Category: previews

concerts, not a book, previews, theatre

Not a Book: Second half of the year Lookahead

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It’s the morning after the night before. And away from the football after the book-ahead yesterday (why didn’t I call the post that!) it’s the not-book lookahead today. Which is mostly theatre, because the second half of the year isn’t great on the events in sports that Verity likes front. And it should be noted that aside from the Seurat exhibtion, I haven’t made it to any of the other exhibitions from the start of the year post, but I’ve still got time.

Let’s start with the stuff that’s happening first – this week coming I’m off to see Midnight at the Never Get at the Menier Chocolate Factory. It’s about the third preview that we’re going to so all I can tell you is that it’ stars Ben Platt, it’s set in 1965 and is about a secret nightclub act. I’m somewhat gutted that my trip clashes with England’s World Cup semi final, but I wasn’t thinking about that when I booked it! And while I’m mentioning the Menier, it would be out of character for me not to mention that their very excellent production of The Producers, which I have written about more times than I should have is closing in mid-September (and I will be tryng to get to it again before it does).

A slightly more known quantity is Jesus Christ Superstar at the Palladium. It opened earlier this week to very enthusiastic reviews (in the main) and has already added a run at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in the autumn to the summer run, as well as a tour early next year – which presumably must be based on incredible demand for tickets which is a surprise given that it’s been revived fairly regularly. What is maybe more surprising is that I’ve never seen JCS live so we’ll see how I find it.

The revival that I’m most excited about however is Rent. It’s got Gatan Matarazzo of Stranger Things as the big name in the cast (not that I’ve watched Stranger Things) and a really solid cast of West End performers, including Billy Nevers, who is currently in the aforementioned JCS revival. The original production Rent was one of the shows my sister and I saw on Broadway when we went on an epic trip back in the day and so I’m interested to see what this looks like, having missed Rent Remixed which was in the West End (briefly) about a year after that Broadway odyssey.

The same week that I’m seeing Rent, I’m also back at the RSC in Stratford to see Jonathan Groff in As You Like It. It’s an all-male production and Groff is making his RSC debut as Rosalind. As you know, I loved his performance in Merrily We Roll Along when I saw that in the cinema. I’ve never seen him perform live and it’s been a decade since he did anything on this side of the Atlantic, so I’m *very* excited about this. As You Like It is a Shakespeare that I’ve never seen or studied and writing this post has reminded me that I need to read the play befoe I go to see it.

And lets end with some music: I’m off to the Proms again this summer – this time to see the American Classics Prom, which has Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue which I’ve adored since Primary school and Berntein’s Symphonic Dances from West Side story (which I once played to the best of my poor ability at the Royal Festival Hall) and On the Town among other things. And I’m also off to see Caravan Palace again when they play London in November.

That pretty much covers off the stuff that I’ve got booked in already, but there are a few other things I want to try and get to that I haven’t got definite plans for yet (as well as that Producers revisit) like The Globe’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream (currently trying to find a date that works for me), Pride the Musical at the National which I’m going to have to try and get to through their weekly ticket drops because it is incredibly sold out except for some very expensive tickes for preview shows this week, Cats at the Regents Park Theatre (it’s open air so it’ll be a last minute job) and Tartuffe (Remixed) in a small off West End theatre starring Mark Rylance, who remains the greatest actor I’ve ever seen live but the fight for tickets is going to be *wilde*. But I’m sure there will be more, and you’ll hear about the good stuff here on Sundays!

previews

Out Today: The Favourites

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Long time readers will know that I am a big figure skating fan (but an extremely bad skater myself) so it may not come as a surprise to you that I wanted to mention a novel that’s out this week and features a pair of ice dancers. The Favourites is about a pair of wrong side of the tracks skaters, Katarina Shaw and Heath Roca, who captivate fans right up until something happens at the Olympics to cause the instant end of their partnership. Ten years later there is a documentary coming out about them and Kat may need to speak out if she wants her story to be heard.

