Difference between revisions of "Newest Entertainment Reviews"

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[[Category:Entertainment|*]]
 
[[Category:Entertainment|*]]
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{{newreview
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|author=John Van der Kiste
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{{Frontpage
|title=A Beatles Miscellany: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About the Beatles but Were Afraid to Ask
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|author=Patti Smith
|rating=5
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|title=Year of the Monkey
|genre=Reference
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|rating=4
|summary=You might have thought that just about everything which could be said about the Beatles had been said and certainly there's been no shortage of books about what went wrong, what happened to the money and even what went right. But what I've never seen before is a 'miscellany' - all those little facts which are so hard to track down and this is where historian John Van der Kiste comes into his own: he's a man with an eye for detail and the ability to bring everything together into a very readable wholeIt's a wonderful collection of the small facts.
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|genre=Biography
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781555826</amazonuk>
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|summary=On the coast of Santa Cruz, Patti Smith enters the lunar year of the monkey - one packed with mischief, sorrow, and unexpected moments. In a stranger's words, ''Anything is possible: after all, it's the year of the monkey''. As Smith wanders the coast of Santa Cruz in solitude, she reflects on a year that brings huge shifts in her life - loss and ageing are faced head on, as it the shifting political waters in America.
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|isbn=1526614758
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=Walton_Ask
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|title=Ask For Blues
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|author=Malcolm Walton
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|rating=3.5
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|genre=Autobiography
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|summary=Malcolm Walton's book is clearly a memoir about his introduction to the Trad Jazz scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s, but he has chosen to write it in the form of a novel, claiming in his prologue that this would give the book a different approach to the music memoir. His protagonist 'Martin' takes on Malcolm's mantle and begins with his first discovery of the Salvation Army band with his grandfatherThis catapults him into a love of music, initially taking piano lessons, and later delving into his true love – the trumpet.
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=Moore Bientot
 +
|title=A Bientot...
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|author=Roger Moore
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|rating=4
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|genre=Entertainment
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|summary=The news of the death of Sir Roger Moore in May 2017 came as a great shock: he was one of those people you knew would go on forever. There was just one small glimmer of light in the sadness - the news that a matter of days before his death he'd delivered the finished manuscript of his book, ''À bientôt…'', to his publishers. Just a few months later a copy landed on my desk and I didn't even bother to look as though I could resist reading it straight away.
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author= Julian Palacios
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|isbn=Maslanka Sherlock
|title= Syd Barrett & Pink Floyd: Dark Globe
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|title=Sherlock: The Puzzle Book
|rating= 4
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|author=Christopher Maslanka and Steve Tribe
|genre= Entertainment
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|rating=4
|summary= There were few sadder casualties of the sixties music scene than Syd (real name Roger) Barrett. The original songwriting genius and front man of Pink Floyd, he burnt out all too soon. A few months in the spotlight were followed all too soon by a pathetic postscript of a stuttering solo career, and over three decades as a largely housebound recluse.
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|genre=Entertainment
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0859655482</amazonuk>
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|summary=Who doesn't love a good puzzle, especially those really fiendish ones that get the brain working extra hard? There really is nothing to compare to that buzz we get from the Aha! moment, when everything falls into place and the solution reveals itself. If puzzles are your thing then you may wish to put your grey cells to the test with ''The Sherlock Puzzle Book'', based on the popular TV series.
 
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}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Jason Fry
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|isbn=Corcoran_Dylan
|title=Star Wars Rogue One: Mission Files
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|title=Do You Mr Jones?: Bob Dylan with the Poets and Professors
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|author=Neil Corcoran
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
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|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Out of several books I've seen to tie-in to the seventh official cinema movie in the ''Star Wars'' universe, this – and the resulting review – is the greatest source of spoilers.  What you get is a surprisingly mature look at the background and events to ''Rogue One'' for such a juvenile book, with some fine stills photographs, and a volume that introduces all the main characters and gears you up to understand and enjoy a lot of the events of the film.  So if you don't want to know those in advance, look away now.  But certainly consider this as a purchase for reading once you've watched it.
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|summary=Bob Dylan's award of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016 'for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition' proved highly controversial. It inevitably led some people in the literary world to take stock and look at his work and reputation with a fresh eye. This volume of essays was first published in 2002, and is now reissued with a new foreword by Will Self.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405285036</amazonuk>
 
