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= Spencer Leigh
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{{Frontpage
|title= Frank Sinatra: An Extraordinary Life
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|author=Patti Smith
|rating= 4
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|title=Year of the Monkey
|genre= Entertainment
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|rating=4
|summary= Frank Sinatra was undoubtedly a legend.  In a notoriously precarious profession, he managed to stay at the top, or very close to it, for a remarkably long time. Despite a few half-hearted flirtations with other styles which may have strayed a little from his comfort zone, he remained true to his musical style, won the respect of younger generations, and never really went out of fashion.
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|genre=Biography
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857160869</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
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Steve Tribe
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|isbn=Walton_Ask
|title=The All New University Challenge Quiz Book: Questions, Answers, Facts, Figures and everything in between
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|title=Ask For Blues
 +
|author=Malcolm Walton
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
|genre=Entertainment
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|genre=Autobiography
|summary=[Cue theme music.  Lights up on presenter, who waffles on about establishments providing contestants – De Montfort University, local pub, family unit.  Contestants don't, for once, introduce themselves as it's probably a given that they know each other. Contestants imbibe nervous sips of 'water', and settle back.] ''You all know the rules, so let's not waste time – here's your first starter for ten.''
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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.
 
 
Yes, this book throws no punches and attempts to put you in the spotlight of one of the nation's most superlative televisual institutions – but does it manage it?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184949701X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author= Jody Revenson
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|isbn=Moore Bientot
|title= Harry Potter: The Character Vault
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|title=A Bientot...
|rating= 4
+
|author=Roger Moore
|genre= Entertainment
 
|summary= Unlock new information about your favourite characters from the Harry Potter film series. This coffeetable book profiles the good, bad, and everything in between – from Harry and Ron to Voldemort and Umbridge. Hugely detailed and filled with beautiful illustrations, images, and never before seen glimpses into the design process – this book will answer your questions about character design in the Harry Potter series.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0062407449</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=John Van der Kiste
 
|title=Jeff Lynne: The Electric Light Orchestra - Before and After
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Biography
 
|summary=Jeff Lynne grew up in a Birmingham suburb right at the end of 1947: even as a child he was passionate about music and was a much respected guitarist as a teenager.  He was a member of various semi-professional groups - critical acclaim came when he fronted Idle Race in the late sixties and popularity and a degree of commercial success arrived when he joined the popular group The Move.  Whilst still playing with that group he co-founded, along with Roy Wood, the groundbreaking Electric Light Orchestra, but it was with Wood's departure that Lynne turned what had been an occasionally uneasy fusion of classical and rock into a successful and popular act.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781554927</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreviewplain
 
|title=Thunderbirds are Go Official Guide
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=It's time to admit that I am old.  I remember the first series of ''Thunderbirds'' from Saturday morning kids' cinema – an episode of that, then a second-run film, both for a quid.  They were only ten years old or so then, but at least that proved the franchise was durable.  Nothing did that quite as much, however, as the news a couple of years ago that the Anderson estate was to allow a CG updating, bringing a new generation of people to the massed audience.  Amid the usual worries about it losing everything that made it special, it actually did pretty well when it aired in 2015 – even with a breakfast time transmission slot.  This small(ish) format hardback is, bar the annual, the very first chance to look at an official book concerning the series, and inasmuch as it inspired me to research the return, and certainly accept it as looking a worthy addition to the canon, it succeeds on all fronts.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1471124991</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author= Keith Partridge
 
|title=The Adventure Game: A Cameraman's Tales from Films at the Edge
 
|rating= 4.5
 
|genre= Animals and Wildlife
 
|summary=Keith Partridge has been one of the world’s leading adventure cameramen for over twenty years. The award winning Touching the Void, Beckoning Silence and Human Planet are just some of the films that have taken him all over the earth, from the caves of Papua New Guinea to the summit of Mount Everest. No location has been too dangerous, no environment too wild, and if you have ever seen a climber or explorer in some outrageous position, chances are that Keith Partridge was there with his camera. Here Keith discusses the challenges that have faced him in the daring adventures has taken part in, with personalities such as [[:Category:Steve Backshall|Steve Backshall]], [[:Category:Joe Simpson|Joe Simpson]] and Stephen Venables.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910124311</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Jonathan Rigby
 
