Comics Wrap Up - Red or Dead

Film Trailers

So many Deadpool teasers this week! (There's a tonne of swearing and adult humour in these - so NSFW - and kids, cover your innocent eyes! (I don't want your parents yelling at me.))

I adore the Australia Day message (the one with the cork hat in the thumbnail.) It's just amazing.

Not long now before the release! Can't wait to see this one - looks like it'll put the let-down of the character in Origins to bed. (Note: Deadpool himself, at this point, would use the last two sentences to make an innuendo - I leave it up to you to find one, in the hopes that your mind isn't as dirty as mine.)

Graphic Novels

This week I read the upcoming Red Sonja/Conan: The Blood of a God (UK - US) - a team up (funnily enough) of Red Sonja with Conan (as in, the Barbarian,) which I'll be reviewing within the next week or two.

Liked this post? Try these:

• I Got Ninety-Nine Problems, and Sonja Ain't One
• Review! (Graphic Novel Edition!) Red Sonja: The Black Tower by Frank Tieri

Mini-Review! (Classics Edition!) - Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Title: Jane Eyre

Author: Charlotte Bronte

Genre: Classics, Romance

Amazon: UK - USA

Verdict:

Awesome, awesome, awesome book! I just finished re-reading this, and I forgot how much I love this book!

Some people may find the prose and style old-fashioned (but given that this book was published in the 1840s, that's hardly surprising,) but the effort you put in really does pay off.

Honestly, I adore this book - if you love creepy, atmospheric, novels with complex characters, societal conventions to use and rebel against, and secrets upon secrets, then this book is for you too!

Buy Now UK – Buy Now USA – Goodreads

Liked this post? Try these:

• Time to Review the Evidence (Classics Edition!) - Dracula by Bram Stoker
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Review (Poetry Edition!) - Today Means Amen by Sierra DeMulder

Title: Today Means Amen

Author: Sierra DeMulder

Genre: Poetry

Release Date: 2 Feb 2016

Amazon: UK - USA

A few starting notes:

I received a free digital review copy of this book via NetGalley. NetGalley provides review copies from publishers in exchange for fair and honest reviews.

This was a random read. The cover kind of intrigued me, and I've been in kind of a poetry mood lately, so I just went for it.

The poet, Sierra DeMulder, is apparently a slam poet of some notoriety, who has a bunch of videos on YouTube.

Premise:

A collection of poems by Sierra DeMulder.

Best bits:

A lot of the poems in this collection were truly beautiful and genuine, and I really did enjoy this book as a whole.

I'd have to say that my favourites were two poems from the last section of the book - 'Today Means Amen' and 'Release It,' because these were the ones that I most related to, and that I imagine most people would relate to in some way.

These two poems, like several of the others, were about being kind to yourself, keeping going even when life seems its darkest, love, and life.

A lot of the poems in this collection can, to me, be classified as 'good' poetry - you don't have to get it, it gets you: it has some life-like, almost breathing, quality to it.

Check out this video performance of 'Today Means Amen' and judge for yourself...

Not so great bits:

I did find that some of the imagery just wasn't to my taste - but that's a personal thing. Some of it was just a little too intimate (in pretty much every sense,) and made me feel slightly intrusive.

To each his own though; that intrusiveness just shows how very personal and open a lot of this poetry is - something which is always admirable, even if not always comfortable.

Verdict:

Overall I really enjoyed this collection - there were some poems I didn't enjoy so much, and some that I didn't relate to as well as others, but then, that's only natural really.

I imagine this would be great for dipping in-and-out of, and would be fairly accessible to people who aren't usually into poetry. 

Buy Now UK – Buy Now USA – Goodreads – Author's Site

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The Month in Review(s) - January 2016

From now on I'm going to provide a brief 'Month in Review(s)' post.

This is literally a re-cap of all the reviews that I've written this month, collated in one post.

So now you can take a shufty at the books (and the odd film) that I've reviewed in the month, and catch up on any you may have missed.

Enjoy! :)

Kids

Hetty Feather by Jacqueline Wilson - Historical Fiction

Young Adult

Dark Hope by Monica McGurk -  Angels, Paranormal.
The Invisibles by Francis Gideon - Romance (M/M), LGBTQ+.



