Francie Nolan grows up in the tenements of Williamsburg in Brooklyn, New York in the early years of the 20th Century. The granddaughter of German and Irish immigrants, Francie and her younger brother Neeley (real name Cornelius) grow up dirt poor, but thankfully don’t really realise it until they get older. Their mother, Katie, works hard as a janitress to make sure they have a place to stay and food on the table. Their father, Johnny, is handsome and charming, a gifted singer, and a […]
Forget the stupid rat-creatures. Stupid and annoying Phoney Bone, more like it
The three Bone cousins Fone Bone (renamed Hero Bone in my head), Smiley Bone (Comic Relief Bone) and Phoney Bone (Greedy, or frequently Insufferable, Bone) have been driven out of their home town of Boneville because Phoney Bone had some sort of get rich quick scheme and scammed the entire town, and now an angry mob has driven them off. They are wandering in the wilderness when they are attacked by a huge swarm of locusts and end up in a mysterious forest in a […]
I think rock stars may be the earls of contemporary romance
Liberty “Libby” Bell (yes, her parents named her Liberty when their surname was Bell, I don’t know why you’d do that to a child either!) has been living as a veritable recluse in her grandparents’ old farmhouse on an island in the Carolinas (I think, there’s an author’s note about how the place obviously doesn’t really exist blah blah) since her parents died in a car accident the year before. She apparently makes her living as a book cover designer (cool job – not one […]
I would be non-compliant in so many different ways
“In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth. Mother Earth, we used to say, before we understood. Space is the mother who receives us, you see? Earth is the father. And your father has cast you out. For your trespasses, your gluttony, your pride, your weakness, and your wickedness are such that you are beyond correction and castigation. Like a cancer you must be excised from the world that bore you. For the well-being of us all, lest your sickness spread. You will […]
How should we live when the world is dying?
The Children of Men is a work of dystopian fiction with religious overtones. PD James steps out of her usual realm of detective novels/mysteries to ponder what happens to relationships (among people, between people and government, between individuals and God) when the end of the world is immanent. In 2021, it has already been 35 years since the last live human birth. For reasons that science has not been able to explain, humans worldwide have been unable to reproduce; they are simply no longer fertile. […]
Can a book be lighthearted if people get eaten in it?
Yet another book I’ve read with my kid. I promise you that I’m also reading grown-up books, but I just haven’t reviewed most of them yet (I’m over 30 reviews behind – I am not proud of that). And this is one I can wholly endorse. We picked it up because the whole family wants to see the movie. Now that I’ve read it (not sure how I missed it when I was a kid), I want to see it even more. But I would […]
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