Category: Book Reviews

I didn’t go to the cin­ema very often as a child.  My first film on the big screen was Star Wars, although that was a mis­take and I should have been watch­ing Snow White instead.  Any­way, I have very fond mem­o­ries of that film but prob­a­bly my biggest child­hood cin­ema mem­o­ries are from the Indian Jones […]

Author Janet Evanovich I was lucky enough to stum­ble onto Janet Evanovich back in ’95 when her book ‘One for the Money’ came out in the UK.  At the time I was work­ing near a large Water­stones and I’d often pop in to have a look dur­ing my lunch hour.  I still recall (what strange mem­o­ries […]

I was sixteen years old and I was miserable. I was flunking in all my high-school classes, my mother and I had a horribly abusive relationship, I saw my father only on the weekends if that…and I hated myself. I had heard about James Dean, but had never seen any of his work. One night, […]

When I was 20 I became love sick.  I was dumped by my boyfriend and I pined my life away.  I caught ton­sil­li­tis then chicken pox and finally I was knocked on my der­riere by glan­du­lar fever (mono — if you’re over the pond) all in the space of 6 months.   If you’ve ever had […]

“I’m Gen­tle­man Death in silk and lace, come to put out the can­dles. The canker in the rose.” ~Lestat~ (Anne Rice) I thought since we’re approach­ing the night on Octo­ber 31 where the crea­tures of the night, cel­e­brate the moon­light, I’ll tell you about two of those crea­tures, their names are Louis and Lestat, and they are […]

For some peo­ple it’s a church or place of wor­ship which is a refuge, a safe loca­tion to take a step out of every­day life and to breath.  I’ve always headed straight for a library when I need safety and respite from the daily grind or when prob­lems need attention. There is some­thing com­pelling and […]

The children’s library, when I was a child, was a mag­i­cal place.  The walls were full of book­shelves and in the mid­dle of the room there were boxes of books.  All kinds of lit­tle kid books.  Adven­ture, ani­mals, pirates and best of all witches.  It was in one of those crammed full boxes I found […]

Negress in Notre Dame By Robert W. Ser­vice (1874–1958) When I attended Mass today A colored maid sat down by me, And as I watched her kneel and pray, Her rev­er­ence was good to see. For whether there may be or no’ A mer­ci­ful and mighty God, The love for Him is like a glow That […]

I remem­ber sit­ting in school learn­ing about his­tory and it would be all dates, pol­i­tics and lots and lots of yawn­ing. I’ve always loved learn­ing about the past but school made his­tory dead. How I wish Hor­ri­ble His­to­ries books were about back then! My sons bring them home from school and I bor­row them. Actu­ally, […]

My hus­band picked out The Gar­goyle by Andrew David­son for me at our local library. The only rea­son the book caught his eye was that I’m a big fan of gar­goyles (and grotesques) so he thought I might enjoy it. I picked it up and almost put it down again because it was a love […]