|title=English Gothic: Classic Horror Cinema 1897-2015
 
|rating=5
 
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Wow.  Every once in a while you come across a book such as this, which represents in two covers the complete sine qua non of its subject and type.  There is little vital to say about this book except it is essential for anyone with any remote interest in British horror in motion picture form – yes, it covers cinema to a minute level but also regards TV in an addendum that will bring back equal memories to those who watch it. A book as long and detailed as this – and boy, is it long and detailed – is immediately marked out as a sterling, five-star read, and yet the humble reviewer (like perhaps a victim of one of these gothic fictions) has an exhaustive and exhausting time ahead.  Yes, we here at The Bookbag do read every word of the books we cover, even if the only verdict regarding them is blatantly evident from the first hour's perusal.
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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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0957648162</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Antonia Fraser (editor)
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|isbn=Maslanka Sherlock
|title=The Pleasure of Reading: 43 Writers on the Discovery of Reading and the Books That Inspired Them
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|title=Sherlock: The Puzzle Book
 +
|author=Christopher Maslanka and Steve Tribe
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary= There has been a trend for lists in recent years, with numerous websites and books cashing in on this craze for cataloguing must-see films, favourite foods, and things to do before you die. ‘’The Pleasure of Reading’’, edited by Antonia Fraser, may be, then, the most sophisticated and erudite result of this fascination for listography, since its premise is straightforwardly based around the top ten books chosen by famous authors. Behind this book is the curiosity readers feel for each other or the question, as Fraser puts it, ‘What ‘’do’’ other people read?’ But these people are some of the greatest writers working in recent years, with contributions from Margaret Atwood, Doris Lessing, and Tom Stoppard and others. The book, however, returns us to those early moments in their lives – before fame and prizes – when reading was a hobby like it is for so many people. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408859629</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.
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Stephanie Milton
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|isbn=Corcoran_Dylan
|title=Minecraft Beginners's Handbook: Updated Edition
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|title=Do You Mr Jones?: Bob Dylan with the Poets and Professors
|rating=5
+
|author=Neil Corcoran
 +
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=If you haven't heard of ''Minecraft,'' where on earth have you been? This popular construction/survival game has captured the imagination of almost 30 million people worldwide and the craze shows no signs of abating. If, like me, you are curious as to what all the fuss is about and wonder why you can no longer get near the computer until after the kids have gone to bed, then this new series of books by Egmont are just what you need. In no time at all, you will be happily chatting about mobs, redstone, endermen and zombie pigmen as if you were an expert...
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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>1405276770</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author= Martin Edwards
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|isbn=Kyncl_Stream
|title=The Golden Age of Murder
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|title=Stream Punks
|rating=5
+
|author=Robert Kyncl and Maany Peyvan
 +
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Martin Edwards has had such a good idea for this book. He takes the foundation of the Detection Club in the late 1920s and follows through into the postwar period, ending his account sometime in the mid-1950s, perhaps with the death of Dorothy L Sayers in 1957. I may sound tentative here because there is no entirely precise end date. The Detection Club itself still lives on, hosting three dinners a year for elected members. Edwards is its current archivist – yet there are no archives, unless you count the hundreds of books produced by its members, which of course he does. And he also explores their lives.  
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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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0008105960</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Peter Ackroyd
+
|isbn=JVDK_Swing
|title=Charlie Chaplin
+
|title=We Can Swing Together: The Story of Lindisfarne
 +
|author=John Van der Kiste
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
+
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Charlie Chaplin dominated the formative years of the cinema, as actor and director, like no other.  As we are told in an early chapter of this book, on his first visit to America in 1910, he is alleged to have shouted, ‘I am coming to conquer you.  Every man woman and child shall have my name on their lips!’  Within a few years he had indeed conquered the entire movie-going world
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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 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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099287560</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Charles Solomon
+
|isbn=JVDK_ELO
|title=A Wish Your Heart Makes : From the Grimm Brothers' Aschenputtel to Disney's Cinderella
+
|title=Electric Light Orchestra: Song by Song
 +
|author=John Van der Kiste
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=It's not a useful thing, to have sniffy presumptions, when you're a humble book reviewer. The same applies of course in the world of cinema, and a lot else besides, but I do have to admit to be really quite dubious about the thought of a live action remake of Cinderella, even before seeing, reading or hearing anything on which to form a proper judgement. Did the world need it, I wondered – the original was great enough, and surely so much a sine qua non in animation history.  What would some new young cast members, and Kenneth Branagh, add to – or possibly would they overlay – decades of cinema audiences' joint memory?  Surely it would be a pig's ear. Well, if this luscious first book regarding the new film is any indication, it's actually going to be pretty good.  The format of film tie-in guides itself doesn't always engender much hope in the likewise prejudiced – but I confirm this, too, is an item well worth bearing in mind.
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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>1484713265</amazonuk>
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}}
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{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=Watkins_Lets
 +
|title=Let's Make Lots of Money: My Life as the Biggest Man in Pop
 +
|author=Tom Watkins
 +
|rating=4
 +
|genre=Entertainment
 +
|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.
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}}
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{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=Kendrick_Scrappy
 +
|title=Scrappy Little Nobody
 +
|author=Anna Kendrick
 +
|rating=3.5
 +
|genre=Entertainment
 +
|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.
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Sean Smith
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|isbn=Ropek_Tragic
|title=Tom Jones - The Life
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|title=Tragic Magic: The Life of Traffic's Chris Wood
 +
|author=Dan Ropek
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
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|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Few singers have sustained a career over half a century and appealed to succeeding generations in the way that the former Thomas John Woodward of Treforest has managed to do. Almost written off during a lean period or two, he proved himself the master of re-invention, and now in his mid-70s he is loved and revered as something of a national treasure.
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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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>000810445X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Lincoln Peirce
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|isbn=Dolby_Sound
|title=Big Nate: Laugh-O-Rama (Big Nate Activity Book 4)
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|title=The Speed of Sound
 +
|author=Thomas Dolby
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
 