 
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}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Lucasfilm
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|isbn=Kyncl_Stream
|title=Star Wars Rogue One: Art of Colouring
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|title=Stream Punks
|rating=3.5
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|author=Robert Kyncl and Maany Peyvan
|genre=Crafts
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|rating=4.5
|summary=Colour me happy that ''Rogue One: A Star Wars Story'' is around. While I've not had the chance of seeing it yet, I'm dead chuffed it takes place at a central point of the main arc of films' storylines, and not some nebulous place elsewhere in [[Star Wars: Galactic Atlas by Emil Fortune and Tim McDonagh|that galaxy far, far away]]. Yes, it does do what the 'new trilogy' did, and have much more gloss and many more technologies than the films set after it, but what is not to like?  Well, the expected expenditure on tie-in books and articles, I guess – several hundred pounds on ''one'' collector's card is a little steep. But seeing as I handily mentioned colouring above, in the vernacular, why not take it literally and use this large format paperback, promising ''100 Images to Inspire Creativity''?
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|genre=Entertainment
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405286377</amazonuk>
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|summary=I watch quite a lot of YouTube. I play music videos when I want to listen to a particular song I don't already have in my collection. I use it to find out how to do things, with the instruction videos they seem to have for pretty much anything. At the gym, I'll stick it on on my phone, prop it up on the cross-trainer and watch some behind the scenes interviews with the cast of my favourite shows. And sometimes I'll treat it as if it is Netflix, to watch series with new episodes releasing every few days, exclusively on YouTube. Having a new smart TV adds an extra, easy way to watch without having to plug in my laptop or squint at a small phone screen. So yes, I like YouTube and I use YouTube. But I didn't know a whole lot about the site it until I read this book.
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=JVDK_Swing
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|title=We Can Swing Together: The Story of Lindisfarne
 
|author=John Van der Kiste
 
|author=John Van der Kiste
|title=Pop Pickers and Music Vendors: David Jacobs, Alan Freeman, John Peel, Tommy Vance and Roger Scott
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=You know those questions you get in celebrity interviews - 'which extinct being would you most like to see brought back to life?' Well, I'd like to see Jimmy Savile brought back, so that he could get his comeuppanceIt's not just the damage he did to children and young people, dreadful as that was - it's the shadow he cast over the entertainment industryWe know that he wasn't alone in what he did, but somehow there's a whole era of entertainment which has been tarred by the same brushJohn Van der Kiste has turned the spotlight away from Savile and on to five of the great DJs of the music industry.
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|summary=It all began with a group of youngsters in North Shields.  Rod Clements, Simon 'Si' Cowe, Ray 'Jacka' Jackson and Ray Laidlaw formed ''The Downtown Faction'', soon changing the name to ''Brethren'' when they were joined by singer-songwriter Alan HullAs a US-based group had a similar name they opted to change the name again - and ''Lindisfarne'' (with the name taken from an island off the Northumberland coast) was bornMore than forty years on and with numerous changes of personnel the band is still very much aroundThey might not be touring or producing much in the way of new material, but they still perform, with Rod Clements, one of the original members on his fourth stint with the group.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781555443</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Emil Fortune and Tim McDonagh
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|isbn=JVDK_ELO
|title=Star Wars: Galactic Atlas
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|title=Electric Light Orchestra: Song by Song
|rating=3.5
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|author=John Van der Kiste
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=At the time of writing this review, people are eagerly tapping away at phones, laptops and screens everywhere to find out what they can about ''Rogue One'', the ''Star Wars'' film that's the first live action cinema effort to be off to one edge of the canon, and is five whole weeks away.  Perhaps, however, there is a chance that all the many books being released that mention the ability to tie in to ''Rogue One'' will let slip something important.  The volume at hand ''includes a map from…'' said movie, and all the maps here initially seem to feature a huge amount of information.  Could valuable secrets be herein?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405279982</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Marc Myers
 
