, he befriends the three most formidable musketeers of the age - Athos, Porthos and Aramis, "the three inseparables", as these are called - and gets involved in affairs of the state and court. Situated between 16, it recounts the adventures of a young man named d'Artagnan (based on Charles de Batz-Castelmore d'Artagnan) after he leaves home to travel to Paris, to join the Musketeers of the Guard. The Three Musketeers is a historical adventure novel written in 1844 by French author Alexandre Dumas. ![]() ![]() ![]() John’s School, an inner city school that had its playground on the roof. His interest in adventure stories began at an early age with reading the books of: Daniel Defoe, Sir Henry Rider Haggard, Arthur Conan Doyle, Sir Thomas Malory, Robert Michael Ballantyne, Robert Louis Stevenson, Edgar Rice Burroughs, and Kenneth Grahame. Along with forty percent of the population of Liverpool, his ancestral roots are in Ireland, County Cork to be exact.He grew up in the area around the Liverpool docks. Ever the performer, Jacques is well-known for applying his acting and entertainment background to his lively presentations to legions of young fans at schools across the United States and England.Brian Jacques was born in Liverpool, England on June 15th, 1939. I hope they give their elders a chance to share the delights.”A well-known radio personality in his native Liverpool–as well as an actor, stand-up comic, and playwright–Brian Jacques is the host of “Jakestown” on BBC Radio Merseyside. ![]() ![]() Newbery Award winner Lloyd Alexander called it “a fine work, literate, witty, filled with the excitement of genuine storytelling. With the publication of his first children’s book in 1987, the award-winning Redwall, Jacques’ fresh talent has received exceptional praise from reviewers in the United States and England. “I sometimes think it ironic for an ex-seaman, longshoreman, truck driver, policeman, bus driver, etc., to find success writing children’s novels,” says Brian Jacques (pronounced “Jakes”). ![]() |