All overgrown by cunning moss, (146) by Emily Dickinson

“All overgrown by cunning moss,
All interspersed with weed,
The little cage of “Currer Bell”
In quiet “Haworth” laid.

This Bird – observing others
When frosts too sharp became
Retire to other latitudes –
Quietly did the same –

But differed in returning –
Since Yorkshire hills are green –
Yet not in all the nests I meet –
Can Nightingale be seen –”

I was recently introduced to Dickinson’s poetry through my module on writing poetry. I had never read any of her work before, and although I had heard of her in passing, I had never thought to look at any of her poems. It was poem 146 that took my fancy straight away, possibly because I could understand its subject matter most clearly: the grave of Charlotte Bronte. Whilst the subject matter appears at first to be morbid…

Synopsis from GoodReads:

“What if your life were defined by a number?

What if any crime could be committed without punishment, so long as you could afford to pay the fee assigned to that crime?

Theo works in the Criminal Audit Office. He assesses each crime that crosses his desk and makes sure the correct debt to society is paid in full.

But when Theo’s ex-lover Dani is killed, it’s different. This is one death he can’t let become merely an entry on a balance sheet.

Because when the richest in the world are getting away with murder, sometimes the numbers just don’t add up.”

My thoughts

After watching Bird Box, a dystopian end of the world film, I fancied reading something dystopian and by chance at the right time picked up this book. I Read 10 chapters in the bookshop and had to buy it. Couldn’t stop reading, waiting…

Double Dragons Lead the Way

      The grand finale of the 15 day Lunar New Year celebration was well under way on Mott St. in the heart of Chinatown. A stage was set up on Hester and Mott Sts. to proclaim the importance of the holiday to VIPs, politicians, and dignitaries. US Senator Chuck Schumer , US Representative Nydia Velazquez and NY State Senator John Liu were among those present to help celebrate the occasion.  Parade founder, Steven Tin, of Better Chinatown, did a great job in keeping the pre-parade festivities going. The most anticipated part is when lettuce heads are dangled from long wooden poles and the dancing lions shred the leaves and toss them to the crowd for prosperity.  It was a great tradition to see well and alive in Chinatown.

Dancing Lions Greeting the Crowd

Staten Island Lions Leading the Way

Dragon Leader Weaving His…

“Whatever you say, say nothing,” Seamus Heaney famously wrote. That, surely, is also part of the message of Anna Burn’s Booker winning novel Milkman, in which nameless people constantly talk around everything but the truth. Told from the perspective of eighteen year-old “middle-daughter”, Milkman recreates the world in which the unmentionable troubles of 1970s Northern Ireland took place. This is a world in which a single misplaced word or misunderstanding can result in a whole level of community conspiracy: a kind of fantasy shared by people whose every thought and action seems to be governed by a specific set of sectarian values.

Thus, the narrator is assumed to be the lover of a high-ranking ‘renouncer’ or republican paramilitary known locally as Milkman, when in fact she is being stalked and intimidated by him. As local narratives do not appear to authorise any alternative to the idea that she might…

 Today is Valentine’s Day and, to get in the mood, I was planning on finding some ridiculous romantic-comedy to review. I’ve been getting into the spirit on my Instagram so I might as well do the same here. My plan was to get home from work and watching something disgusting. Probably a Richard Curtis film or something. Instead, I had a dreadful day and really lost my romantic spirit. There’s nothing like your manager unnecessarily calling you a liar to really ruin your entire day. So, I decided I wanted to watch something a little less conventionally romantic this evening. As I was going through my film collection and found this beauty. It seemed to tick every box: romance, mindless violence, humour, Gary Oldman, Patricia Arquette’s boobs… it was all there. I don’t think I’ve ever really made a definitive list of my favourite films ever because it would be…

So it’s been another stressful week but at least it’s raining (for me!) and I’m going to ramble mostly about movie trailers. But first, at long last, there’s a date for Good Omens!

 Clipart Photo

Fluffy white flakes

The day I was waiting for finally arrived…. I went to Waterstones. I do have book shops close to me, two branches of The Works and a WHSmith but they don’t have as much as Waterstones, it’s not the same!

I’ve been wanting to go for a while but time, too many books and buying a lot of things for my new house stopped me. Nothing was going to stop me this week! I had a week off with my boyfriend, busy week, (hence this is the first post) we got some house stuff done.

I think I spent ages in Waterstones, my boyfriend isn’t a reader and he was waiting for me, whoops.

As usual I completely forgot what books I wanted and ended up going on my GoodReads to remind me. Deciding was hard and there’s a book I didn’t get that I want to buy Haunting of…

Rainbow Bouquetis live! There’s a pleasingly eclectic mix of stories in this anthology: the narrator of mine is an English Civil War ghost on a mission to save the family home from being turned into offices. It owes something to Eleanor Farjeon’s Faithful Jenny Dove, and something to Oscar Wilde’s The Canterville Ghost, and a little to my parents’ short-lived plan to buy a water-mill and operate it as a tourist attraction.

I’m also very pleased to say that A Spoke In The Wheel was a finalist in the North Street Book Prize 2018. It’s pleasing that there are more competitions out there that are willing to consider self-published books, and very pleasing that there are some set up specifically to honour self-published books, and – of course – very pleasing indeed when they honour mine!