film review: the boy downstairs

We’ve all heard the story before: Girl meets boy. Girl leaves boy. Girls runs into boy several years later. Complications ensue. It’s a simple formula that allows for endless variation, with good and not-so-good results. The Boy Downstairs, the feature-length debut of writer/director Sophie Brooks, falls maddeningly into the middle ground between the two. Its capable if clichéd script allows enough room for the main players to find a little magic, before the disappointing denouement undoes their hard work.

Zosia Marmet and Matthew Shear in The Boy Downstairs

The film shifts between present day and four years in the past. Currently, Diana (Zosia Mamet) has just returned to New York after two years abroad. With no place but a friend’s couch to sleep, she jumps at the opportunity to move into an apartment owned by Amy (Deirdre O'Connell), a motherly former actress and widow who didn’t want to let go of a home with so much family history. What Diana doesn’t know when she signs the lease is that her ex-boyfriend Ben (Matthew Shear) lives in the basement apartment. They met four years earlier, before her move to London, bonding over a shared sense of humor and artistic aspirations. As present-day Ben and Diana adjust to their new and unplanned proximity, we also watch their relationship blossom, then wither, in the past.

book review: thunderhead

Thunderhead by Neal Shusterman
Simon & Schuster, 504 pp.
Published January 9, 2018

Summary (via Goodreads): Rowan and Citra take opposite stances on the morality of the Scythedom, putting them at odds, in the second novel of the chilling New York Times bestselling series from Neal Shusterman, author of the Unwind dystology.

Rowan has gone rogue, and has taken it upon himself to put the Scythedom through a trial by fire. Literally. In the year since Winter Conclave, he has gone off-grid, and has been striking out against corrupt scythes—not only in MidMerica, but across the entire continent. He is a dark folk hero now—“Scythe Lucifer”—a vigilante taking down corrupt scythes in flames.

Citra, now a junior scythe under Scythe Curie, sees the corruption and wants to help change it from the inside out, but is thwarted at every turn, and threatened by the “new order” scythes. Realizing she cannot do this alone—or even with the help of Scythe Curie and Faraday, she does the unthinkable, and risks being “deadish” so she can communicate with the Thunderhead—the only being on earth wise enough to solve the dire problems of a perfect world. But will it help solve those problems, or simply watch as perfection goes into decline?

down the tbr hole #7

As my Goodreads to-read shelf creeps closer to 500 books, I've been eyeing it with a growing feeling of apprehension. It would take forever to get through so many...and that's not counting all of the new books I hear about along the way. Thankfully I discovered Lost In A Story's series (by way of Boston Book Reader) at the beginning of the year and it sounds like a great way to trim down my TBR.

The guidelines, per Lost In A Story, are simple:

• Go to your Goodreads to-read shelf
• Order on ascending date added
• Take the first 5 (or 10 if you’re feeling adventurous) books
• Read the synopses of the books
• Decide: keep it or should it go?

I'll be going through 10 books every week, meaning it should take me almost the whole year to reach the end! If you'd like to do this yourself, be sure to visit Lost In A Story's original post and let her (and me!) know you'll be joining in the fun.

between daemons: true (bookish) love

Between Daemons is a discussion post series dealing in bookish and filmish topics. Inspired by the spiritual companions from the His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman, I chose that specific title to encourage comments and conversations grounded in the personal thoughts, feelings, and opinions you may not have the chance to share very often. While disagreement is welcome, disrespect is not. As always, please be polite to your fellow commenters!

A popular theme for the month of February is love: familial, romantic, or platonic, everyone's attention seems to turn to the special people in our lives. I wanted to take a slightly different approach and, apropos to this blog's focus on books, discuss the presence of literary love in my life!

Because really, books don't differ all that much from the people we meet, do they? There are the unfortunate few we wish we'd never met, the fun and casual friends, the best friends, and the loves of our life. My favorite books are those that make me feel like the best version of myself: not because they're motivational self-help manuals, but because they inspire such a depth of emotion that I'm able to learn more about myself just by virtue of having read them.

Also like a love shared between people, the affection I feel for my favorite books can either be rooted in a very specific time, place, or feeling, or else it might grow and change with time. I've included a selection of both down below, and I hope after reading about my true bookish loves, you'll share yours with me as well!

sunday post #5

The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Caffeinated Reviewer. It's a chance to recap posts from the past week and tease upcoming content, as well as share new books, reading challenge progress, and anything else you've come across in the last seven days.

Whew! My weekdays may have been calm, but this weekend was the first genuinely busy one of the new year. (And believe me, that was entirely by design!) Yesterday I had a very early start and long day outside as a strong and misty cold front rolled through. This afternoon I get to brave the cold and ice again for the first opera of the new year. I went to my first performance about 15 years ago: a classic rendition of Madame Butterfly by Puccini. It was love at first sight! My mother and I indulged in season tickets through high school, but let them go when I moved away for college and graduate school. Now that I'm back in my hometown, we've resumed the tradition ♥

film review: permission

If you’ve only been romantically involved with one person your entire life, is it possible to know that they’re your perfect mate? It’s a question posed to Anna (Rebecca Hall), in crasser terms, over a birthday dinner shared with her boyfriend Will (Dan Stevens) and fellow couple Heron (Raúl Castillo) and Hale (David Joseph Craig). She and Will have shared every relationship “first” with one another but, after 10 years together, the drunken suggestion that they may be missing out scuttles Will’s plans for a romantic proposal that night. Instead they decide, with no shortage of trepidation, to experiment with other partners.