culture
Book Review - All Lee Child's books
For this month’s company newsletter I was asked to review a book I have read recently. I decided to review all of the wonderful Jack Reacher novels by Lee Child together as I honestly can’t separate out all the characters and plots.
I hope you enjoy.
April 28, 2008 |
Category » culture
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Josh Ritter: All grown-up!
It was foolish of us really.
We went to the Cambridge Folk Festival in 2004, not intending to see Josh, but as these festivals go, you end up seeing a lot of people you don’t know.
Josh came on stage all by himself. He looked about 20. He had curly hair, a beat up guitar, a dark suit, shy on the mic … but played for an hour with the energy and sound of 10 people.
He blew us away.
I immediately bought all his cds and we listen to the often. But somehow we just don’t buy that many cds here and haven’t bought is last two albums. So we were more than a little surprised when we arrived the the Shepherd’s Bush Empire to see a setup for an eight piece band.
We were even more surprised to see him walk on stage. He cut his hair and looked a foot taller (impossible I know) and certainly wasn’t shy anymore. All the new songs and and many of the old ones where redone to fit the expanded band. But it was good — really good. He even added to Harrisburg an section of a Modest Mouse song that I love (Tiny Cities Made of Ashes) but is pretty obscure. He did play a few older tunes and a few with a smaller set of back-up.
Definitely catch him if you can.
November 23, 2007 |
Category » culture
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Was that Santa?
“Dad, was that really Santa?”
“Humm, what did you think Owen?”
“Well, he didn’t say ‘HO HO HO’”
“Is that what Santa does?”
“Yes and is fat with a white beard and he wants to make toys all the time…”
“So Santa has sudden urges to make toys?”
“Yes”
“Maybe that was just one of Santa’s helpers then”
“I think so”
December 3, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Book Festival — Giorgio Locatelli
Last night the wife and I attended a talk with Giorgio Locatelli at the Petersham Hotel in Richmond as part of the Richmond Book Now 2006 Festival.
The event was lovely. Served champagne and canapés before the talk. Giorgio was also mingling with people, which was unexpected. The talk was very intimate, about 50 people only. Giorgio talked about his book, his views on artists vs. artisans, sourcing, his life and more. It was very informal with the audience asking loads of questions and guiding the talk.
At the end, Giorgio signed copies of the book and chatted some more. We got a copy and I have to say, its huge and looks wonderful.
November 8, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Play — Avenue Q
Usually I like my comedy dark & twisted, but adult & irreverent works too. Avenue Q has it nailed. Wrapped up as a sort of Sesame Street for adults — a musical with puppets — it is actually a far more interesting guide to starting out in life having coming from a largely useless liberal arts university (something I know a lot about).
The songs are hilarious, the puppets add a visual humour that actors probably couldn’t get away with. My favourite songs had to be Schadenfreude, sung by Gary Coleman (really!) about why being a bum or a washed up child actor was good for hummanity, We Are All a Little Bit Racist and of course, The Internet was Made for Porn.
If you can see this, I really recommend that you do.
June 26, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Books — Doctored Evidence
Doctored Evidence
By by Donna Leon
Rating: ★★★★
Again, an excellent Guido Brunetti mystery. This one is about a old widow found murdered. Nearly everyone who knew the lady wished her dead. Too many false trails nearly distract Guido from solving the case, but he gets there in the end. About three quarters of the way through I figured out where the solution lay, buy didn’t know until the final twenty pages. Very exciting.
June 19, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Books — Death at La Fenice
Death at La Fenice
By by Donna Leon
Rating: ★★★★½
This is my second Commissario Guido Brunetti mystery. I liked it better than the first one I read, Uniform Justice as it didn’t really have the same strange passive acceptance of corruption at the end. Perhaps Italians laugh that non-Italians like these books because they are romantic in their own way, but I admit, I loved Venice and the setting of these stories does add to how much I like them.
Brunetti is an interesting complex and human character. The whole setting is believable. A famous conductor doesn’t appear for the third act of an opera and is found poisoned in his dressing room. Who did it, an old flame, a young wife, a singer in the troupe or the producer? Interesting to the end, even if you know who, you don’t really know why.
If you like mysteries, I recommend reading these.
June 12, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Books — Uniform Justice
Uniform Justice
By by Donna Leon
Rating: ★★★★
A good friend loaned me this book. Something I would never have picked up on my own. However, I read it and really liked it. Its sort of a cross between a crime/detective story and a travelogue. You get a decent crime to be solved, but in Venice and learn about the life of a family there.
While the characters are well done, the morality play is a little hard to ponder in this one, where coruption wins the day. Perhaps this is reality, but it sort of feels pathetic at the same time. I am now well on my way to reading the rest of the series.