|summary=This seems to be a firmly established publishing practise now – the enhanced readership experience offered to fans of a franchise by a tie-in activity book. This is yet another example – looking like a genuine entry in an on-going series, it instead offers the fan of the characters the chance to interact with them in new ways, as well as looking back through the shelves of their collection, and inwardly as well, at their own thoughts and tastes.  Note I say it's for a fan – this example will alienate anyone else from the first page – but for the right audience it’s generally a good thing.  And in this instance it's a very, very good thing indeed.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007569076</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Dr Gareth Moore
 
|title=Clever Commuter: Puzzles, Tests and Problems to Solve on Your Journey
 
|rating=3.5
 
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=The week before I reviewed this book I saw a newspaper article that said that so-called brain-training apps are a waste of time, that they merely replace what we should be doing anyway to keep our grey cells active (multi-tasking, observing, REAL LIFE etc). This is the puzzle book version of a brain training app, and so with all those electronic titles on the market it already had opposition, even before that news came in. But let's face it – who on earth would risk the science being wrong on this occasion? Surely this kind of book should be an inherently essential purchase?
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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>1782433953</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Peter A David
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|isbn=Morris_Legion
|title=The Avengers Vault
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|title=The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains: Oddball Criminals from Comic Book History
|rating=3
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|author=Jon Morris
|genre=Graphic Novels
 
|summary=It's not just because the third richest take of any movie is about to get a sequel that we have this pictorial background guide.  There have been decades of action featuring the main characters of The Avengers, and they themselves are fifty years old as a collective entity, so this book has a lot of ground to cover.  To its benefit there are hardly any mentions of the global behemoth that are Marvel films these days, beyond a couple of references where relevant.  Instead we're looking back, with bright and eager eyes, to see what we can find, what the beginner may need to know, and what the fan will have fond memories of.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781313989</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Gareth Murphy
 