|title= Anatomy of a Song: The Oral History of 45 Iconic Hits That Changed Rock, R&B and Pop
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary= This book developed from a series of columns of the same title which appeared in the ''Wall Street Journal'' over a period of five years, in which forty-five songs (what an appropriate number) from the years 1952 to 1991 were put under the microscope and examined through interviews with the artists, songwriters and others who created them.
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|summary=My memories of pop music in the early sixties revolve around guitars and drums, sometimes the piano with only occasional excursions into strings and brass. Pop music rarely stands still and it wasn't long before the basic instruments were seen as constraints and The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Beach Boys began to experiment, with other groups following where they led. Amongst these groups was The Move and their lead guitarist and songwriter, Roy Wood. Wood wanted to develop the group's sound by adding more instruments but was prevented from achieving what he wanted by cost limitations and because the rest of the group didn't really share his enthusiasm.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>080212559X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Stephen Moss
 
|title=Planet Earth II
 
|rating=5
 
|genre= Animals and Wildlife
 
|summary=''Planet Earth II'' is the official companion to the upcoming BBC wildlife documentary series of the same name. Our understanding of the world around us has reached a new level, courtesy of ground-breaking technology that gives us unparalleled access to a diverse range of environments and a ''sneak peek'' into previously hidden worlds. The book looks at six vastly different environments: Jungles, Mountains, Deserts, Grasslands, Islands and Cities and showcases some of the amazing creatures that live in each one.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849909652</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=John Seabrook
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|isbn=Watkins_Lets
|title= The Song Machine: How to Make a Hit
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|title=Let's Make Lots of Money: My Life as the Biggest Man in Pop
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|author=Tom Watkins
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary= The popular music business has always been about – well, business – and some might say that music comes a poor second. Ever since the advent of the 78 r.p.m. disc, record companies have competed with each other and sought new ways of marketing their goods. The songwriter, or if you like the person or partnership at the controls of ‘the song machine’, has long been a vital link in the chain. In today’s climate of increasingly free music, how much does this still hold true?
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|summary=Who on earth would be a manager in the larger than life, here today gone tomorrow world of pop? Anybody with an ego, a ruthless streak, an opportunity to embrace the chances and accept that it's not going to last, evidently. Tom Watkins is just one of several to have walked the fine line and, for part of the time, quite successfully. As his memoirs suggest, part of the time was achievement enough.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009959045X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Rod Green
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|isbn=Kendrick_Scrappy
|title=Only Fools and Horses: The Peckham Archives
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|title=Scrappy Little Nobody
|rating=4
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|author=Anna Kendrick
|genre=Entertainment  
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|rating=3.5
|summary=We are in the world of one of the country's most famous and well-loved sitcoms – even if it was sort-of killed off for Christmas 2003. Yes, there have been specials since, and more repeats to clog up the BBC schedules than is really pukka, but very few people failed to succumb to its charms at one time or another. I'm sure there have been books before now celebrating the stony-faced reception of ''that'' drop through the open bar hatch, and ''that'' chandelier scene, but this is much more meaty.  Purporting to be the family archives, found dumped in Nelson Mandela House, the documents here were passed from pillar to post, from one council worker in a department with a clumsy acronym to another, from them to the police – and now here they are being published for their social history worth. Will enough readers find them of worth, as the series quietly celebrates its 35th birthday?
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|genre=Entertainment
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849909245</amazonuk>
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|summary=Celebrity autobiographies. It's a genre long tainted by the examples of people who clearly didn't deserve to be a celebrity, let alone have a ghost-writer create their book, and by those who did so little but managed to churn out five memoirs before they were even thirty. But more recently it's become a way of staking a claim to importance for female comics. They've not all written autobiographies, as Bridget Christie proved, but enough have to provide for a rapidly-filling shelf at the bookstore. 2016 we had Amy Schumer winning a GoodReads award, Lena Dunham's been at it, and we've also got Anna Kendrick. Now she's not a strict comic – not all of her films are designed to make you laugh, and some of them that are just don't – but this has to be in the same bracket.
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author= Mojang AB
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|isbn=Ropek_Tragic
|title= Minecraft Exploded Builds: Medieval Fortress
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|title=Tragic Magic: The Life of Traffic's Chris Wood
|rating= 5
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|author=Dan Ropek
|genre= Entertainment
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|rating=4.5
|summary=If you have ever marvelled at the creative architecture designed by the talented members of the Minecraft community and been inspired to give it a go yourself, then ''Exploded Builds'' might be the perfect book for you. It is aimed at those of us who have the ambition but lack the necessary expertise to design such stunning buildings. ''Medieval Fortress'' will guide you every step of the way with detailed diagrams and customisation options, allowing you be king of you own castle in no time at all.
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|genre=Entertainment
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140528417X</amazonuk>
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|summary=Chris Wood was a member of Traffic, the group formed by Steve Winwood in 1967 after he left The Spencer Davis Group. A gifted musician best known for his flute and saxophone work, he also played keyboards, bass guitar and contributed backing vocals as well as having a hand in writing several of the songs and one or two instrumentals. This biography takes its title from the name of one of his compositions for their fifth album.
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Bruno Vincent
 
