Music Monday - Running Up That Hill - Kate Bush/First Aid Kit

I love the original version of this song, but I really like First Aid Kit and their version.  Singing live, the girls still manage to make this song their own.

Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows - Balli Kaur Jaswal

This books seems ripe for being made into  a cheeky English Sunday night movie.  Nikki decides to do something different with her life and signs up to teach creative writing at a local Sikh community centre in London.  The ladies who arrive though have different ideas about what they want to learn.  For some they want to learn English, but many of the older woman want to share Erotic stories.  Nikki finds herself learning about these women, their experiences and marriages and how these stories are compensating for the lack of passion in their lives.  4/5

Coming Soon

I've been stuck with the 100 day cough after my flu of the 2018 film festival meaning I missed 10 movies I had booked, and I haven't been able to go back to the cinema since.  So it will be nice when I can go back.  These movies look good and i will add to my list to see.

The Andy Cohen Diaries - Andy Cohen

Andy Cohen is a Bravo TV host and producer, and in this book he writes a diary following a year in his hectic life.  He is quite the name dropper, and the amount of celebrities he mentions does begin to blur after a while.  It is quite often amusing, he is quite witty and not scared to be a bit scathing about the people he meets and dates.  I did like his relationship with his new found dog, who seems to be the love of his life, but was left enamored with his manorexia and obsession with his weight.  Still he was quite the hard worker, and although he manages quite a few holidays scattered here and there, he does seem to be doing lots of shows, charity events and schmoozing.  His days are packed with meals out with a big gang of friends, and I was impressed at his stamina thinking that his life would exhaust me. 3/5

Music Monday - Falling Slowly - Glen Hansard & Lisa Hannigan

This song won the Academy Award for original song in 2008, for the 2006 Irish film Once, and it always tugs on my hearstrings to hear it played.  There is something magical about the tune, the lyrics and the two voices singing it.

Little Fires Everywhere - Celeste Ng

This is the story about the Richardsons, a family with four kids living the average life in 1990's Shaker Heights Ohio, when Mia and her daughter Pearl arrive in town, and move into their rental things beginning to shift and change.   A bit of a slow starter for me, I kept thinking as I read this one that everyone has a story to tell, and what we do and say ripples across many other people.

I did feel a bit confused, not really knowing whether I was reading an adult book or one aimed at young adults, as much of the story focused on the kids Trip, Moody, Lexi, Izzy and Pearl.  3/5

American Made

After a day of doing nice things and an afternoon of relaxing, for me it is nice to dish up the dinner and sit on the couch and watch a movie.  Itunes and apple TV have made it easier, especially with 99c and 2.99 specials.  Especially when cinemas here charge $17.50 for a seat, it has to really be a good movie for me to want to see it. 

So American Made is a bit of a Tom Cruise movie very loosely based on a real story about Barry Seal, a TWA pilot who became involved with the CIA and ended up being a drug and guns smuggler between several countries in Central and South America and the US.  Tom Cruise does a good job of holding the whole movie, but I can't help but being left with the feeling that the movie felt like it would have done well 10 years ago and that the whole thing just felt a bit smug and self important.  Maybe a drug smuggler story is not really the thing for this middle aged lady viewer.  3/5

Happily Ever Esther - Steve Jenkins, Derek Walter and Caprice Cane

I had never heard of Esther the Wonder pig until I found this book staring at me from the library shelves.  Apparently it is the second book, that tells how her two fathers, after realizing that she is indeed getting too big for their suburban house,  decide to move to rural Canada, buy some land and set up a pet sanctuary. 

Part of the story are amusing, and I had to admire their determination to look after so many animals that had been abandoned, and it made me want to pack in my job and do the same.  I did find some of it a bit bitchy and wondered if they should have just stayed quiet on their opinions about some of their helpers.  A quick light read it did make me go and look at Esthers Instagram posts.  3/5

Music Monday - This Must Be The Place - Talking Heads

This always reminds me of teenage years.  Must have been too many Saturday nights with the cassette player blasting loud.

The Lost Vintage - Ann Mah

Kate needs to pass the Master of Wine test and so returns to her families ancestral vineyard in France. Here she runs into old boyfriends, meets new loves and digs into the families hidden past. A lost diary answers some questions about what happened during the second world war.

Look it was ok for me but I was pretty sure I knew how it was going to end right from the start. I also kept wondering how a wine sommelier could keep affording to jet to and from Europe so often. Anyway it is always nice to escape into a French vineyard. 3/5