Movie #23 of 2016: Die Hard (1988) Another old favorite that my wife hadn’t seen (and another “Christmas movie” in that it’s set around the holidays, although that’s honestly not such a huge part of the film). This is a classic for a reason, with great performances from young Alan Rickman and Bruce Willis and …
Author Archives: Joe Kessler
Movie Review: Bad Santa (2003)
Movie #22 of 2016: Bad Santa (2003) A family favorite that my wife had never seen before (and that I hadn’t watched in probably ten years). I don’t really have any interest in seeing the new sequel – which looked pretty awful from the trailers – but the original is a non-stop laugh riot. Very …
Book Review: Seize the Day by Saul Bellow
Book #148 of 2016: Seize the Day by Saul Bellow “You can spend the entire second half of your life recovering from the mistakes of the first half.” So laments Tommy Wilhelm in this tightly-focused character study of a New York City Jew longing for a fresh start but unable to find his way there. …
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Book Review: Letter to My Daughter by Maya Angelou
Book #147 of 2016: Letter to My Daughter by Maya Angelou A short but powerful essay collection, pivoting back and forth between Angelou’s personal memoirs and her observations / advice for how to live a decent life to the fullest. Although framed as though addressed to her child, it is of course a great read …
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Book Review: Why Not Me? by Mindy Kaling
Book #146 of 2016: Why Not Me? by Mindy Kaling More heartwarming and less offensive than her previous book. I couldn’t always relate to the situations Mindy describes from her life – like how hard it is to balance dating a White House staffer with being a world-famous television star – but this was a …
Book Review: Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry
Book #145 of 2016: Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry (The Giver #2) Not nearly as good as The Giver, and also entirely unconnected despite being marketed as a companion novel / sequel. (I’ve been told they tie together in a later book in the series, but on their own this one and The Giver are …
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Book Review: Doctor Who: Twelve Doctors of Christmas by Jacqueline Rayner, Colin Brake, Richard Dungworth, Mike Tucker, Gary Russell, and Scott Handcock
Book #144 of 2016: Doctor Who: Twelve Doctors of Christmas by Jacqueline Rayner, Colin Brake, Richard Dungworth, Mike Tucker, Gary Russell, and Scott Handcock An absolutely delightful collection of Doctor Who short stories – one for each incarnation so far except the War Doctor – all set around Christmas, somewhere in time and space. All …
Book Review: I’m Dreaming of a Black Christmas by Lewis Black
Book #143 of 2016: I’m Dreaming of a Black Christmas by Lewis Black Either I’ve cooled on Lewis Black’s angry style of comedy over the years or he was just particularly off his game here. Listening to this audiobook as a fellow Jew just before Christmas, I feel like I should have been particularly situated …
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Book Review: Time Travel: A History by James Gleick
Book #142 of 2016: Time Travel: A History by James Gleick A fascinating history of the evolving concepts of time and time travel, traced through the separate but related traditions of physics, philosophy, and popular fiction. (I was most surprised to read that the idea of going to another time period would have been inconceivable …
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Book Review: NOS4A2 by Joe Hill
Book #141 of 2016: NOS4A2 by Joe Hill NOS4A2 is a great story, but it’s also something of a love letter from author Joe Hill to his father. The plot and the characters all feel like they could be pulled straight from a Stephen King novel, and even if Hill were not King’s son, it …
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