Just finished Sycamore Row by John Grisham which is labelled as a sequel to A Time To Kill. For those who read John Grisham books then you know what to expect and it doesn't disappoint. I enjoyed it myself and certainly worth the £2 I paid in charity shop for it
Reading Challenge 2022
- Thread starter RobMCFC
- Start date
RobMCFC
Well-Known Member
1. The Spirit Engineer - A.J.West - 7/10
2. The Lost Man - Jane Harper - 8/10
3. The Fall of Babel – Josiah Bancroft - 5/10
4. The Forest – Michaelbrent Collings – 3/10
5. Black River – Will Dean – 7/10
6. Winter is Coming – Garry Kasparov – 9/10
7. Archangel – Robert Harris – 8/10
8. The Justice of Kings – Richard Swan - 8/10
9. Priest of Bones – Peter McLean – 8/10
10. Watching Skies: Star Wars, Spielberg and us – Mark O’Connell – 7/10
11. Björn Borg and the Super-Swedes – Mats Holm and Ulf Roosvald – 8/10
12. We Men of Ash and Shadow – HL Tinsley 6/10
13. Paul Kelly: The man, the music and the life in between – Stuart Coupe – 7/10
14. Steven Spielberg: A Biography - Joseph McBride – 8/10
Wow, this was a long read – and you only have to finish up to 61% because the rest is all index and photos!
The book starts off spending an incredible amount of time telling us about Spielberg’s roots – his relatives come from Poland, Ukraine and Russia. After this is out of the way (not quick!) we hear a lot about his childhood, and you already know that this book is incredibly well researched. There are stories of anti-Semitic bullying and conflicting accounts of how much he actually suffered.
The most interesting portion takes us from his teens, when he was already making fantastic low-budget home movies, to his bluffing his way onto the Universal set, his early days in TV and that successful run of films that included Duel, Jaws, Close Encounters, Indiana Jones and E.T.
There’s a fantastic chapter on 1992-93, where he was filming Schindler’s List during the Polish winter, suffering emotionally because of the subject matter and at the same time spending a couple of hours in his hotel every night, supervising post-production on Jurassic Park. After all that has come before (the anti-Semitic bullying and his family history) you get a window into what it really meant to be making Schindler’s List.
There’s also a lot of good analysis on the direction of his films in the wake of 9/11 – I hadn’t really thought about it in too much depth, but the author makes a good case for how Spielberg chooses his films to create a narrative: Minority Report (people being arrested because of things that may or may not have done/could do), The Terminal (the bureaucracy and big brother nature of Homeland Security), Munich (the nature of revenge on terrorists and whether it is justified), and War of the Worlds (a nation under attack).
However, the book is not without some critical waffling, and the author loses a point for his dismissal of Raiders of the Lost Ark (one of my favourite films of all time), calling it and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom racist! – It’s bloody escapism! And similarly dismissing the The Goonies.
After back-to-back entertainment bios, I think it's time for some fiction.
2. The Lost Man - Jane Harper - 8/10
3. The Fall of Babel – Josiah Bancroft - 5/10
4. The Forest – Michaelbrent Collings – 3/10
5. Black River – Will Dean – 7/10
6. Winter is Coming – Garry Kasparov – 9/10
7. Archangel – Robert Harris – 8/10
8. The Justice of Kings – Richard Swan - 8/10
9. Priest of Bones – Peter McLean – 8/10
10. Watching Skies: Star Wars, Spielberg and us – Mark O’Connell – 7/10
11. Björn Borg and the Super-Swedes – Mats Holm and Ulf Roosvald – 8/10
12. We Men of Ash and Shadow – HL Tinsley 6/10
13. Paul Kelly: The man, the music and the life in between – Stuart Coupe – 7/10
14. Steven Spielberg: A Biography - Joseph McBride – 8/10
Wow, this was a long read – and you only have to finish up to 61% because the rest is all index and photos!
The book starts off spending an incredible amount of time telling us about Spielberg’s roots – his relatives come from Poland, Ukraine and Russia. After this is out of the way (not quick!) we hear a lot about his childhood, and you already know that this book is incredibly well researched. There are stories of anti-Semitic bullying and conflicting accounts of how much he actually suffered.
The most interesting portion takes us from his teens, when he was already making fantastic low-budget home movies, to his bluffing his way onto the Universal set, his early days in TV and that successful run of films that included Duel, Jaws, Close Encounters, Indiana Jones and E.T.
