Review 2015 No. 3 | Live And Let Die by Ian Fleming

“You start to die the moment you are born. The whole of life is cutting through the pack with death. So take it easy. Light a cigarette and be grateful you are still alive as you suck the smoke deep into your lungs. Your stars have already let you come quite a long way since you left your mother’s womb and whimpered at the cold air of the world.” 

With these words in his second James Bond book, Ian Fleming reminds us of something. In the majesty and mystery of the world of the secret service agent - the films, the long-limbed actors, the wealth - we lose sight of one pertinent fact; Fleming was more than a half-decent writer. Here Fleming works with a fundamental of writing - write about what you know - taking Bond on a journey through Harlem, Florida and Jamaica, places he knew well. This novel has all the best bits of the films and more - scuba diving, an international baddie chase ('Mr Big' in Live and Let Die), a Bond girl - and I would argue it is a difficult card to trump. If Fleming follows a trend I strongly believe in - that writer's tend to release the majority of their creative energy in their first book or two - then it will be. The jury's out, as I still have 10 or so of the other Bond novels to digest. I say SAY YES to this one!

Daydreams and Dinner Dates | Photo Vlog

Where are the days in January going? It seems only yesterday that New Year and Hogmanay wound their way round again, so here's a flashback to some of my Yuletide feasting and frivolities...

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Review 2015 No. 1 | Girl Online by Zoe Sugg

Image: http://www.zoella.co.uk

Welcome, welcome to 2015 (on the blog that is)! I hope you had a great Christmas and are having a good New Year and all that. Having been sidetracked with a hectic schedule in the final months of 2014 I didn't manage to read much at all, which has lead me to decide to read and review at least 52 books in 2015 (that's at least one blog post a week! :)). Without further ado, seeing as it is the end of the first week, here are my thoughts on Girl Online.

If you are au fait with all things blog/YouTube/book in the world then you'll probably know that on 25th November 2014 Zoe Sugg, or Zoella to her 6 million+ YouTube subscribers, released her first novel, Girl Online. Everything was going well, the book had rave reviews and had the highest ever first-week sales for a debut author (78,109) since records began in 1998. That was until it came out that Zoe hadn't written the book 'on her own'. Zoella and her publishers Penguin Random House eventually confirmed that Girl Online had been ghostwritten.

So now that the elephant, or penguin, in the room has been dealt with I can say that I don't think it matters. Surely the quality and reception the novel receives is more important? The novel is a form of semi-autobiography, telling the story of a female UK blogger who, like Zoella, lives in Brighton. A love story ensues that leads us through the side roads of Brighton and New York and into the mind of a teenage girl dealing with anxiety disorder. I won't spoil any more of the adventure, but I will say that, whether or not she wrote it herself, Zoella came up with the idea and has used her experiences to empower rather than put down young people. For that, I think she deserves credit for creating one of the few Young Adult books worth reading this year.

Reviews and comments below! Cx

Review: James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl

Cloud-men causing weather chaos with hailstones? A grasshopper that plays the violin? Set across the iconic metropolis backgrounds of London and New York, James and the Giant Peach tells the tale of James Henry Trotter and a ladybird, glow-worm, centipede and others, as they leave England to sail in a peach to America. 

My first exposure to this literary imaginarium was the 1996 film, which I was obsessed with and watched over and over again as a child. The book, first published in America in 1961, is justifiably more magnificent, with Quentin Blake's illustrations creating the classic we know today. 

The inclusion of several cultural landmarks, such as London Zoo, might be one of the many reasons why Dahl's treasure is included in The Telegraph's list of 15 best children's books. It would be a sin to slander this book in any way. So I won't. It's a gem.

Carpe Diem xx

Review: Breakfast at Tiffany's by Truman Capote

In contrast to the iconic Audrey Hepburn film, the 99-page gem of a book, on which it was based, is far more wide-reaching and all encompassing. In today's literary environment, where epic tomes such as the Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and The Luminaries, are all celebrated for their length, it is refreshing to read Capote's 1958 Breakfast at Tiffany's and Three Short Stories. In less than one hundred pages the author manages to say all that needs to be said, leaving extraneous detail for the reader to conjure in their imagination. 

Similarly at odds with the glamour of the later film, the novella is set in sparse 1943 New York, not the sixties. The tale is a reminiscence on a brief encounter with Holiday Golightly, a glamorous but complex call girl. This fact, as well as her apparent mental illness - depression described as the 'mean reds' - is brushed over rather. For anyone wavering over whether to give it a chance, be brave! This one has a lot to give.

Carpe Diem xx

Review: Shopaholic Ties the Knot by Sophie Kinsella

Simultaneously the most infuriating and laugh-out-loud chick-lits I've ever read. Shopaholic was recommended by a friend, who let me borrow the entire series, and since I started reading them I've been hooked. How Sophie Kinsella, the alias of Madeline Wickham, could turn out so many books dedicated to her car crash of a protagonist, Rebecca Bloomwood, is almost as much of a mystery to me as how popular the series has been. The book is the third in the series, published in 2002, centred around Becky Bloomwood. The plot jumps around rapidly as Becky attempts to juggle wedding(s), jobs, family, friends and finances. This is a disaster in slow motion. You will either cry with frustration at her naivety and recklessness or laugh at the romance and joy splattered throughout. However much I might have loved to hate this book, I'm already on the next one!

Carpe Diem xx

NEW YORK FASHION WEEK

Barbie:

New York Fashion week 2009

Retro Barbie doll

Carpe diem xx