I’m fascinated to read this and see how much of it is skating, how much of it is drama and what on earth the incident was. I will endeavour to report back, maybe even before the skating season is over*…

*Worlds is at the end of March so that’s possible right? Right?

previews, series

Series Redux: Fixer Upper Mysteries

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Number 11 in the Fixer-Upper series – The Knife Before Christmas came out on Tuesday – and as I said in the Christmas series post, this one getting a hardback release, which is new thing for the series and probably a positive sign for the health of the series. And as I do love a series of mysteries about house renovating I thought I’d take an opportunity to talk about them, especially as this is probably the best of the construction-set mystery series that I’ve read – because (and this is a common theme with series that I like) the lead character is good at her job, and her competence (or otherwise) isn’t really used as a plot point.

Our detective is Shannon Hammer, who runs a building contractors in a small town on the California coast. Over the course of the series she’s worked on all sorts of buildings – as Lighthouse Cove has plenty of historic buildings of various types and Kate Carlisle has been able to invent more when necessary without it seeming weird! Shannon has a solid group of friends at the start of the series and has added a love interest as well – which has been a pretty slow burn, which again I like because it’s annoying when (mostly) heroines are married off fast because authors seem to find it harder to find scenarios to put them into after that point – particularly when kids appear for female leads. The blurb for this one has her working at a hotel in the town who are famous for their events between Thanksgiving and Christmas. The family of the owners are less keen on the festivities than their parents are, on account of their potential inheritance – and then of course someone turns up dead. It sounds like a lot of fun – and it’s a shame that I’ll probably have to wait a bit to read it, on account of that non-matching hardback. Hey ho. I’ll get there in the end though.

You can buy it now though, if you’re a kindle reader or don’t mind that non-matching thing – here are the Kindle and Kobo links. You probably won’t be able to find the book in shops – I don’t think I’ve ever seen them in a UK store, but you should be able to order it in.

Have a great weekend!

previews

Out Today: The Bells of Westminster

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A step away from the Christmas themed-books today for a new historical mystery. It’s 1774 and Susan’s father is the Dean of Westminster. Life is pretty calm, until the Society of Antiquities arrives with a letter from the King demanding the opening of Edward I’s tomb. Then a ghostly figure is spotted and then a man is murdered. Susan’s father’s job is under threat so she decides to investigate. I do like a good historical mystery and this is recommended for people who like Andrew Taylor (among others) so I have high hopes!

Book previews, previews, Recommendsday

Recommendsday: Autumn new release preview

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Happy Wednesday everyone, and I’m taking the opportunity today to do a quick run through of some of the new books coming this autumn, as we’re about to hit the flood of books arriving in the shops in time for Christmas. The literary fiction headlines are the new novels from Sally Rooney, Elizabeth Strout, Olga Tokarczuk and Haruki Murakami, but we all know my tastes run slightly differently.

Lets start with the ones I’ve already got on the Kindle waiting for me, thanks to the joys of NetGalley. Firstly there’s the new book by Lissa Evans – A Small Bomb at Dimperley, which comes out next week, so I’m doing this just in time. This is set at the end of the Second World War, with a second son returning to his ancestral home – where he is now responsible for the whole kit and caboodle after the death of his older brother. Also waiting on the Kindle but not out until October is Miss Beeton’s Murder Agency by Josie Lloyd, a cosy crime which features a distant descendent of *the* Mrs Beeton who runs a household staff agency where one of her staff ends up dead over the festive period. This might be the first of the Christmas themed novels I’ll read this year – but it won’t be the only one…

And that’s because only a few months after the third instalment of the series, we have a fourth Three Dahlias book and as I mentioned in my post about the series, this next one is a Christmas one. I don’t have this on Netgalley so I will have to wait – or maybe put it on my Christmas list, but A Very Lively Midwinter Murder is out on November 5. Out the same day is The Author’s Guide to Murder by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig and Karen White which appears to be a bit of a new direction for the trio – as the blurbs are promising a whodunnit with literary satire when a superstar author is found dead on a remote Scottish Island. I look forward to getting my hands on it.