|title=Danger Mouse: Declassified
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Entertainment  
 
|summary=There is nothing else for it but to declare my love for ''Danger Mouse'' (and no, I don't mean the musician/producer, or the remake, which I've not sampled).  What I didn't know at the time to call 'breaking the fourth wall', the chutzpah and energy of the storytelling, and primarily the simple and simply brilliant character design made it one of my go-to sources for entertainment, and about the only thing that would get the TV switched to ITV, apart from ''Blockbusters''.  The dates on the front of this volume prove we're referring to the genius original series, but these contents seem to me fully new.  Taking it that they are, has the idea stood the test of time, and will people be on board for what is surely a much-belated tribute gift book?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0753545225</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author= Simon Callow
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|isbn=Dolby_Sound
|title=Orson Welles, Volume 3: One-Man Band
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|title=The Speed of Sound
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|author=Thomas Dolby
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
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|genre=Entertainment
|summary= Orson Welles, the noted actor, director and producer, was one of those larger than life characters whose impact on the world of stage and screen during his lifetime was inestimable. Simon Callow has found the task of condensing his story into a single volume is impossible, and this is the third of three solid instalments.
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|summary=From struggling post-punk musician to pop star, from Silicon Valley innovator to university professor, Thomas Dolby has had a remarkable if not unique career, often reinventing himself on the way. This memoir is based on his extensive notes and journals.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099502836</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Peter Doggett
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|isbn=Morris_Legion
|title= Electric Shock: From the Gramophone to the iPhone - 125 Years of Pop
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|title=The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains: Oddball Criminals from Comic Book History
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|author=Jon Morris
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary= For many of us, it must be difficult to imagine a life without recorded music. Millions of us must have grown up with, even to, a very varied soundtrack consisting of one genre after another. In this book, Peter Doggett takes a marvellous broad sweep through the history of popular music from the end of the nineteenth century to the present day, from wax cylinders to streaming services. A rather maudlin ditty 'After The Ball', by Charles K. Harris, is regarded as the first modern popular song (well, it was modern in 1891) – the first of millions.
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|summary=As much as I like comics – and I do, whether superhero ones or not – I have to admit one thing, namely that the villains in them are a bit pants. What is The Penguin but the world's worst Mafioso, with a hobby of waddling along like his pet birds? Where else do you win an Oscar of all things by playing a two-bit killer who just fell in a vat of random chemicals and changed colour, and got mardier as a result (although recently he's become a nanotech genius – but let's not go there)? And what is it with the gimp in the see-through plant pot because he is the embodiment of cold? And that's just some of the better-known enemies of ''Batman'', one of the better goodies. You can imagine how awful the baddies related to the bad goodies can be. And if you can't, this is the perfect primer.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184792218X</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author= John Lydon
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|isbn=Fletcher_Midnight
|title= Rotten: No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs
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|title=In the Midnight Hour: The Life & Soul of Wilson Pickett
|rating=3.5
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|author=Tony Fletcher
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|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary= Picking up this book immediately makes you wonder what exactly you make of John Lydon, the man who became notorious in the late 1970s as 'Johnny Rotten' of the Sex Pistols. Was he the iconoclast who if some of the tabloids were to be believed was about to destroy western civilization almost single-handed? Had he really come to destroy, or merely to use the showbusiness system and end up becoming part of what he had set out to fight, or both – or what?
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|summary=Tamla Motown groups and singers apart, in the mid-sixties there were three major names in the soul music field who mattered above all. James Brown was something of a cult name who rarely bothered about or troubled the singles charts, and Otis Redding was on the verge of shooting into the stratosphere when he died in an aeroplane crash. The other was the man from Alabama, 'the wicked Pickett'.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0859653412</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author= Nev Schulman
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|isbn=Paling_Reading
|title= In Real Life: Love, Lies & Identity in the Digital Age
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|title=Reading Allowed: True Stories and Curious Incidents from a Provincial Library
|rating= 4
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|author=Chris Paling
|genre= Reference
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|rating=4.5
|summary= Nev (it's pronounced Neev) is a man who knows about the darker side of online dating. Known for his documentary ''Catfish'' – a film which showed an online flirtation going sour, Nev then began making a tv show of the same name, travelling America to offer advice to those in online relationships, and possibly being catfished (which means being lured into a relationship by someone adopting a fictional online persona). Now the go-to expert in online relationships for millenials, a generation who have never known a world without Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other online places where interactions can form. Here, he takes his investigation to the page – exploring relationships in the era of social media, delving deeply into the complexities of dating in a digital age, and continuing the dialogue his show has begun about how we interact with each other online – as well as sharing insights from his own story.  
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|genre=Entertainment
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473608066</amazonuk>
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|summary=I once made a comical faux pas in a library when I was younger, but it certainly didn't put me off returning.  I once declared in a self-important way that I would start at the beginning of the books for young children and not stop til the end, then do the same for those for the older children – ''and then do it all over again with them'', I said, pointing at the large-print shelves. ''I hope not'', was the response but little me was only aware of a need for large font for my fellow whippersnappers, and not for any other reason.  Since then I've needed libraries, and going to them has been second nature. On the dole I made sure I could use the free Internet they provided to pay me back for my council tax; later I was intent on finding out if a Senior Library Assistant girl was worthy of her title, and of course, it saved a fortune on books for study and fun. I'm not alone in sharing the warmth of both their heating system and the very thing they were born to provide – books, but there was still a huge step up between my level of use and knowledge of them to actually working in one.  Which is where Chris Paling comes in.
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=John Howlett
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|isbn=Springsteen_Born
|title= James Dean: Rebel Life
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|title=Born to Run
|rating=4
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|author=Bruce Springsteen
|genre=Biography
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|rating=5
|summary= James Dean was in a sense to the 1950s what Sid Vicious was to the 1970s – the ultimate 'live fast, die young' character, although as the star of three classic movies of the era he achieved rather more in his short life than the hapless punk icon ever did in his.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0859655342</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author= Sue Perkins
 
