Librarysus

Dracula, the Victorian era novel by Bram Stoker, still sends chills down the spine. All the vampire tropes are here. This is the undead character that set the blueprint for all subsequent vampires. And the writing is pretty good, too!

Jim Defede's sweet little book "The Day the World Came to Town, 9/11 in Gander, Newfoundland" is a comforting reminder that there is human goodness and connection even in times of turmoil and political animosity.

Congratulations! This is so exciting!

Dan Fesperman writes and reads well his exciting spy novel, The Cover Wife. Surveillance of the terrorists planning the 9/11 attacks is impeded by rivalries and male egos of Western spy agencies. Claire Saylor, the excellent female spy, can't overcome these flaws to save the day.

The best thing about the movie Moving On is watching the stars, Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin (though Fonda seems to have had some disfiguring facial work done that took me aback). The story itself is ridiculous.

In the wonderful off-Broadway show, Pen Pals, at Daryl Roth Theater, the lives of two women are made vivid through 50 years of their correspondence. I laughed and I cried as their lives and the world they live in speed by, just like in real life.

Stunning to see the full scale recreation in NYC of the Annex - the attic where Anne Frank hid for over two years with 7 others and wrote her extraordinary diary, before she was captured. Within months, she died in a concentration camp.

What a wonderful, all-too-short trip to NYC. Explored the Union Square neighborhood for the first time. So much to do on any given street in New York!

KPop Demon Hunters is a hip animated movie that seems to be aimed at tween age girls. I liked that the saviors of humanity were young women. The K-pop music was fun.

The 2021 dramatic movie version of Operation Mincemeat wasn't as good as the musical comedy show on Broadway.

It was fun to read Beth Henley's play script, Crimes of the Heart, with friends. Three sisters in their 20s convene at the family home when their grandfather is hospitalized. As the women feud in a fond sisterly way, the depth their troubles is revealed little by little.

I'm a big fan of Tom Hanks but I don't think he was the right actor for the role in the movie Greyhound as a first-time commander of a WWII warship in dangerous waters. Still, if you want to feel like you're on the high seas in the midst of battle, this is the movie for you.

Astonishing how the show, Operation Mincemeat, turns a real WWII spy story into a funny musical. Most of the Broadway cast is from the original British run. They're so tight that they make this musical pop!

Male power and dominance that is so entrenched you don't even notice it is revealed in the breathtaking show, John Proctor is the Villain. I was lucky to catch it on Broadway before it closed.

Death Becomes Her is everything a Broadway show should be - it's a grand spectacle, a musical comedy of over-the-top fun, gorgeous costumes and stage sets, and even bits of magic that turn a head or two as two terrific actresses play it for laughs

Safe Houses by Dan Fesperman is a fun novel about spies set in Berlin after the fall of the wall. But the most dangerous threats seem to come from intra-spy intrigue and outrageous misogyny. Led by spy extraordinaire, Claire Saylor, a sisterhood forms.

The Peabody Essex Museum in Salem Mass is a beautiful art museum with excellent collections and special exhibits on art of all kinds. Naturally, the exhibit on the Salem Witch Trials of 1692 is a must see. Surely jealousy was one of the motives for bringing down rich people.

So excited to visit the JFK Presidential Library in Boston. Unlike other presidential libraries I've visited, a sense of the man and his times isn't clearly projected.

The movie Oh, Hi! is a reverse romcom. Catharsis doesn't come when the couple realizes they're in love but rather when they realize that they're really mismatched. Sandwiched in the center of the story is a horror movie. I'm glad my dating days are over!

The difference between a psychopath and a person who is adroit at hiding dark secrets is illustrated in Jean Hanff Korelitz's page-turner novel, The Plot.

Author Abby White's sophisticated and subtle YA novel, D.J. Rosenblum Becomes the G.O.A.T, is marvelous. Multi dimensional people populate the exciting story about a 14-year-old trying to make sense of the suicide of her beloved cousin.

It's good vs evil - Superman vs Lex Luther - in the new Superman movie, a straightforward story about the superhero who is modest to a fault and a villain with all the latest technological skills but no heart. Fun special effects.

Leaving Everything Most Loved, the 10th Maisie Dobbs mystery by Jacqueline Winspear, is just as good as the first. As Maisie investigates logical clues, two of her cases intertwine. She knows not to trust coincidences. Wrapping up her practice, she begins a major journey abroad.

Each story in Ted Chiang's collection, Exhalation, focuses on an idea, such as the technology of writing and its effect on the brain, experiments in raising a baby without ever a human to touch it, and free will. Too many scientific details for my taste.

Each story in Iddo Gefen's collection, Jerusalem Beach, is different yet similar in that each expresses a sense of displacement, existential unease and inability to connect to others. Crazy? Maybe. Yet, it may not be the individuals who are crazy but rather the society.

With the pace of a mystery, Rebecca Romney's book, Jane Austen's Bookshelf, is the story of how Romney built a collection of 18th C authors who influenced Austen. A wonderful hybrid of lit crit, memoir, history of the novel, inside info on the rare book business and more.

Never heard of author Jane Stanton Hitchcock until I saw her recent obit. Intrigued, I read her first novel, Trick of the Eye. It's a fine mystery. A woman hired by a grande dame of elite NY society discovers it's not only her art that is trompe-l'oeil.

Muholland Drive recently ranked #2 on the NYTimes list of best movies so I watched it. It's a beautifully shot series of stylish and unnerving dream sequences. The probable protagonist is Betty aka Diane, a disillusioned aspiring actress in LA.

John Steinbeck's 1936 novel, In Dubious Battle, is a parable for its time, where, like Milton's version, cosmic forces do battle for the immortal souls of men (and I do mean men). It's overwrought. You have to be young or in the mood to appreciate it.

Black Bag is a stylish, straightforward spy movie about a top spy couple. They have an unusual marriage in that it's loving and loyal, so when someone makes them question one another's professional integrity, they out him or her and make them pay.