A couple of memoirs to finish today – firstly Lisa Marie Presley’s, From Here to the Great Unknown, which has been completed after her death by her daughter Riley Keogh. I watched Priscilla on the plane to Manila, and I’ve watched most of Elvis (probably need to start again from the beginning at this point though) so I look forward to seeing where Lisa Marie’s story fits in on that spectrum given all the controversy about those two movies and the family splits they caused, not to mention all the fighting after Lisa Marie’s death early in 2023. That’s coming in early October. And then there’s Darren Hayes Unlovable (another one out on 5 November). You may remember Hayes as the lead singer of Savage Garden, and you may also remember that I went to see him in London the other year and was in floods of happy tears to hear all my favourite songs of his sounding amazing, more than 25 years on. Given that one of my favourite songs of his is the haunting Two Beds and a Coffee Machine, which is clearly about domestic violence, there’s obviously going to be some difficult stuff to read in here – even before you get to the attitudes of the music industry to his sexuality. But I’m looking forward to reading it – and to finding out more about what he was up to in his ten year hiatus – and what made him come back.

That’s your lot for today – I’m sure you’ll be hearing more about some of these in the next few months though. Happy Humpday everyone.

books, new releases, previews, romance

Bonus review: Fake Flame

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I read it in April and it’s been out in the US for about a month now, but Adele Buck’s new romance Fake Flame is out in the UK today, so I’m taking the opportunity to give you a little bonus review!

Fake Flame opens with a public proposal – of the most unwanted kind. University professor Eva’s ex-boyfriend has decided that the way to win her back after cheating on her is to serenade her in the middle of the quad. Eva disagrees and finds it deeply manipulative (she’s not wrong there!) and tries to set the piano on fire. Sean is one of the firefighters called to the scene and manages to talk her down. And soon he’s offering to be her fake boyfriend to keep the Awful Ex off her back. He’s hot and sweet – but he’s also younger than Eva – but there’s something about him that makes her agree. And soon they’re enjoying spending time together – but it can’t go anywhere can it?

This is the first in a new series from Adele Buck and it’s a lot of fun. It’s a reverse age-gap, fake relationship romance, with a smart heroine who knows what she’s looking for in life, and a hero who is pretty wise for his age, but needs to work a few things out. There’s not a huge amount of conflict between the two of them until quite late on, but I actually liked it more for that – and there’s other sources of conflict going on to keep the tension going. I think if you liked Cathy Yardley’s Role Playing, then this will hit some of the same spots for you. I basically inhaled it, and I’m really looking forward to seeing what the rest of the series brings. And if you haven’t read any Adele Buck before, may I point you at my post about her Centre Stage series, which I read last year.

My copy of Fake Flame came via NetGalley, but it’s out now in the UK as well as the US on Kindle and Kobo, and Waterstones is claiming to have the paperback too, which is exciting.

Happy Reading!

books, previews

Out this week: New Katherine Centre

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Hilariously, given that my pre-ordered copy of The Bodyguard arrived less than a week ago, Katherine Centre’s new book is already out! I’d been waiting for the Bodyguard to come out in the UK for about a year – and now they’ve timed the release of Hello Stranger to match the US one. Bonkers. Anyway, the new one is out, and it’s got a heroine suffering from face blindness after an operation and trying to save her career as a portrait photographer. This sounds intriguing to me – although I only liked not loved The Bodyguard over the weekend so I may not buy it straight away!

previews

Out This Week: Three Dahlias sequel!

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The Three Dahlias was one of my post-Christmas presents to myself and I absolutely loved it, so I’m looking forward to reading the sequel, A Very Lively Murder, and seeing what happens next. When we left the three actresses at the end of the first book, the new adaptation of The Lady Detective was imminent and the blurb has the three reunited on the set after a suspcious incident. I’m really intestested to read it – and to see how Katy Watson sustains the premise of the series.

books, previews

Out this week: The Brightest Star

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Today I wanted to mention Gail Tsukiyama’s new novel The Brighest Star which came out this week. It tells the story of Anna May Wong, Hollywood’s first Asian American movie star from her childhood skipping school to go to the movies and dodging bullies to success on screen, even if behind the scenes things are still difficult. I love a Novelised Real person novel, and I love books about Hollywood, so I don’t think it will be a surprise that I really want to read this one. The only question is how long it will take me to get hold of it because it’s a hardback release and we all know I’m not meant to be buying any more of them because they take me so long to read and the Kindle edition is priced accordingly. Maybe it’s one for the Christmas list. And yes I know, it’s June but I really do plan ahead with these things!