|title= Spectacles
 
|rating= 4
 
|genre= Autobiography
 
|summary= A dash of drama, a sprinkling of gossip and a smattering of laugh-out-loud funny make for the best sort of memoir.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405918551</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Stephanie Milton
 
|title=Minecraft: The Survivors' Book of Secrets
 
|rating=3.5
 
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Ready to take your Minecraft game to the next level? Then you just might need the advice of a professional. 'The Survivors' are an elite group of gaming experts who are proficient in survival skills. They are breaking their cover to share their most precious secrets with us; valuable insider knowledge on the best ways to survive and prosper in the most inhospitable online environments. Minecraft proudly present their latest official book: ''The Survivors' Book of Secrets.''
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|summary=No, you haven't stumbled into a music review from the 1970s, I'm talking about The Boss's autobiography.  Lots of books have been written about Springsteen by folk who knew him, worked with him and by others who have only read the cuttings.  Over the last seven years he has been going about – not putting the record straight, exactly – but telling it from his own perspective.  As he puts it: ''Writing about yourself is a funny business''. By his own admission, it isn't the whole truth, discretion holds him back but ''in a project like this, the writer has made one promise, to show the reader his mind.'' ''In these pages, I've tried to do this.''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405283335</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Coco Balderrama and Laura Coulman
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|isbn=JVDK_Beatles
|title=David Bowie: Starman: A Colouring Book
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|title=A Beatles Miscellany: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About the Beatles but Were Afraid to Ask
|rating=4
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|author=John Van der Kiste
|genre=Crafts
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|rating=5
|summary=David Bowie's death in January 2016 came as a shock to me: we were much of an age and he'd always seemed so ''vital''.  But his final album, ''Blackstar'', seemed to foretell his death and was a commercial success, coming in at number one in the UK Top 100 Albums Chart, and the ''David Bowie Is'' exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum is the most successful exhibition ever staged by the V&A.  But what of a more relaxing memory of the man who was part genius and part chameleon?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0859655504</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author= Stephen Witt
 
