Booklog 21/2018 - Jim C Hines: Terminal Alliance - Janitors of the Post-Apocalypse, #1

The apocalypse (a mutated plague) turned all humans into mindless savages, but the Krakau found a cure. A hundred years later, those cured humans are allowed into space on Krakau ships, acting in menial roles. They are prized for their toughness, their ability to thrive on basic rations, and their hard work. They get the jobs that no one else wants. Marion “Mops” Adamopoulos is a Lieutenant in charge of shipboard hygiene and sanitation. When a bio attack wipes out the command crew and turns the shipboard humans feral again, Mops and her crew are wearing containment suits so they are the only ones not affected. They go from being janitors and plumbers to having to fly the ship and outwit the aliens, and in doing so learn the secret that the Krakau didn't want them to know.

It's quirky and intriguing. Highly recommended.

Booklog 22/2018 - Lindsey Davis: The Silver Pigs - Marcus Didius Falco #1

Ever since I heard one of the Falco books dramatized on Radio4's Book of the Week, I've wanted to get round to reading one of Linsey Davis's stories about Marcus Didius Falco, the Roman 'informer' – a detective in all but name. What better place to start than the first book, from 1989? Falco is a fabulous character, impoverished, but clever. He's thirty years old with an interfering mother and a recently deceased military brother (Didius Festus) who was the family's shining star. Falco knows he'll never measure up to his brother, so he goes his own way, living in a sixth floor apartment over Lenia's laundry and taking a variety of 'informing' jobs. This book kicks off when Falco rescues sixteen year old Sosia who was kidnapped from her uncle's house (Senator Decimus Camillus). This starts Falco on a track that takes him from Rome to British silver mines (working under cover and almost dying from the conditions). There's stolen silver, kidnapping, treachery and violence… and the senator's daughter, the acerbic Helena Justinia. Has Marcus met his match?

Booklog 23/2018 - Jodi Taylor: An Argumentation of Historians - Chronicles of St Mary's #9

Does time travel make this science fiction, or is it pure fantasy? I don't know and I don't care, it's an attention-grabbing read. There's a quick trip to see Henry VIII fall off his horse and a trip to Persepolis, but Clive Ronan is still causing chaos up and down the timelines, so Max and the time police set a trap for him. Well, it seems like a good idea, but when have Max's good ideas ever worked? As a result, Max is dumped in the Medieval period and no one knows where she is. She knows where she is - in St Mary's but about 600 years in the past. She has to learn to live there and to make a new life for herself because she doubts she'll ever get home again. She's desperately missing Leon, but there's someone in 1399 who can offer her protection. She knows Leon would be the first to tell her to find a way to survive, even if that means marrying.

We've known for a while that there was a traitor at St Mary's feeding Ronan information. At last we find out who.

Jodi Taylor is on by buy on sight list, so this is a must-read for me. Highly recommended.

Booklog 24/2018 - Sheila Walsh: The Sergeant Major's Daughter

I've never read any books by the late Sheila Walsh before, but this was on offer so I gave it a try. Written in 1978, it easily stands up alongside the modern crop of Regency romances, with a strong heroine, though the evil antagonist is a bit two dimensional. Felicity Vale, the daughter of a well-respected sergeant major who has been brought up as an independent army brat, has to rely on her cousin for a roof over her head after her father is killed at Waterloo. The cousin, Amaryllis, is the widow of the younger brother of an earl (Stayne) and felicity's new home turns out to be Stayne's estate. Not wanting charity, she takes on the task of governess to Felicity's (spoilt) son and then – at the Earl's request – opens up a school in the village, thus angering an evil neighbour who wants the peasants kept in their place. Dastardly shenanigens ensue with a fire and peril, but eventually it all ends as expected.

Booklog 25/2018 - Jodi Taylor: The Battersea Barricades - Chronicles of St Mary's short story 9.5

Jodie Taylor is a buy-on-sight author for me, so I really enjoyed getting the backstory of Mrs Mack (St Mary's kitchen supremo), Mrs Enderby (wardrobe) and Mrs Shaw (admin) when they manned the Battersea Barricades during an unbelievable three weeks of revolution in Britain and began the downfall of a corrupt government. Oh, ladies, where are you when we need you?

Booklog 26/2018 - Jane Aiken Hodge: Marry in Haste

I was curious to read this as Jane Aiken Hodge was a writer I read way back in my teens and twenties. I read a lot of recently written historical fiction, mostly Regencies, so I wondered how this would stand up. If you can ignore the bonkers premise… that Camilla Forest, fleeing a bad situation as a governess in a household with a lecherous older son, is picked up on the road (literally) by Lord Leominster when the coach she is waiting for doesn't turn up. Within a couple of hours he's proposed to her, a business arrangement because his fearsome grandmother will disinherit him if he remains single.

