Ballroom_Pink

• Rated 2 stars

“The author seemed a bit hesitant or afraid to really write down what she really wanted to. Perhaps not confident in her skills just yet but mostly just afraid to express her thoughts to strangers.”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Thursday, January 19, 2012. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 1 stars

“Rife with spelling errors. Poorly written.”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Monday, January 31, 2011. ( reply | permalink )

1 of 1 members found this review helpful.

• Rated 4 stars

“As an American, despite being an incurable Anglophile, I had never heard of Lynn Barber and her wicked penmanship until I heard that the lovely film An Education was based on her teenage years. Apparently she had written a short piece about her relationship with an older and mysterious man in some newspaper or magazine and Nick Hornby developed it into the script (with a few fictional enhancements). Barber then developed this short memoir adding her years in journalism — she began as a fact checker during at London-based Penthouse in its early days — and her romance with the man she would marry and have two daughters with only to see him succumb to cancer. Perhaps a good example of her writing that escaped me until now, this short little collection of her life and work is fantastically written, cheeky and human. ”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Saturday, January 29, 2011. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 1 stars

“Clearly written by someone who is more a fan of the BBC miniseries than the actual novel.”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Monday, January 24, 2011. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 5 stars

“I'm not a comic book/graphic novel fan in general, and yet I was lent this book and my ideas about what graphic novels could accomplish was changed. Not only is it a completely unique retelling of the Holocaust, but it also shows a struggling relationship between a father and son. The fact that the Jews are mice and the Nazis are cats is not a gimmick in any way.”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Friday, December 31, 2010. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 2 stars

“Completely changed what I thought of Princess Grace.”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Tuesday, November 30, 2010. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 5 stars

“Heartbreaking. You really feel for these characters over the years and you root for them and shake your head at their actions.”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Wednesday, August 4, 2010. ( reply | permalink )

1 of 1 members found this review helpful.

• Rated 4 stars

“I would have thought at first to classify this novel as science-fiction from the cover flap and that tends to be a genre of fiction that I veer away from but the fact that Kazuo Ishiguro wrote it spoke highly of its literary merit.
The novel reminds me of watching scary movies of the 1970s late night transfixed by the possibility of being frightened, lulled in by the atmosphere that promoted something lurking underneath serenity.
Ishiguro's is one of finest writers working today so when the narrator Kathy H. tells us so haphazardly of the events that shaped her and her friends at Hailsham, I had to just trust him and eventually the sentences beginning with "Anyway" began to fade away.
If one is expecting a typical science-fiction horror story from Ishiguro than they would be wrong because that is not Ishiguro's typical fare and it seems more like a test of those structures and then he implements his own novel characteristics. If one is a fan of Ishiguro's then read this.”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Sunday, June 20, 2010. ( reply | permalink )

1 of 1 members found this review helpful.

• Rated 2 stars

“Alternating fascinating and dull essays about certain aspects of English life. Touches about stereotypes which prove to be true (according to the author), observations she believes to be original. ”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Tuesday, April 6, 2010. ( reply | permalink )

1 of 1 members found this review helpful.

• Rated 3 stars

“Decidedly not as approachable as Niffenegger's best-selling novel, The TIme Traveler's Wife, Her Fearful Symmery is nonetheless intriguing. Macabre to say the least, Niffenegger certainly enjoys putting her love of it on display here. It's not macabre that the actions of novel take place near a well-known London cemetery, it's macabre in the way the characters act. Characters change from being relatable to being complete mysteries claiming what forgiveness one could have for them in a matter of sentences. Whether this sounds appealing as a story, I'm not quite sure, but I did keep reading Niffenegger's tale.”

Ballroom_Pink wrote this review Monday, March 8, 2010. ( reply | permalink )