|title= How Music Got Free: The Inventor, the Music Man, and the Thief
 
|rating= 4
 
|genre= Business and Finance
 
|summary= In the digital age, new technology made recorded music a free-for-all.  It was good news for the consumer, but dealt a major blow to the beleaguered music industry.  Where people once amassed physical collections, they now had the choice of file-sharing instead.  This book describes how everything changed from the mid-1990s onwards.  It is however written more with the computer enthusiast or business student than the music lover in mind.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1445636786</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Justin Richards
 
|title=Doctor Who: 365 Days of Memorable Moments and Impossible Things
 
|rating=4.5
 
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Is it any wonder that The Doctor's use of a diary is mentioned merely as a joke?  Let alone the fact it would come in whatever time unit (if any) Time Lords actually use, there's the problem of it not ever being chronological, and the fact he would never seem to have the time to fill it in.  O tempora, o mores indeed. But if the human observer of ''Doctor Who'' would want a full year book, completely filled in and annotated with everything they would want to know about the Doctor in relation to the human calendar, then they have it at last with this lovely hardback.  It's a brick of a book, of course, given the depth of the subject, but well worth the time taken to read it.
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|summary=You might have thought that just about everything which could be said about the Beatles had been said and certainly, there's been no shortage of books about what went wrong, what happened to the money and even what went right. But what I've never seen before is a 'miscellany' - all those little facts which are so hard to track down and this is where historian John Van der Kiste comes into his own: he's a man with an eye for detail and the ability to bring everything together into a very readable whole. It's a wonderful collection of the small facts.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785940260</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author= Johnny Rogan
 
|title= Ray Davies: A Complicated Life
 
|rating= 5
 
|genre= Entertainment
 
|summary= Most of Britain's most popular and successful songwriters of the last 150 years, from Gilbert and Sullivan and Lennon and McCartney, to Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice and Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb, have been partnerships.  The only solo writer in the same league is Ray Davies, front man of The Kinks from their formation in 1963 to their final performance in 1994.  While this mighty tome is partly an account of the group's tortuous thirty-year history, it is also first and foremost, as the title says, a biography of Davies himself. Through interviews with the Davies brothers, Ray and his younger brother Dave, the group's guitarist and only other constant member of the line-up, other group members, managers, friends and associates, Rogan has given us as complete a book of the man as we are ever likely to get.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099554089</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 +
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Latest revision as of 16:30, 29 August 2020


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Review of

Year of the Monkey by Patti Smith

4star.jpg Biography

On the coast of Santa Cruz, Patti Smith enters the lunar year of the monkey - one packed with mischief, sorrow, and unexpected moments. In a stranger's words, Anything is possible: after all, it's the year of the monkey. As Smith wanders the coast of Santa Cruz in solitude, she reflects on a year that brings huge shifts in her life - loss and ageing are faced head on, as it the shifting political waters in America. Full Review

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Review of

Ask For Blues by Malcolm Walton

3.5star.jpg Autobiography

Malcolm Walton's book is clearly a memoir about his introduction to the Trad Jazz scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s, but he has chosen to write it in the form of a novel, claiming in his prologue that this would give the book a different approach to the music memoir. His protagonist 'Martin' takes on Malcolm's mantle and begins with his first discovery of the Salvation Army band with his grandfather. This catapults him into a love of music, initially taking piano lessons, and later delving into his true love – the trumpet. Full Review

link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/Moore Bientot/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21