|title=Cowboys and Indies: The Epic History of the Record Industry
 
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=It’s not difficult to find a history of popular or recorded music, written around the musical names who made it happen. ''Cowboys and Indies'' takes a different approach.  While there is plenty in these pages about several of the most important stars, there is just as much again if not sometimes more about the movers and shakers, the inventors, managers, impresarios, and record label founders without whom there would not have been a record industry.
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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>1781254524</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Emma Tennant, Hilary Bailey and David Elliott
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|isbn=Fletcher_Midnight
|title=Did We Meet on Grub Street?
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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
 +
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Essentially, the three authors (all of whom have long careers in the book industry) revel in the idea of being whining old curmudgeons who miss the good old days of publishing. This unashamed nostalgia provides the focus of the book and allows the writers to recount numerous anecdotes from their days in the publishing business. Whilst the primary audience for this book may well be students of creative writing and media studies, it also serves as an interesting exploration of an aspect of modern history: how a once-burgeoning industry is now a shell of its former self, much like a lot of manufacturing. Because of this, I was disappointed that no space was given to a consideration of how the rise of the e-book and Kindle has directly damaged both the sale of books and the potential for new books to be written (fewer real books sold = fewer financial advances paid to writers = fewer books written). Also, given the clear love of books as treasured artifacts, the dismissal of the Harry Potter phenomenon seems truculent, given the impetus the series gave to reading amongst both the young and adults.
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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>0704372983</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=David Lodge
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|isbn=Paling_Reading
|title=Lives in Writing
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|title=Reading Allowed: True Stories and Curious Incidents from a Provincial Library
|rating=4
+
|author=Chris Paling
 +
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=David Lodge Lives in WritingSo blares the cover of my edition, and it's not far wrongWhen he's not entertaining us with his [[:Category:David Lodge|writing career]] (now in its third, more erudite and to me more serious stage, after the first third of comic light touches, before he found his metier – and fame with TV adaptations– with comedies about the social and sexual lives of academe) he's teaching about and around writingWhen I was younger I also read around writing literature books, in other words – and Lodge's were among those I turned to.  So this book and its contents are a welcome step back down a very familiar road.
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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 returningI 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 reasonSince 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 oneWhich is where Chris Paling comes in.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099587769</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Steve Tribe
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|isbn=Springsteen_Born
|title=Sherlock: Chronicles
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|title=Born to Run
 +
|author=Bruce Springsteen
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=I still remember sitting down to watch the first episode of ''Sherlock''.  I was looking forward to it, certainly, but within minutes I realised this was going to become far more than just a television seriesIt also struck me that, of all the television and film versions I had seen, this felt like the most authentic interpretation of the original stories - but trying to work out exactly why would definitely be a three patch problem. Happily, this book provides all the explanations.
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|summary=No, you haven't stumbled into a music review from the 1970s, I'm talking about The Boss's autobiographyLots 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>1849907625</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Greg Keyes
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|isbn=JVDK_Beatles
|title=Interstellar: The Official Movie Novelization
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|title=A Beatles Miscellany: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About the Beatles but Were Afraid to Ask
|rating=3.5
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|author=John Van der Kiste
|genre=Science Fiction
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|rating=5
|summary=The Earth is dying – dust storms are ravaging the world and blight killing off all useful crops, meaning farmers are vital to keep the few people to have survived recent wars fed, even if they need to go further and use less arable lands to do so.  Cooper is one such man, despite a history in a completely different career; he lives with the father of his deceased wife and their two children in amongst the corn.  But when some mysterious happenings keep occurring in the bedroom that was his wife's as a young girl and is now their daughter's, a most unlikely chain of events leads him to find clues that could revive his past – that in fact of a highly trained astronaut, with the one last potential mission – that of a shortcut to the stars in the trails of prior manned probes to detect new habitable planets for what's left of mankind…
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1783293691</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Mark Cotta Vaz
 
|title=Interstellar: Beyond Time And Space
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|summary=Christopher Nolan speaks here of two pertinent visits to the cinema to see sci-fi epics.  The first time round it was ''Star Wars'', and the young cinema craftsman in the making became an avid fan, who eventually found the story and nature of the film's construction almost as epic, invigorating and absorbing as the movie itself.  After that came a chance to see a re-release of ''2001: A Space Odyssey'', upon which Nolan reports ''information about the making of Kubricks's masterpiece was harder to come by than Lucas's.''  You don't need me to tell you that nowadays information about making of movie magic is all around us – the trailers and camera diaries of set footage advertising upcoming blockbusters in parallel with each other, the DVD and Blu-Ray extras, and so on.  And I'm sure a lot of that is evident with the example of ''Interstellar'', Chris Nolan's attempt to bridge the gap between ''Star Wars'' and ''2001'' and create a thinking woman's emotional, family sci-fi epic.  Likewise, too, this book, which is a happy ground between being told only the bare outlines, and the full-on, nothing-kept-sacred smorgasbord detail of a Blu-Ray.  A very happy ground, indeed, that will leave many a happy reader.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178329356X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Paul Ruditis
 
|title=Battlestar Galactica Vault: The Complete History Of The Series, 1978-2012
 
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=For those who don't know, or can't remember, ''Battlestar Galactica'' was a '70s piece of American sci-fi TV, launched to great acclaim as a parallel to the rather similar ''Star Wars'' with a full-on TV movie, then one lengthy season of hour-long adventures, that even had Fred Astaire playing a bit part before audiences dwindled and the show died out.  It shot itself in the foot with a sort-of sequel soon afterwards, then languished for decades before two crafty creatives found a way to put more meat on the bones, and to marry the show with much more modern sensibilities.  It's not a programme I would necessarily have entered a 'vault' for, as I was only a fan of the original, and possibly only then as opposed to now. I've not seen a ''BSG'' entity since my youth – but I know a heck of a lot about what I have pushed to the back of my mind since then, courtesy of these pages.
+
|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>1781313350</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 +
Move on to [[Newest Fantasy Reviews]]

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

4star.jpg Entertainment

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

4star.jpg Entertainment

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

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

4star.jpg Entertainment

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

3.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

5star.jpg Entertainment

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

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

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

5star.jpg Entertainment

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

Move on to Newest Fantasy Reviews