June 4, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Books — Gods in Alabama
Gods in Alabama
By by Joshilyn Jackson
Rating: ★★★★½
As you can tell by the rating, I really liked this book. Its the story of a young woman forced to face her past and go back on her three promises to God. The characters are really well written and the mystery is carefully revealed in a quick paced narrative with detailed flashbacks. It is not until the very end that you understand the whole picture and only then can you think back to several hints that were there along the way, but you might have missed.
Joshilyn Jackson’s characters are well written and the sub-plots all work and distract only as required. I am hugely impressed with this as her first major work.
May 18, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Books — Dublin
Dublin
By Edward Rutherfurd
Rating: ★★★★
I have read Rutherfurd’s Russka, Sarum and New Forrest and liked or loved them all. I think this was better than the New Forrest but fell down at the end. The characters and storyline from the start up through Brian Boru were amazing, but the English period really slowed down and the links to the previous generations much more tenuous. I also didn’t like the unrequited love story of the monk and his love. I don’t think real people would have done this, nor did Rutherfurd subject his monk in the New Forrest to such chastity.
That said, I did like it and would recommend it. Its a very human way to learn about history, specially the role of religion and migration and law in this book.
May 14, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Books — The Forrest
The Forrest
By Edward Rutherfurd
Rating: ★★★½
I have read Rutherfurd’s Russka and Sarum and loved both. This book was nearly as good, but somthing was missing in the starting and final vignette — you just didn’t know or care about the modern era. However, its an interesting gendre that Rutherfurd has started and very good way to learn about the history of a place. Basically he follows a series of families for centuries in a single place. This book is about the New Forrest in South West England, near to wear we go camping.
The characters in throughout are really well crafted and the movement of traits and crafts and objects moving through the generations are powerful. I felt that this book some of the characters were even more tragic than they had to be. But if you like historical fiction and are interested in a funny little corner of Britain, this book is worth a read.
April 8, 2006 |
Category » culture
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World Book Day 2006
Today is world book day and the boys have been planning all week who to go to school as. Sadly, we only have about four choices of costume, so it isn’t that hard to pick.
My eldest is an ‘Erosaurus’ from Hilary’s non-fiction, dinosaur pop-up book. My youngest is the goldfish from Cati in the Hat. Even the boy’s teachers were dressed up. One teacher was ‘Little Red Ridding Hood’ and the other was ‘Bob the Builder’ — I have to do school pick-up today!
Very cute.
March 2, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Play — The Exonerated
We were lucky enough to see The Exonerated at Riverside Studios in Hammersmith tonight. It was one of the most incredible stories I have ever heard. It is the true life stories of six completely innocent people held for huge parts of their lives on ‘death row’ only to be released later. All the words were taken from interview and court transcripts.
The play is minimalist, with all the actors simply reading from tall chairs with spotlights to highlight the transition of voices. The stories interweave and the actors often play the parts of other people. The power and eloquence of the narrative is compelling and the acting was perfect. There were no overt messages about the US justice system or about the death penalty — it didn’t need it. The stories laid plain the fact that in the case of high profile murders, the police and prosecutors will often do ‘whatever it takes’ to make people feel that the case is solved, even if it means killing innocent, but down and out people.
Most of the players where actors, some celebrities, we had Delroy Lindo and Adain Quinn, but the others were equally good. One person was playing herself, Sunny Jacobs, whose partner was murdered, even after the true killer confessed.
I was a powerful statement against quick justice and the death penalty itself. Killing one innocent person by mistake isn’t worth the benefits of having the threat of death.
February 22, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Play — James Saunders' Games & After Liverpool
Last night we had the pleasure of seeing two fantastic one act plays by the late James Saunders at the Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond. The first play was After Liverpool, a witty, spinning set of conversation between couples, new and old, exploring how people can fail to communicate even when they are talking by either not saying anything, not listening or simply evading. Sadly, all of us have had nearly everyone of these conversations at some point in your lifetime of relationships. It was beautifully directed and acted. A rare pleasure.
The second play was Games, which attempts (and succeeds) on breaking the barrier between the actors, the acting, the performance and eventually the audience. You are pulled into watching the actors preparing for a play, but you don’t know what is the practice and the discussion of the play. Jarringly the play stops at a point and invites (unknowingly) the audience to comment on the theme of the play within the play. At our performance, people were slow to open up, but the audience comment’s came and were amazingly thoughtful and thought provoking. Very interesting lesson in personal and moral responsibility, powerfully illustrated.