Review of

A Bientot... by Roger Moore

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The news of the death of Sir Roger Moore in May 2017 came as a great shock: he was one of those people you knew would go on forever. There was just one small glimmer of light in the sadness - the news that a matter of days before his death he'd delivered the finished manuscript of his book, À bientôt…, to his publishers. Just a few months later a copy landed on my desk and I didn't even bother to look as though I could resist reading it straight away. Full Review

link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/Maslanka Sherlock/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21

Review of

Sherlock: The Puzzle Book by Christopher Maslanka and Steve Tribe

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Who doesn't love a good puzzle, especially those really fiendish ones that get the brain working extra hard? There really is nothing to compare to that buzz we get from the Aha! moment, when everything falls into place and the solution reveals itself. If puzzles are your thing then you may wish to put your grey cells to the test with The Sherlock Puzzle Book, based on the popular TV series. Full Review

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Review of

Do You Mr Jones?: Bob Dylan with the Poets and Professors by Neil Corcoran

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Bob Dylan's award of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016 'for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition' proved highly controversial. It inevitably led some people in the literary world to take stock and look at his work and reputation with a fresh eye. This volume of essays was first published in 2002, and is now reissued with a new foreword by Will Self. Full Review

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Review of

Stream Punks by Robert Kyncl and Maany Peyvan

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I watch quite a lot of YouTube. I play music videos when I want to listen to a particular song I don't already have in my collection. I use it to find out how to do things, with the instruction videos they seem to have for pretty much anything. At the gym, I'll stick it on on my phone, prop it up on the cross-trainer and watch some behind the scenes interviews with the cast of my favourite shows. And sometimes I'll treat it as if it is Netflix, to watch series with new episodes releasing every few days, exclusively on YouTube. Having a new smart TV adds an extra, easy way to watch without having to plug in my laptop or squint at a small phone screen. So yes, I like YouTube and I use YouTube. But I didn't know a whole lot about the site it until I read this book. Full Review

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Review of

We Can Swing Together: The Story of Lindisfarne by John Van der Kiste

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It all began with a group of youngsters in North Shields. Rod Clements, Simon 'Si' Cowe, Ray 'Jacka' Jackson and Ray Laidlaw formed The Downtown Faction, soon changing the name to Brethren when they were joined by singer-songwriter Alan Hull. As a US-based group had a similar name they opted to change the name again - and Lindisfarne (with the name taken from an island off the Northumberland coast) was born. More than forty years on and with numerous changes of personnel the band is still very much around. They might not be touring or producing much in the way of new material, but they still perform, with Rod Clements, one of the original members on his fourth stint with the group. Full Review

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Review of

Electric Light Orchestra: Song by Song by John Van der Kiste

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My memories of pop music in the early sixties revolve around guitars and drums, sometimes the piano with only occasional excursions into strings and brass. Pop music rarely stands still and it wasn't long before the basic instruments were seen as constraints and The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Beach Boys began to experiment, with other groups following where they led. Amongst these groups was The Move and their lead guitarist and songwriter, Roy Wood. Wood wanted to develop the group's sound by adding more instruments but was prevented from achieving what he wanted by cost limitations and because the rest of the group didn't really share his enthusiasm. Full Review

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Review of

Let's Make Lots of Money: My Life as the Biggest Man in Pop by Tom Watkins

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Who on earth would be a manager in the larger than life, here today gone tomorrow world of pop? Anybody with an ego, a ruthless streak, an opportunity to embrace the chances and accept that it's not going to last, evidently. Tom Watkins is just one of several to have walked the fine line and, for part of the time, quite successfully. As his memoirs suggest, part of the time was achievement enough. Full Review

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Review of

Scrappy Little Nobody by Anna Kendrick

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Celebrity autobiographies. It's a genre long tainted by the examples of people who clearly didn't deserve to be a celebrity, let alone have a ghost-writer create their book, and by those who did so little but managed to churn out five memoirs before they were even thirty. But more recently it's become a way of staking a claim to importance for female comics. They've not all written autobiographies, as Bridget Christie proved, but enough have to provide for a rapidly-filling shelf at the bookstore. 2016 we had Amy Schumer winning a GoodReads award, Lena Dunham's been at it, and we've also got Anna Kendrick. Now she's not a strict comic – not all of her films are designed to make you laugh, and some of them that are just don't – but this has to be in the same bracket. Full Review

