In the song the time is late and Rene Marie is ready for home, love, rest, as “tomorrow is already today.” I began by commenting that Black Lace Freudian Slip is a master class in good, possibly great, singing; and my hesitation was due to my perception that a definitive assertion of rare and important quality—of greatness—can be off-putting when it comes blunt and fast, but this is what I think: Rene Marie is a great singer.
A Garden of Wisdom, from Some Long-Ago Dream: Carole King’s Tapestry
On Tapestry, King’s singing, sincere and strong, is quite good in “I Feel the Earth Move,” which has a driving rhythm and engaging melody, and uses earthquake as a metaphor for a stirring love. The song is more dramatic than romantic, as it contains energy and hunger. It is followed by the ballad “So Far Away,” in the album’s regular pattern of an uptempo song followed by a ballad. One can hear a little jazz in “It’s Too Late,” a rock song about a failing relationship, the rhythms of the song matching the intensity of the situation.
When Strength is Earned and Becomes Beauty: On Tina Turner, “I Might Have Been Queen,” Private Dancer, Break Every Rule, Foreign Affair, and More
Tina Turner: hair, eyes, mouth, teeth. Glowing brown skin. Breast, hips, legs. A burst of dazzling energy. Honesty and passion. Dignity and sexiness. Tough history, tougher spirit. Serenity sought and found. A new telling of a woman’s story, of an American life—and the evolution of an international artist and entertainer. In “I Might Have Been Queen,” a song that she sings with sorrow and pride, with resignation and triumph, Tina Turner looks out over time, looks at and through history, and sees no tragedy.
Seven Compositions (Here Playful, There Serious): Beautiful Mechanical by the classical group yMusic
On Beautiful Mechanical, the title song has a nearly comic frantic energy, something the strings both soften and deepen, before going off on their own quick currency against a droning beat. The piece is actually hard to grasp, to think about, as it contains much frequently fast textured movement. “Proven Badlands,” featuring cello and horn, is slow, sonorous, and has a cinematic quality, especially in the rise of the horns in repeated phrases. The high, mellow but still sharp, soaring trumpet playing, and a three-beat rhythm, and a scraping against strings, distinguish it.
A review of Ben’s Challenge by L.M. Visman
Set in 1958 Australia, Ben’s Challenge is at its heart an historical coming-of-age story with a fair dose of mystery and intrigue thrown in. The story begins with news of thirteen-year-old Ben Kellerman’s father’s death in a hit and run. It’s an accident that remains unsolved until the end of the book and is the catalyst for Ben’s transition from childhood.
A review of The Steampunk Bible: An Illustrated Guide to the World of Imaginary Airships, Corsets and Goggles, Mad Scientists, and Strange Literature by Jeff VanderMeer and S. J. Chambers
Somehow the Steampunk aesthetic, whether it be a fondness for clockwork devices or an interest in dressing up in cravats and corsets, has extended to other areas of culture too – and the authors cover these also. They even compare Steampunk to Surrealism at one point, which strikes me as absurd: Surrealism was much more radical, an hard-edged beast.
A review of Irrepressible: The Life and Times of Jessica Mitford by Leslie Brody
Leslie Brody has a big story to tell, and she tells it well, deftly manoeuvring through an extraordinary life filled with multiple significant figures, historical episodes, social action, tragedies, world war, children and writing. Her style is easy and fluent, lively and engaging, enhancing what is a captivating life story.
A review of Schlechter’s Chess Games by Tom Crain
width = “80” height = “110”> This book contains pretty much all of Schlechter’s available games – about eight hundred in number – arranged chronologically by tournament and match; and there is also a section devoted to miscellaneous games: exhibition games, games played at odds, etc. Just the bare score of the game is given; there are no, or to be precise, very few annotations.
A review of The Plot Against America by Philip Roth
The writing is always very competent and sometimes even better than that. Lending interest is a symbolic element in the treatment of stamps (Philip collects them, they get printed with swastikas at least in his imagination, Lindbergh is an aviator who delivered air mail). There is humor, though more in individual passages than woven into the fabric of the writing (but given the nature of the story, that is perhaps understandable).
A review of A Boy Called Dickens by Deborah Hopkinson
A Boy Called Dickens is a great primer to get children interested in what did happen to this little boy, and to read the works of the famed Charles Dickens, who proved that anything is possible through hard work and never giving up on your dream.