February 3, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Puppet Show — Seas of Organillo
Last night we went with our friends Allen and Nilgun to the London International Mime Festival’s showing of Seas of Organillo by Stephen Mottram. The website descibed the play as this;
“The ancient seas of Organillo are warm and mysterious. This is where babies are made. In a sensual journey from fertility to birth, Mottram’s puppets swim and wriggle through our deepest Freudian oceans. Music by Argentine composer Sebastian Castagna, recorded on a miniature street organ - an organillo.”
And, yes it was that strange.
The puppets were amazing. Mottram cleverly used anamatronics to create little illusions that they puppets were live, like a flywheel to make these bipedal aliens swim, or a man rowing a boat. The performance appeared to be flawless, with no dropped or missed, or tangled anything. The craftsmanship and artistry was amazing as well. At one point he took a puppet of a single fish and slowly transformed it into a school of a dozen fish all darting around together.
It was the abstractness of the story that really got me. I couldn’t really guess what he was suggesting. I found myself asking:
- Does he think that space aliens mated with fish to create more complex mammals and ultimately man?
- What is that calm doing?
- Are there really two alien puppets humping?
- Did that egg really just eat six fish?
Seriously, it was a little odd — but highly enjoyable.
At the end of the show he came out and showed the ‘organillo’ which he had to make as no museum would loan him one. That showed him as a funny, clever, talented and entertaining human as well as puppeteer.
January 27, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Exhibition — China: The Three Emperors
Having been to China twice and generally in love with their art and culture, I had to see this show at the Royal Academy of Arts. China: The Three Emperors absolutely lived up to my expectations. The size, range and quality of the works was impressive. 
Real care was taken to preserve all the clothing, furniture and scrolls — everything was in perfect condition.
Learning from previous experience, we got the boys ‘kids’ audio guides which gave us a full two hours to peruse. The scrolls and paintings were the most exciting for me. The gallery had unrolled some 60-70 feet of many of them. The detail was fantastic.
If you have a chance to see this, make the effort. Its worth it.
January 5, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Books — The Diving-bell and the Butterfly
The Diving-bell and the Butterfly
By Jean-Dominique Bauby
Rating: ★★★★
This was the saddest book that I can remember reading since Charlotte’s Web. It is so well written and Jean-Do so much avoids pulling the obvious strings that it only makes the book more poetic and sad. Afterwards you want to just find your family and friends and tell them how much you love and cherish them, then really learn to enjoy life. Not that he had any real regrets, just that he only missed these things, not the wealth, power or job.
It is the true story of a man, editor of Elle in Paris who has a massive stroke around the base of the brain. So is effectively becomes a quadriplegic. In fact, the only part of his body that he can truly control is his left eye. He dictates the book by blinking it to a person recording. Amazing to think of it.
The book is a series of vignettes where he explains what his life as a ‘locked-in’ is, what he misses, visits and his memories of the day of the stroke. Only in the preface do you know that he died only a few months after finishing the book and only two or so years after the accident.
Its very moving and something everyone should read.
January 3, 2006 |
Category » culture
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Books — The Sum of All Fears
The Sum of All Fears
by Tom Clancy
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
After having read Red Rabbit and not being too happy with it, I decided to get this from the library. I had heard good things about the book, even though Ben Affleck was Jake Ryan in the movie (which I refused to see on those grounds, in fact, I wasn’t too happy that Harrison Ford stole the role from Alex Baldwin in the first place, but that is another post I should write).
This book was much better. Even more outrageous in terms of feasibility, it was far more interesting to follow. In fact the last 200 pages or so was a sprint to finish — I couldn’t put it down. There were some thin plot points, but not many. He didn’t deal with how the president was removed from office so quickly, killed off a bad submarine captain a little too easily, etc… but generally it was believable, scary and so well written. I really enjoyed it.
December 28, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Play — The Nutcracker
We figured that this might be the year to take the boys (aged 4 and 6) to see The Nutcracker. We have fond memories of seeing it as children and as adults. The production we picked was the English National Ballet’s version at the Coliseum.
While the costumes and the set was really well done, designed by the excellent Gerald Scarfe. The ballet itself was quite boring. Not just for me, the boys weren’t that interested either. It wasn’t the dancing either, it was the choreography.
There was a lot of walking around and very little dancing. On top of that, I felt that the director sort of ‘ignored’ the hints in the music to parallel the motions… if you know what I mean. Perhaps I was always spoiled by seeing George Balanchine versions in New York and Milwaukee. But I was pretty unhappy considering the cost, it was not the magical day out I was hoping for.