Once you've suspended disbelief for that element of the plot, the rest follows quite neatly. Leominster is dispatched to Portugal in the teeth of Napoleon's invasion and Camilla (while gradually falling in love with Leominster) has to navigate war-torn Portugal. In truth, though the characterization is less vivid than it could be and the sex scenes are less steamy that those written by some contemporary historical novel writers, it still stands up reasonably well today as a Gothic Romance. Though there are moments when the tension could be resolved instantly if the two protagonists simply talked to each other.

Movie of the Week: The Shape of Water

I'm catching up with my Movies of the Week blog posts. This is from 14th February.

I absolutely adored The Shape of Water.

Set in 1962 in a secret laboratory somewhere in Baltimore this features Sally Hawkins as Elisa, a mute cleaning lady who make friends with and then falls in love with an amphibious captured sea creture, a beautiful monster (Doug Jones).

Elisa's muteness is explained by three parallel scars on the side of her throat and we are left to draw our own conclusions about them.

It's Guillermo del Toro'sblood-curdling fairy tale of forbidden romance is multi-layered. Elisa has a good commannd of sign language, but she's used to not being heard. Her only friends are workmate Zelda (Octavia Spencer) and her neighbour, Giles (Richard Jenkins).
The villain of piece is Strickland (Michael Shannon), one-dimensional in his relentless cruelty and the pursuit of the creature when Elisa and Zelda rescue him.

There's excitement and love and an ambiguous ending which you can put your own spin on. If you missed this at the cinema, treat yourself to the DVD when it comes out. Marvellous.

 

Movie of the Week: Black panther

21st February.

Black Panther is a gorgeously visual movie, much lauded already by critics for its almost entirely black cast offering a combination of diversity and commercial appeal. Set in the fictional African country of Wakanda, which is high-tech but secluded from the world, this features Chadwick Boseman as T'Challa (Black Panther), now king of Wakanda following his father's death.

His claim to the crown is challenged by Eric Killmonger (Michael B Jordan), an embittered young man who believes Wakanda should use its tech for the benefit of all. So here we have a villain with possibly more noble motives than our heroes, which is an interesting twist. It plays out well in the end.

Kudos to Lupita Nyong'o and Danai Gurira for portraying strong African women (and a special mention for the costume designers. The warrior women were superb).

Movie of the Week: Finding Your Feet

One of those charming British films featuring a galaxy of beautifully aging British thesps let by Imelda Staunton as Sandra, the betrayed wife who runs to her estranged sister, Bif (Celia Imrie) when she has nowhere else to go. Introduced to a variety of unlikely characters including Charlie (Timothy Spall) and Jackie (Joanna Lumley) she gradually begins to unwind and start living again when she joins a dance team..

It's a feelgood movie with a mixture of sadness and joy.

Movie of the Week: A Wrinkle in Time

18th April

Oh dear, what a badly miscast movie. The young leads were OK (Storm Reid, Levi Miller and Deric McCabe) but, oh dear, Oprah Winfrey as Mrs Which was so over the top, she met herself coming back. I think it's down to the costume design. In a previous review I praised the costume and set design for Black Panther. The costumes for Mrs Which, Mrs Who and Mrs Whatsit were just about as far in the opposite direction as it's possible to get.

Chris Pine as the missing dad in need of rescue kinda dialled it in. There really wan't much to be done with a turgid script. Even Gugu Mbatha-Raw had no opportunity to shine.

The galling thing was that we had to travel to the Showcase Cinema in Batley to see it because it disappeared from our local cinema in Wakefield in just one week. (Now I know why.) The nice thing was that the cinema has reclining seats which help you to sleep through in comfort.

If you haven't seen it, do yourself a favour and don't.

Movie of the Week: Avengers - Infinity War

2nd May

Much anticipated, Avengers - Infinity War delivered (in lumps).

Without spoilers, there are two things you need to know before you see it. Firstly, it's not the end of the story, but you'll have to wait until next year to find out how it continues. And secondly, it's worth sitting through the incredibly long credits because there's an Easter Egg right at the end which gives a clue to what's coming next.

So, how does a movie maker take the main characters from across the Marvel franchise and bring them all together in one movie? The answer is, carefully. Guardians of the Galaxy, plus Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, Black Panther, Spider Man, Black Widow, Vision, Doctor Strange and The Hulk (or mostly Bruce Banner). And of course we get super-villain Thanos from Guardians. There was also a lovely vignette from Peter Dinklage.

No spoilers, but this movie could be a game-changer for the marvel Universe. I'm looking forward to 2019 to see how certain issues are resolved.

Booklog 27/2018 - Peter Ackroyd: Revolution - The History of England Vol 4

I haven't read the whole six book set of Peter Ackroyd's History of England. I read the first and wanted to skip ahead to this one because it covers the period I'm writing about in my Rowankind novels, that is, the Napoleonic wars. This is a well written account, probably greatly simplified, but with enough information for my purposes. Peter Ackroyd's writing is smooth and delightfully readable and delivered just the right amount of information. It's definitely 'popular' rather than 'academic'. Highly recommended if you have a general interest in English history.