Movies and Books #BriFri
Welcome to British Isles Friday! British Isles Friday is a weekly event for sharing all things British and Irish — reviews, photos, opinions, trip reports, guides, links, resources, personal stories, interviews, and research posts. Join us each Friday to link your British and Irish themed content and to see what others have to share. The link list is at the bottom of this post. Pour a cup of tea or lift a pint and join our link party!
Last week, I learned that Johnson’s Dictionary from 1755 said that no words in the English language began with X. Tina re-visited Herriott’s Yorkshire with a contemporary author who has a Twitter following in A Year in the Life of a Yorkshire Shepherdess. Gaele reviewed three books: Dangerous Crossing by Rachel Rhys, A Year of Taking Chances by Jennifer Bohnet, Charity Ends at Home by Colin Watson (fifth in a mystery series from the 1960s, currently being republished). Becky reviewed a historical novel about the illegitimate daughter of King John, Here Be Dragons, and listened to audio dramas.
April was consumed by the A to Z Challenge. I really enjoyed my theme of UK and Ireland, with the bonus that my British Isles Friday posts fit right into the flow.
For today, I thought I’d look back through what I’ve watched and read in the past month to make sure that I didn’t miss anything that I wanted to talk about on my blog.
Movies
The 2017 film version of Agatha Christie’s classic tale
The Man Who Invented Christmas. This one got no nominations and I was completely charmed. I want to watch it again during the Christmas season.
Murder on the Orient Express. It seems I shared the majority opinion on this one — stunningly beautiful, but the all-star cast was underutilized. Many of us who are used to David Suchet’s portrayal of Poirot couldn’t quite come around to Kenneth Branagh’s way of playing the role.
Books
I wrote about The Jane Austen Project for ‘J’ and The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage for ‘L’.
So the only British-set book that got lost in April was the tenth book in the Maisie Dobbs series by Jacqueline Winspear, Leaving Everything Most Loved. I sometimes find these books calming, but not this one because Maisie is anticipating big changes in her life and I felt as unsettled as she did. This almost had the feel of the end of the series, but it’s from 2013 and four more books have been published since then. I have a feeling that at least some of the newer books aren’t going to spend much time in England as Maisie seems prepared to leave everything she loves.
What content from the UK & Ireland do you have to share this week? I’ll add my links to my last few A to Z Challenge posts, including one where I recapped the whole month in order.