December 23, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Books — Red Rabbit
Red Rabbit
by Tom Clancy
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆
Once upon a time my aunt worked for Penguin/New American Library and got me all the Clancy books as they were published. She has since retired and I basically stopped reading them. So it was a nice homecomming of sorts to take “Red Rabbit” out of the library and enter the world of Jack Ryan again.
The book is so well written and Clancy’s narative style is so excellent that you almost don’t notice the real plot failures all the way through. Only now has I sit down to write about it do I realize how bad some of the flaws really were. Basically, the hero of the serise, Jack Ryan entire role in the book is passive and only vaguely related to the main plots. Of those two plots, one where a family defects Russia, happens with so little insident that its almost a let down. The other, where the Pope is shot, adds something interesting to the real life events, but seems so poorly pulled together at the end that its almost seems an afterthought, even though hundreds of pages set it up!
December 14, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Concert — Ezio
I don’t know where she found this band, but Angela out of the blue ordered two albums from their website. Then has been watching them to play a show in London that we can go to. It ended up being tonight. They were amazing.
The show was all the way in Islington at the Bar Academy, all they way in the North East corner of London and we live in the South West. We drove, just to make sure getting home wasn’t too bad. The place was small, about 200 covers. We arrived with about 20 minutes to wait before Ezio went on stage.
The concert was about two hours long and they played loads of songs we knew and many more that sounded equally well written. Ezio was very funny between songs saying things like:
This is a newish song… so we will probably fuck it up.
or, when a string broke during the encore and he couldn’t do the song everyone wanted…
Sorry, I ain’t gonna play that, I have played that one a million times… and this isn’t a democracy… they told me that song was going to be huge on the aerobics circuit and I was going to be rich… fuck it, I am playing this one instead.
All the musicians were excellent, specially Booga, the huge lead guitar player and the drummer.
They songs were magnificent and Ezio’s voice is near perfect. Some times you wonder why they didn’t make it big? Perhaps the acoustic guitars?
Anyway, I would recommend seeing them if you can.
November 16, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Book — Bon Appetit!: Travels Through France with Knife, Fork and Corkscrew
Bon Appetit!: Travels Through France with Knife, Fork and Corkscrew
by Peter Mayle
Much like my feelings about A Year in Provence this was a good light read. Written in same style, that of memoires, Peter Mayle travels France visiting seeming strange country fairs celebrating special food festivals and celebrations. Its part descriptive and part journal, so it never attempts to authoritative, just light hearted. Again, the book is peppered with enough French phrases to throw off anyone without some good understanding of the language (albeit briefly). The cast of characters (his friends and people he meets) are as interesting.
If you like this style of writing, give it a go.
November 7, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Chihuly at Kew Gardens
All summer Kew has had a Dale Chihuly exhibit. As we go to Kew quite often with the boys, we have seen it in bits and pieces and have been impressed the individual works and impressed by how organic many of them look and how well they fit in with Kew’s displays. However tonight was something altogether more special, a night time tour of all the pieces, all specially lit. It was really magically.
All the works really came alive. Some seemed to be strange new plants, some ornaments, some new chandeliers. From the Temperate House to the pond to the Princess of Wales House you walked on lit paths with entertainers along the way. We all loved it.
We have also never seen Kew so busy, even for their music events in the summer. The place was just heaving with families and groups of friends. I am glad we arrived early and missed 80% of the crowds.
If the exhibit ever comes to a garden near you, I strongly recommend going to any night events.
October 30, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Books — A Year in Provence
A Year in Provence
by Peter Mayle
This was really the first of the new generation of ultimate travel memoirs from people who actually immerse themselves in a place by moving there. Personally, I think these can be a good read, but the author really puts the way of life they are sharing at risk to millions of potential copycats and tourists trying to visit all the places in the books.I don’t know about what has happened to the Mayle’s since publication, but I know Frances Mayes, author of Under a Tuscan Sun, ultimately had to move.
That said, I did like the book. Its a wity, enjoyable year in the life of an English couple who moved to Provence. You learn about life in the region, house construction and all the magic and mundane of ordinary life.
The only negative comment would be the overuse of French phrases peppered throughout the book. While they give the flavor of the country, they are pretty disarming to the non-French speaker. I even speak some French and struggled with much of it.
October 23, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Julius Caesar at the Lyric Hammersmith
We went to see Julius Caesar at the Lyric Hammersmith with some friends. It was great. I don’t think I have ever seen it performed, but read the play a few times. This was a Royal Shakespeare Company staging — very modern, and well acted. Marc Anthony, Brutus and Cassius were specially well done.
