The Pale Blue Eye

 A gothic murder mystery featuring the renowned poet Edgar Allen Poe as one of the chief investigators , this movie is a period thriller set in New York in 1830s.

A veteran detective Augustus Landor( Christian Bale ) is called upon to investigate the gruesome murder of one of the cadets in the US military academy. The only evidence which Landor has is a scrap of note left in the hands of the victim . He seeks the help of a fellow cadet ( Poe) to assist him in solving few pieces of the puzzle together.

As they together embark on solving the mystery, they unravel something gothic and find themselves in danger . And when they think they have untangled the mystery, another big twist comes up .

This movie has a lot of things to be praised upon . The star cast is outstanding, there are superior performances which we do not come across very often . Christian Bale is a very fine actor and this is one of his finest performances till date . Harry Melling ( Dudley Dursley in Harry Potter movies ) has turned out to be an excellent actor , his performance complemented Bale’s performance very well . The setting is beautiful, full of snow , pristine white . The plot is also intriguing, it is a twisty puzzle .

But where it falters is the number of characters in the story . There should have been a lot more characters to avoid narrowing down the suspicion on a selected few .

Overall it is a good one time watch. If you like gothic mystery and you are up for some seasoned and exquisite acting , this movie is for you .

My Rating : 👍👍👍👍

Love at First Sight

 Oohlala, romance is in the air . Reminded me of the good old movies , you have got mail , serendipity, sleepless in Seattle . Old fashioned romance . There is statistics on one side , there is fate and luck on the other . Good to see both sides of the coin in this beautiful, soulful romance .

Rating : 👍👍👍

All

The Gifted School

Author : Bruce Holsinger 

This was our September book club read . A very very interesting novel which lets the readers observe how the competitive spirit and the high ambitions of the parents affect their own lives and the lives of their children , a very common trend prevalent worldwide.

Set in the upscale fictional town of Crystal , Colorodo , four friends decide to enlist their children to a gifted school ( magnet school ) which has newly opened in the neighborhood. Like any gifted and talented program , there are a series of tests to be cleared to get the admission into the school . As the journey begins and the tensions skyrocket , the parents are sucked into a competitive spiral, where at one point , oblivious to their own conscience, the moral compass bends and the relationships become a complex tangled web of secrets and lies

The book is very relatable and also self reflective. Most of us who have school going kids can map the characters to one or another parent who we meet in the school . The subtle emotions we encounter as a parent , the jealousy , vanity, pride is very well captured in this book .

The plot does deviate a bit towards the end , a lot of unpleasant complexities surface between the parents . Those could have been easily avoided and not necessary for the main storyline to progress.

But overall it is a very good read . I would recommend it to every parent who has school going kids .

Parenting is a favorite topic of discussion for many of us . Most of us have very strong opinions and are prone to judging and belittling other parents and their children .

None of us are experienced enough to counsel others on how to raise their kids , but there is a school of thought that helicopter parenting is not very good in the long run . And all of us in our book club agreed on the same yesterday.

Rating : 👍👍👍👍

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All rea

Last Christmas in Paris

Authors : Hazel Gaynor and Heather Webb

After Remarkably Bright Creatures , I am fortunate to have found another great book in succession . There is a joy in reading good books back to back , it’s not very frequent I encounter this spree .

I am forever in love with the book, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society . So I went around asking for similar recommendations and was rewarded with this beautiful romance , set during world war 1.

This book , similar to Guernsey, is epistolar, written in the form of a series of letters . Two childhood friends , Will and Tom , in a zeal of enthusiasm and higher purpose of duty , sign up for war in the name of their country and the queen . They are posted at the war front in France to fight against the Germans . Will’s spirited sister Evelyn ( Evie ) , a strong feminist writes frequent letters to her brother and his friend to support the two men morally . Based on the controlled news released by the government in England , they all are under the impression that the victory bells are around the corner and the soldiers will be back home by Christmas . Little do they know that it is just the beginning of one of the bloodiest wars which was fought in the history of mankind .

What keeps them alive in all this despair is the power of words , literature and poetry , poetry no less than the likes of Shakespeare , Yeats and Blake . As every year passes and the war intensifies , Evie and Tom keep their hopes up with their lengthy conversations back and forth through letters .

Hopelessly romantic , the lovers secretly and desperately dream of a day when the horrors will end and they can spend time together in the most romantic city of the world , Paris .

To summarize , there is war , tragedy, loss , injuries , bloodshed and politics , things which require a strong morale fiber and supposedly demonstrate the strength of man power . There is also lot of knitting , cooking , parties and gardening , things which women were constrained to in those days, even during war times. But then there comes paper , pen , ink , letters and poetry . Slowly and steadily , the power of words takes over everything and gives hope to everyone , even in the dreariest of circumstances . Literature has the magic to make even the strongest of humans kinder and empathetic and gives the weakest , the strength to stand up and face the obstacles.

Rating : 👍👍👍👍👍

Buy the book here