There’s a fantastic chapter on 1992-93, where he was filming Schindler’s List during the Polish winter, suffering emotionally because of the subject matter and at the same time spending a couple of hours in his hotel every night, supervising post-production on Jurassic Park. After all that has come before (the anti-Semitic bullying and his family history) you get a window into what it really meant to be making Schindler’s List.
There’s also a lot of good analysis on the direction of his films in the wake of 9/11 – I hadn’t really thought about it in too much depth, but the author makes a good case for how Spielberg chooses his films to create a narrative: Minority Report (people being arrested because of things that may or may not have done/could do), The Terminal (the bureaucracy and big brother nature of Homeland Security), Munich (the nature of revenge on terrorists and whether it is justified), and War of the Worlds (a nation under attack).
However, the book is not without some critical waffling, and the author loses a point for his dismissal of Raiders of the Lost Ark (one of my favourite films of all time), calling it and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom racist! – It’s bloody escapism! And similarly dismissing the The Goonies.
After back-to-back entertainment bios, I think it's time for some fiction.
Wonder if this be anything like the book>
Loosely based on Spielberg's childhood growing up in post-World War II era Arizona, from age seven to eighteen, a young man named Sammy Fabelman discovers a shattering family secret, and explores how the power of movies help us see the truth about each other and ourselves.
Loosely based on Spielberg's childhood growing up in post-World War II era Arizona, from age seven to eighteen, a young man named Sammy Fabelman discovers a shattering family secret, and explores how the power of movies help us see the truth about each other and ourselves.
RobMCFC
Well-Known Member
There’s a lot in the book about him and his family when they moved to Arizona. Can’t remember a shattering family secret but I think this will be worth a watch.
stoneblue
Well-Known Member
Recently read 2 books on holiday
The Expats - Chris Pavone
This is the debut novel from this author and is a decent but not outstanding read. The main character Kate Moore is an ex CIA field agent, mother to two small boys and wife of husband Dexter, who works in bank security.
The book begins with Dexter persuading Kate to move to Luxemburg in order for him to follow a job opportunity in a private bank. She soon develops suspicions about his job and of a couple they meet and socialise with. The story is told both in the present but also in flashbacks which can get confusing at times! The story moves quite slowly at first but gathers paces as Kate's investigations develop.
Billy Summers - Stephen King
This is easily the best fiction book that I have read this year. A departure from the usual horror stories from Stephen King and considered to be his best book for some time.
Billy Summers, the title character, is an ex Iraqi war sniper who puts his skills to use as a hitman for hire. But he’s a hitman with a moral compass in that he only takes jobs to take out bad people. The story begins as he decides to do one last hit, although he suspects that there is something not quite right about the job; however it’s more money than he’s ever been offered before and his suspicions prove to be correct!
Billy Summers also features the book-within-a-book device, because Billy is writing a memoir about his childhood and war experiences. Readers get even more context to his motivations through those sections. If you only read one work of fiction this year, make it this book!
The Expats - Chris Pavone
This is the debut novel from this author and is a decent but not outstanding read. The main character Kate Moore is an ex CIA field agent, mother to two small boys and wife of husband Dexter, who works in bank security.
The book begins with Dexter persuading Kate to move to Luxemburg in order for him to follow a job opportunity in a private bank. She soon develops suspicions about his job and of a couple they meet and socialise with. The story is told both in the present but also in flashbacks which can get confusing at times! The story moves quite slowly at first but gathers paces as Kate's investigations develop.
Billy Summers - Stephen King
This is easily the best fiction book that I have read this year. A departure from the usual horror stories from Stephen King and considered to be his best book for some time.
Billy Summers, the title character, is an ex Iraqi war sniper who puts his skills to use as a hitman for hire. But he’s a hitman with a moral compass in that he only takes jobs to take out bad people. The story begins as he decides to do one last hit, although he suspects that there is something not quite right about the job; however it’s more money than he’s ever been offered before and his suspicions prove to be correct!
Billy Summers also features the book-within-a-book device, because Billy is writing a memoir about his childhood and war experiences. Readers get even more context to his motivations through those sections. If you only read one work of fiction this year, make it this book!
RobMCFC
Well-Known Member
I bought about 7 books a few months ago and Billy Summers is one of them. Looking forward to it - it's on my slate to read before the end of the year and, naturally, my review will appear here.