![]() ![]() Sorkin begins Too Big to Fail ingeniously. ![]() This is high praise coming from an author who has covered much of the same territory. And while I must admit that my interest waned slightly over the last hundred pages or so, for most of Sorkin’s ride I was fixated. Indeed, so detailed is this account that at times I wondered whether the author’s telling of concurrent events actually consumed more time than the events themselves. Too Big to Fail is by far the most detailed blow-by-blow account of the days that changed America’s financial landscape forever, and the narrative is both immediately engaging and propulsive. Sorkin has assembled, with the assistance of a team of researchers, what many regard as the definitive financial crisis book. As the author of another book primarily or wholly focused on Lehman Brothers ( OTC:LEHMQ) I was pleased by the promise of finally sharing the space with a quality writer. I greatly anticipated the release of Sorkin’s book. ![]()
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![]() Don\’t waste your time on this one, I felt like ripping my hair out on several occasions. Lucy Sullivan Is Getting Married by Marian Keyes 3.7 (28) Paperback (Reprint) 15.99 Paperback 15.99 eBook 11.99 Audiobook 0. ![]() Absolutely no surprises along the way either, it is blatantly obvious who Lucy will end up with from the moment he\’s introduced, and every other plot point is predictable and cloying. I really have trouble believing this is written by the same author as Last Chance Saloon and Sushi for Beginners, as this book is just riddled with horrible characters, tedious dialogue and a plot that is shallow at best. The protagonist, Lucy, is whiny, obnoxious and very faux-modest, and the dialogue is often either stilted or irritating ( take for example the constant need to address a person by name at the beginning or end of EVERY SINGLE SENTENCE.) The narrator definitely didn\’t help, as she had none of the charm usually possessed by Marian Keyes\’ narrators, and managed to make everyone sound even more entitled and awful. However, this book didn\’t contain a single likeable person. Lucy Sullivan Is Getting Married Audible Audiobook Unabridged Marian Keyes (Author), Amy McAllister (Narrator), ![]() The book’s a high-water mark for both personal narrative and social criticism. In Heavy, he writes with a fearless intimacy and bracing honesty, indicting the treatment of black people in the U.S. ![]() Laymon attended Millsaps College and Jackson State University before graduating from Oberlin College. This deeply personal exploration of the political is nothing new to Laymon, a professor of English and creative writing at the University of Mississippi, who previously published a novel, Long Division, and a collection of essays, How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America. Kiese Laymon is a black southern writer, born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi. accountable for its role in creating and fueling the racial violence and toxic masculinity that shaped the struggles of both of them, making it so difficult for them to give and receive love in a trusting and trustworthy way. As he recounts this, he holds the culture of the U.S. Throughout, Laymon lays bare the many secrets mother and son kept from each other in their home: addictions, sexual violence, physical abuse, eating disorders, theft, lies and shame. Books were readily available, but his mother bounced checks at the local grocery store his home life included writing exercises and whippings in equal measure. ![]() ![]() His childhood, however, was haunted by poverty and violence. Laymon grew up in a household that nurtured his intellect and creativity. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The tone is at once nostalgic and embittered, rollicking and sad, and the juxtaposition of domestic conventions with the wild masturbatory fantasies of young Alex Portnoy, achingly accurate in every respect, including the highly colored one of the "castrating" Jewish mama, often equals the pathetic brilliance of some of the short stories of Gogol and Babel, besides being, in its rather idiosyncratic way, a closer look at the "generation gap" than anything that has yet appeared in print. The truer one is best represented by the remarkable section called "Jewish Blues." Here the theme is adolescent rage, middle class New Jersey misery, and filial ambivalence ("a Jewish man with parents alive is a 15-year-old boy, and will remain a 15-year-old boy till they die!"). There are two voices in Portnoy's Complaint, Philip Roth's quasi-autobiographical tour de force, though both voices are the voices of the hero. ![]() ![]() Soon after, Miller left home at 19 to enroll in the Art Students League of New York in Manhattan to study life drawing and painting. She returned to New York in 1926 and joined an experimental drama programme at Vassar College, taught by Hallie Flanagan, a pioneer of "experimental theatre". In 1925, at 18, Miller moved to Paris where she studied lighting, costume, and design at the Ladislas Medgyes' School of Stagecraft. In her childhood, Miller experienced issues in her formal education, being expelled from almost every school she attended while living in the Poughkeepsie area. When she was seven years old, Lee was raped while staying with a family friend in Brooklyn and was infected with gonorrhea. Theodore always favored Lee, and often used her as a model for his amateur photography. She had a younger brother named Erik, and her older brother was the aviator Johnny Miller. Her father was of German descent, and her mother was of Scottish and Irish descent. Her parents were Theodore and Florence Miller (née MacDonald). Miller was born on April 23, 1907, in Poughkeepsie, New York. During the Second World War, she was a war correspondent for Vogue, covering events such as the London Blitz, the liberation of Paris, and the concentration camps at Buchenwald and Dachau. ![]() ![]() She was a fashion model in New York City in the 1920s before going to Paris, where she became a fashion and fine art photographer. ![]() ![]() Elizabeth " Lee" Miller, Lady Penrose (April 23, 1907 – July 21, 1977), was an American photographer and photojournalist. ![]() ![]() “The Room” is completely without irony - and some would insist without logic - which is what makes it unintentionally hilarious.