Short Movie Review: How to be a Latin Lover

Finding himself dumped after 25 years of marriage, a man who made a career of seducing rich older women must move in with his estranged sister, where he begins to learn the value of family.

Director: Ken Marino

Writers: Jon Zack, Chris Spain

Stars: Eugenio Derbez, Salma Hayek, Raphael Alejandro

1h 55min | Comedy, Drama 

This was one I did not expect much from, but it was funny. I enjoyed this one.

Recommend?

yes

PS. I have these very very old drafts saved so time to post them! :D

Audio: They went left by Monica Hesse

Narrated by: Caitlin Davies

Length: 9 hrs and 6 mins

Release date: 04-08-20

Publisher: Little, Brown Young Readers

Own

YA Histoical fiction

The author explained at the end that so many books is about the war and the end, but not what happens after the end. And she is right, I haven't read many like this that is all about afterwards.

So yes, nothing about the war, nothing about her time in the ghetto or concentration camp. The war is long over when Zofia is released from hospital. She is really messed up and had no idea what really happened before the concentration camp, or after. I have rarely seen a book like this, just so out of it, and of course she would be. But she is trying to put her life together, she goes back to Poland, she goes back to Germany to find her brother.

Most of the book takes place in a refuge/replacement camp. She is trying to find her brother, like so many others. She meets new friends, she meets a man. Pieces of memory shows itself to be made up, erased or just hidden so well behind her trauma. A few things surprised even me.

A good book. Sad, but that is understandable. I did not understand the title either before it was explained, she went right, so many others were taken left and killed.

Good narration, there is music too, and the tone she sets during that time is so sad and emotional. Those are the hard bits

Germany, 1945. The soldiers who liberated the Gross-Rosen concentration camp said the war was over, but nothing feels over to eighteen-year-old Zofia Lederman. Her body has barely begun to heal; her mind feels broken. And her life is completely shattered: Three years ago, she and her younger brother, Abek, were the only members of their family to be sent to the right, away from the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau. Everyone else--her parents, her grandmother, radiant Aunt Maja--they went left.

Zofia's last words to her brother were a promise: Abek to Zofia, A to Z. When I find you again, we will fill our alphabet. Now her journey to fulfill that vow takes her through Poland and Germany, and into a displaced persons camp where everyone she meets is trying to piece together a future from a painful past: Miriam, desperately searching for the twin she was separated from after they survived medical experimentation. Breine, a former heiress, who now longs only for a simple wedding with her new fianc�. And Josef, who guards his past behind a wall of secrets, and is beautiful and strange and magnetic all at once.But the deeper Zofia digs, the more impossible her search seems. How can she find one boy in a sea of the missing? In the rubble of a broken continent, Zofia must delve into a mystery whose answers could break her--or help her rebuild her world.

Audio: The Christmas Bookshop by Jenny Colgan

Narrated by: Eilidh Beaton

Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins

Release date: 11-16-21

Publisher: HarperAudio

Women's fiction

To review

Carmen has a dead end job, and then the store closes. She likes her life, but is not really doing much. So she ends up in Edinburgh, living with her sister and working in a bookshop. She sees her sister as perfect, and is rather resentful.

And sure Sofia is rather perfect, but she works hard for it. She says that her water can broke in the office and she will then go have her baby.  But yes she needs to let loose a bit. And not to rely on her truly annoying nanny (omg, ugh the nanny.)

As for Carmen, she also have to loose some of her prejudices. She will also see how good she really is trying to turn around a bookshop. And finding out kids are not horrid.

Lots of interesting people comes into her life, a chance for romance too, but since this is not a romance it takes time.

And I really want to visit that street in xmas times now. Awww xmas times.

Good xmassy book.

The narrator had this great voice for Carmen that fitted her so well, the same with the rest if the voices too. Annoying people, stuck up people, the kids, yes everyone got the voice they deserved.

When the department store she works in closes for good, Carmen has perilously little cash and few options. She doesn’t want to move in with her perfect sister Sofia, in Sofia’s perfect house with her perfect children and her perfectly ordered Edinburgh life.

Frankly, Sofia doesn’t exactly want Carmen there either. Her sister has always been sarcastic and difficult. But Sofia has yet another baby on the way, a mother desperate to see her daughters get along, and a client who needs a retail assistant for his ailing bookshop, so welcoming Carmen might still have some benefits for everyone.

At Sofia’s behest, Carmen is thrown into the daily workings of old Mr. McCredie’s ancient bookshop on the streets of the old dark city. Can she use her design skills to revamp the store and bring it back to popularity in time to benefit from Christmas shopping traffic? Can she choose between bad boy literary rock star Blair and quiet Quaker student Oke? And will she heal the rift with the most important people of all: her family?

TMST

 

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11/23/2021 Gratitude. 

What books/authors/narrators/bloggers are you most thankful for this year?

I was looking at Goodreads and omg, is this my worst year ever? Not a single 5, and my 4s are really really few. No wonder I have a hard time picking a book each month, because yes I have read lots of good books, but not that many great books.

And now I do not feel thankful at all *sobs*

But no, I am always thankful to wonderful narrators that makes a book come alive in my head, and gives my eyes a rest. I love audiobooks and I am grateful for them

And for all wonderful authors that keeps writing good books!

11/30/2021 Book cover love: Share some book covers that you loved in 2021