Adult

Dead Ice by Laurell K Hamilton - Paranormal, Urban Fantasy, Zombies, Vampires, Crime, LGBTQIAP+
Poetry From the Lady of the Pier by Effrosyni Moschoudi - Poetry, Short Stories, Chick Lit

Graphic Novels

STARVE Vol 1 - dystopian

Non-fiction

Death, Disability, and the Superhero: The Silver Age and Beyond by Jose Alaniz

Popcorn Reviews (Film)

Batman (1989)
Constantine (2005)


I'll do a Charity Reading Challenge 2016 update when I've actually read something towards it. (Note to self: remember to read stuff for that challenge.)

Nerd Church - Care Some

I've read two blog-posts recently that made me think about the book Angelfall by Susan Ee (US - UK.)

The first was the fabulous post on +Emily F (aka the Paperback Princess)'s blog, about diversity in YA. This led me to a small rant... more on that in a sec.

The second post was a review of the book by Laura @ P.S. I Love That Book. (A very good review, may I add.)

This is a book that I myself have read and reviewed before, and to be honest I have a tendency to go on and on about various points that can be made with this book as an example.

So, on to the rant...

Reading these posts made me think more about Angelfall - a book which really resonated with me because the main character, Penryn, acts as a carer to her mother and her sister.

I actually really appreciated having a character that I could relate to in terms of caring - that part of my life is something which a lot of people don't understand.



I've been a full-time carer for a relative in the past, leaving me with lasting depression issues - and I currently act as a part-time carer to other relatives.

And then I thought... why aren't there more carers as characters in books? There are a lot of carers in life, after all.

Why don't people include diverse situations more in books? There are people out there who are hugely under-represented in popular culture.


And then I thought... why don't people know more about carers in general?

This definition of a carer comes from The Carer's Trust website:

"A carer is anyone who cares, unpaid, for a friend or family member who due to illness, disability, a mental health problem or an addiction cannot cope without their support."

Believe me, being a carer is something which affects everything about you - the way you think, the way you act, and your sense of self. There are also literally millions of carers in the UK, and hundreds of thousands of those are aged 16-24.

The Carer's Trust can offer support to carers in the UK - please use them if you need them; I wish I'd known about them when I could've done with a helping hand. There's a ton of practical advice on the site - whatever your age or situation.

Carers do an incredible job - but rarely ask for anything in return.

My own theory is that we don't want to cause worry or distress to the person/people we're caring for - or cause any embarrassment for them because they can't manage various tasks themselves; but then, we forget to take care of ourselves. And that doesn't end well.

You probably know quite a few carers - you just don't know you do.


Nerd Church is a space where I have a small chat/rant every week about 'issues' of various sorts in a friendly setting (non-nerds welcome!) Feel free to continue the discussion or start your own, but please link back to this blog ;)



Like this post? Try these:

• Reviewing the Evidence - Angelfall by Susan Ee
• Nerd Church - Look for the Light

I Want To Read All The Books!

Do other readers get this? This inexplicable, irresistible, urge to go out and read every single book in the goddamned world?!?!

No? Just me? Ok. I'll go sit in my corner and be quiet.

Seriously though, do you ever get discouraged by the fact that a single human life-time is just not enough to read all the books that are worth reading?

(And let's face it, they are all worth reading - even the bad ones, because even the bad ones have something to say about you, about life, about everything.)

If I carry on reading at the pace of about 200 books a year, it'll take me five years to reach 1000 - millions of new books are published every year. That's well over 5 million books in the time that it takes me to read 1000. Sigh.

That doesn't mean I'm going to stop - hell, no! It's better to read a fraction of the books available, than to read no books at all!

(On a related note: this lady is now my hero.)

Happy Reading! ;)


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A Few Changes

I've been having some issues with Google+, so I've reverted to the old BlogSpot comments system.

This means that Google+ comments will no longer appear on this blog, but will still appear on the Google+ version of the post they were related to.

I'm not ignoring you; if it were up to me I would've kept all your comments where everyone can see - but needs must.

And my technology issues (Google+ keeps insisting that I'm spam and blocking my access to various things,) mean that I need to be able to comment on my own blog (which I couldn't under Google+) - and this is the way to do it.

Feel free to re-comment or copy and paste your comments back onto the blog. And please know that I appreciate all of your comments.