Īs Sestero and Bissell write in their book, this vanity project became “a blockbuster . The enjoyment of the film comes from the absolute earnestness of its awfulness. It slowly caught on, and monthly midnight screenings of the film began along with celebrities holding private “Room” parties to share their enthusiasm for this craptacular film. A cult of fans formed around the film after the theater posted a “no refund” sign, which dared viewers to sit through the entire film. The signage features Wiseau’s visage, the title, credits, website and (Tommy’s) phone number. Wiseau promoted the film with an expensive billboard in Los Angeles for five years. ![]() (Although no one knows how Wiseau came by his fortune, a bank teller assures a check-cashing crew member that Wiseau’s account is a “bottomless pit.”) The film earned $1,800 at the box office during its two-week, Oscar-qualifying run in Los Angeles in 2003, and received reviews only a masochist would read. In their book, Sestero and Bissell describe the film as an act of “cinematic hubris,” made in 2003 for $6 million of Wiseau’s money. ![]() ![]() “The Room,” for those who don’t know, is a cult film like no other. With the release of “The Disaster Artist,” the film based on the book of the same name by Greg Sestero and Tom Bissell, James Franco is actually generating Oscar buzz for playing Tommy Wiseau, the writer, director, producer and star of arguably the greatest bad movie of all time, “The Room.” ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Cotton-candy–tressed Nola spends her days dreaming in her peaceful town, Alta Donna. 8-12)īubble-gum–tinged whimsy abounds in this stylish French graphic-novel import. In the end it’s Peter’s true talents, not magic, that prove most reliable.Īuxier has a juggler’s dexterity with prose that makes this fantastical tale quicken the senses, even if it does bog down from time to time. (Fantasy. Solving the riddle and embracing his destiny are just the beginning of Peter’s problems. With one onslaught after another, the violence turns from suggested to overt, with weaponry and bloody battles. ![]() The action never flags, even though the suspense does. ![]() The king has brainwashed all the adults and enslaved all of their children, who are controlled by a horde of bloodthirsty apes. He seeks and eventually finds a vanished kingdom, where he faces a tyrannical king. After much travail, Peter learns that the mysterious eyes are not always dependable. Thus begins a perilous adventure wrought from a riddle found in a bottle. When Peter drops the first pair into his eye-sockets, he’s instantly swept away. His wretched existence changes when he steals a box containing eggs that are actually three pairs of magical eyes. Blinded by ravens in infancy and made to steal for the town’s beggar-monger (think Fagin), Peter becomes an expert thief and pickpocket. What begins Dickensian turns Tolkien-esque in this quest replete with magic and mystery. ![]() ![]() Crossing snow-capped mountains, canyons and volcanic deserts, Levison will see some of the most spectacular but little-known landscapes on the planet. Known as the 'lands in between', Levison will travel through these countries that sit at the crossroads of two continents, and form a large part of the historic and mysterious Silk Route. ![]() Beginning in Southern Russia, Levison will track the mountains through increasingly dangerous terrain where Islamist fighters hide out in the hills, toward Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia and into Iran: a captivating nation that's been off the tourist track for decades. Travelling with the locals and living as they do, Levison's epic, 2,600-mile journey takes him through five countries, crossing the wild lands on the tense frontier between Europe and Asia and visiting some of the most fascinating and diverse people's on earth. And as well as a new region of the world, Levison is taking a new approach to exploring: making his way by any means necessary. Explorer Levison Wood - famous for Walking the Nile, Walking the Himalayas and Walking the Americas - is taking on a new expedition in this four-part series: to cross the mighty Caucusus mountain range that lies between Russia and Iran. ![]() ![]() ![]() In Whose Water Is It, Anyway?, renowned water justice activist Maude Barlow recounts her own education in water issues as she and her fellow grassroots water warriors woke up to the immense pressures facing water in a warming world. Today, Paris, Berlin, Bern, and Montreal are just a few of the cities that have made themselves Blue Communities. With its simple, straightforward approach, the movement has been growing around the world for a decade. The Blue Communities Project is dedicated to three primary things: that access to clean, drinkable water is a basic human right that municipal and community water will be held in public hands and that single-use plastic water bottles will not be available in public spaces. “This book is a blueprint for communities around the world to take back that responsibility and maintain water as a human right.” - David SuzukiĪ call to action from former Senior Advisor on Water to the U.N., honorary chairperson of the Council of Canadians, chair of Washing-based Food and Water Watch, and councillor with the Hamburg-based World Future Council ![]() “Maude Barlow is one of our planet’s greatest water defenders.” - Naomi Klein, bestselling author of This Changes Everything and The Shock Doctrine ![]() ![]() ![]() I wasn't super excited about reading it, but it turned out to be much more enjoyable than I expected. Review 2: I was in need of a light, easy read and since the bookstore was closed, this was all I could find at the drug store. ![]() Questions were left unanswered and I was left with a feeling that I wasted my time. more onversations left me with a feeling of "who talks like that?!" The author then hints at a storyline with the supporting cast, but then it never went anywhere. All of the supporting cast were never fleshed out. And to complete the trifecta of why this book just didn't do it for me - I felt like I couldn't connect to the characters at all. But my parents always taught me to finish what I started, so here it is. Where was the segway? Second, I put the book down one day and never found the urge to pick it back up again. ![]() For one, I found the story hard to keep up with - one minute characters are talking in a living room, and in the next sentence Bella is at a party with none of the people she was just speaking to. Review 1: This book had all of the elements that would fall in with all of my favorites - glamour, romance, and just a touch of klutz to keep the story from being cliche. ![]() |