Afterwards we even had time for two leisurely pints at the St Margarets Travern
September 23, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Book — If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things
If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things
by Jon McGregor
Recommended by a friend to my wife, she read it and loved it. So, for a quick trip to New York, I read it … and loved it. Its really as much a poem as a novel. It takes place in England — somewhere, but really could be anywhere in the world.
The ‘remarkable thing’ about this book is that its all about the tiny observations, movements and changes that make the characters and plot move. There are no big sweeping statements or movements, its all about hundreds of fragments that are someone’s day and life. Its like observing the fingering on the third violin, then the bow work of the tenth and the trench horn player turning and then realizing that its part of a symphony being played.
I highly recommend reading it.
September 16, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Play — Guys & Dolls
I love the movie and the music, plus this production was starring Ewan McGregor, so we decided to get tickets. Basically, it was excellent. I loved the sets, the acting, the music, the sound and the singing. They really did a great job. My only complaint was that the accents seemed a little fake (which they were).
Oh, and the theatre really needs to open more doors at intermission, getting to the pub next door where our pints were waiting took nearly 15 minutes!
September 13, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Book — Freakonomics
Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
by Steven Levitt & Stephen Dubner
Well, I am probably the second last person ever to read this book. It was a quick read and very interesting; however, I wish it wasn’t quite so dumbed down. It was so commercial that I missed the real hard work and out-of-the-box thinking that was required to put each vignette together. It also stops short of bringing any morality into the topics at all, purposely — but I think its hard to discuss how legalized abortion led to a massive decline in crime 15-20 years later and not think of ethics!
Ah well, a good read and fun to discuss.
August 30, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Book — Collapse : How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive
Collapse : How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive
by Jared Diamond
This book is the philosophical follow-up to the Pulitzer Prize winning Guns, Germs & Steel, one of the most thought provoking books I have ever read; however, this ones is completely engaging in a very different way — it brings the conclusions to today and the near future. Sadly these answers aren’t so good for modern first world societies.
Diamond brilliantly finds parallels from modern Montana and Greenland of a thousand years before and countless powerful examples of societies that succeeded, then fell. He found some 13 key factors; however, only a few really mattered and one ruled them all. The few that mattered seem to be:
- environmental factors
- breakdown of a good trade partner
- violence from aggressive neighbour or internal war
In reality, the only one that really matters is the environment. If that’s stable, you rarely even have problems with the other 12 factors. And even more scary, the most important environmental factor seems to be around trees — if you don’t have good forestry management, you destroy your soil fertility, create solid erosion, create water problems and more. There are only a few societies that have managed to do any kind of forest management; Tikiopia, Germany (recently), Japan (only within Japan, they are striping the rest of Asia bare!) and New Guinea.
When you draw forward to today and look at all the other ecological problems we are creating, we are nearly doomed. Consider:
- massive deforestation of the world’s rain forests, Australian forests, North American and Asian forests
- massive destruction of nearly all the world’s fisheries
- salinization and errosion of top soil everywhere
- industrial pollution
Basically, there is no way to ignor this warning. The world needs to act to survive. This isn’t just about curbing waste, this is about completely changing the way we manage shared and private resources. This is about living with far less stuff — think comfortable 2nd world — having less children immediately, starting to repair the environmental damage that has been done — and doing it all right now.
Sadly, I know that this will never happen until it is too late. I now know that in my life-time and in my children’s the world will become damaged, war-torn in places and poorer. And I know it doesn’t have to be that way.
I recommend this book to everyone specially those with power to help change the world.
August 16, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Concert — Kings of Leon
I have loved the music of the Kings of Leon from before the release of Youth & Young Manhood. At once they sound familiar, like some thing from the 70’s, but more energy. I had wanted to see them on their previous tour, but couldn’t arrange the sitter, etc.
We finally got to see them after the release of their second album, the equally excellent, Aha Shake Heartbreak and it was a good thing too. They have so little material that for the encores, they had to replay some songs they played previously.
However, they are very good live with a ton of energy. Good musicians as well. They only note would be they have to banter between songs at all. No stories or anything…
I can’t wait for their third album.
June 19, 2005 |
Category » culture
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Book — At the Edge of Honor
At the Edge of Honor
by Robert Macomber
My father-in-law loaned me this book. He had heard the author speak recently and was impressed with him. Apparently he has lectured at Annapolis on guerrilla tactics and is a sailor.
I assumed it would be pretty boring, as it deals with a fictional captain in the East Gulf Blockading Squadron during the Civil War. Not that it wouldn’t be well written, but really, how much happened there…
Surprisingly, a lot happened and the book is very well written. While some of the story-lines weren’t as interesting, I really enjoyed it. In fact, I am looking forward to read the next two books in the series.
April 9, 2005 |
Category » culture
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