The Inner Child Keeps on Growing

 A new review is up at bookzombieblog

bookzombieblog.wordpress.com/2011/05/30/review-feed-mira-grant/

Comments welcome as always.

So the Razzie nominations are out. I was amused (but not entirely surprised) to see the Indiana Jones film in there.

I saw the third Brendan Fraser 'Mummy' film on one of the flights in Australia. And do you know? As 'Belated sequels to old film series that no one really wanted to see resurrected' films go it's actually a better film than Indy 4. There's words I never thought I'd see myself type.

Both start from a similar premise (post-WWII, heroes work in intelligence during war, grown up son involved), and the Rachel Weisz replacement has the problem of, well, not being Rachel Weisz frankly, but where Mummy 3 has the advantage is that it doesn't look as cheap. There are parts in Indy 4, particularly the jungle scenes, which (especially on second viewing) look horribly studio-bound.

While, honestly, neither are great films by any means, but overall Mummy 3 looks less tired and more like people are having fun.

My first review for the Interzone/TTA website is up:

http://ttapress.com/369/book-review-axis-robert-charles-wilson

Okay, it's actually been up for a couple of weeks, but I keep forgetting to post about it...

We finally got to see Mirrormask last night and I start to understand many of the reviews I saw.

( spoilerage behind cut )

Hi guys.

I'm very aware that I've had all these things in my head that I wanted to write about this week and I haven't got around to doing any of them. Such is life... Part of it has been that I was having one of my very tired weeks. I can't remember if I mentioned this here, but early in the year I discovered I had been suffering from Glandular Fever (Mononucleosis for my American friends). Luckily mildly, but it hasn't quite gone away. The main symptom is that some weeks I just about get through the days and then feel too tired to have the energy to do anything very much. This has been one of those weeks.

So a brief summary:
Finished Olympos by Dan Simmons which I had been looking forward to. I would sum it up as extremely entertaining at the same time as being complete tosh! I thoroughly enjoyed it though.

Work has been very busy and more than a bit stressful this week. I had to lead a workshop on Thursday and on Friday I presented a new appraisal system to half the department. This seemed to go pretty well. Unfortunately my favourite user has been making my life a misery, with more to come no doubt. Oh yes, and I've found out that I'm going to have some staff to manage. Bleugh!

Watched all of Fruits Basket on DVD. I definitely want to write more about this at some point. To sum up: we laughed, we cried, it made me think about family stuff and upbringing in a way I hadn't for a while. So I cried some more. I can't recommend this enough though. Now to read the Manga to find out the bits the Anime missed!

Watched bits of Wimbledon and Live 8.

Currently, just about finished reading (in PDF version) Cory Doctorow's latest (reviewing for Interzone. An odd one. I sort of like it, I think.

Anyway, I hope to have a bit more energy next week. I know I wanted to write about Fruits Basket and the recently finished Doctor Who series before I forget what I wanted to say!