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Review of

Tragic Magic: The Life of Traffic's Chris Wood by Dan Ropek

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Chris Wood was a member of Traffic, the group formed by Steve Winwood in 1967 after he left The Spencer Davis Group. A gifted musician best known for his flute and saxophone work, he also played keyboards, bass guitar and contributed backing vocals as well as having a hand in writing several of the songs and one or two instrumentals. This biography takes its title from the name of one of his compositions for their fifth album. Full Review

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Review of

The Speed of Sound by Thomas Dolby

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From struggling post-punk musician to pop star, from Silicon Valley innovator to university professor, Thomas Dolby has had a remarkable if not unique career, often reinventing himself on the way. This memoir is based on his extensive notes and journals. Full Review

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Review of

The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains: Oddball Criminals from Comic Book History by Jon Morris

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As much as I like comics – and I do, whether superhero ones or not – I have to admit one thing, namely that the villains in them are a bit pants. What is The Penguin but the world's worst Mafioso, with a hobby of waddling along like his pet birds? Where else do you win an Oscar of all things by playing a two-bit killer who just fell in a vat of random chemicals and changed colour, and got mardier as a result (although recently he's become a nanotech genius – but let's not go there)? And what is it with the gimp in the see-through plant pot because he is the embodiment of cold? And that's just some of the better-known enemies of Batman, one of the better goodies. You can imagine how awful the baddies related to the bad goodies can be. And if you can't, this is the perfect primer. Full Review

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Review of

In the Midnight Hour: The Life & Soul of Wilson Pickett by Tony Fletcher

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Tamla Motown groups and singers apart, in the mid-sixties there were three major names in the soul music field who mattered above all. James Brown was something of a cult name who rarely bothered about or troubled the singles charts, and Otis Redding was on the verge of shooting into the stratosphere when he died in an aeroplane crash. The other was the man from Alabama, 'the wicked Pickett'. Full Review

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Review of

Reading Allowed: True Stories and Curious Incidents from a Provincial Library by Chris Paling

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I once made a comical faux pas in a library when I was younger, but it certainly didn't put me off returning. I once declared in a self-important way that I would start at the beginning of the books for young children and not stop til the end, then do the same for those for the older children – and then do it all over again with them, I said, pointing at the large-print shelves. I hope not, was the response – but little me was only aware of a need for large font for my fellow whippersnappers, and not for any other reason. Since then I've needed libraries, and going to them has been second nature. On the dole I made sure I could use the free Internet they provided to pay me back for my council tax; later I was intent on finding out if a Senior Library Assistant girl was worthy of her title, and of course, it saved a fortune on books for study and fun. I'm not alone in sharing the warmth of both their heating system and the very thing they were born to provide – books, but there was still a huge step up between my level of use and knowledge of them to actually working in one. Which is where Chris Paling comes in. Full Review

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Review of

Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen

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No, you haven't stumbled into a music review from the 1970s, I'm talking about The Boss's autobiography. Lots of books have been written about Springsteen by folk who knew him, worked with him and by others who have only read the cuttings. Over the last seven years he has been going about – not putting the record straight, exactly – but telling it from his own perspective. As he puts it: Writing about yourself is a funny business. By his own admission, it isn't the whole truth, discretion holds him back but in a project like this, the writer has made one promise, to show the reader his mind. In these pages, I've tried to do this. Full Review

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Review of

A Beatles Miscellany: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About the Beatles but Were Afraid to Ask by John Van der Kiste

5star.jpg Entertainment

You might have thought that just about everything which could be said about the Beatles had been said and certainly, there's been no shortage of books about what went wrong, what happened to the money and even what went right. But what I've never seen before is a 'miscellany' - all those little facts which are so hard to track down and this is where historian John Van der Kiste comes into his own: he's a man with an eye for detail and the ability to bring everything together into a very readable whole. It's a wonderful collection of the small facts. Full Review

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