Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge for July 19, 2023

Each Wednesday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly “blog hop”. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

Today’s topic is: Share one Interesting Fact You Know

Thank you for joining our Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. Tanith Davenport  6. Michael Mock  
2. Lydia Schoch  7. M | RAIN CITY READS  
3. George L Thomas  8. Kel @ rewritingkel  
4. Stephen @ Reading Freely  9. Alex Isle  
5. Patrick Prescott  10. Priscilla King  

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Top Ten Tuesday: One-Word Titles


Hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl

We’ve reached the hot, humid portion of the year where I live. Along with eating ice cream and other cold foods, I spend a lot of free time reading and trying to stay cool.

Here are ten books that have one-word titles that could be good reads as the temperature soars.

1. Pawcasso by Remy Lai

2. Allegedly by Tiffany D. Jackson

3. Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto

4. Warcross (Warcross, #1) by Marie Lu

5. Alaska by James A. Michener

6. Mooncakes by Suzanne Walker

7. Girl by Jamaica Kincaid

8. Heartstopper by Alice Oseman

9. Brass by Xhenet Aliu

10. Sadie by Courtney Summers

Friday Five Writing Prompt Challenge for July 14, 2023

Each Friday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly five word writing prompt. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

Today’s five words to use as your prompt are:

banana, embark, pillow, ego, foot

Thank you for joining our Friday Five Writing Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. Echo Ishii  

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Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge for July 12, 2023

Each Wednesday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly “blog hop”. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

Today’s topic is: Describe Your Fashion Sense

Thank you for joining our Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. George L Thomas  5. Michael Mock  
2. Lydia Schoch  6. Stephen @ Reading Freely  
3. Priscilla King  7. Patrick Prescott  
4. Snapdragon Alcove  8. M | RAIN CITY READS  

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Top Ten Tuesday: Bookish Summer Quotes


Hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl

Long and Short Reviews has a small team of people who take turns writing Top Ten Tuesday posts. I feel excited every time Freebie posts pop up and try to request them as often as I can.

This week I’m going to use the freebie post to share ten bookish summer quotes.

 

“Summer afternoon—summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.”
Henry James

 

“All in all, it was a never-to-be-forgotten summer — one of those summers which come seldom into any life, but leave a rich heritage of beautiful memories in their going — one of those summers which, in a fortunate combination of delightful weather, delightful friends and delightful doing, come as near to perfection as anything can come in this world.”
L.M. Montgomery, Anne’s House of Dreams

 

“The library in summer is the most wonderful thing because there you get books on any subject and read them each for only as long as they hold your interest, abandoning any that don’t, halfway or a quarter of the way through if you like, and store up all that knowledge in the happy corners of your mind for your own self and not to show off how much you know or spit it back at your teacher on a test paper.”
Polly Horvath, My One Hundred Adventures

 

“I have only to break into the tightness of a strawberry, and I see summer – its dust and lowering skies.”
Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye

 

“It was summer and moonlight and we had lemonade to drink, and we held the cold glasses in our hands, and Dad read the stereo-newspapers inserted into the special hat you put on your head and which turned the microscopic page in front of the magnifying lens if you blinked three times in succession.”
Ray Bradbury, The Illustrated Man

 

“The sound of crickets, the feel of warm dried grass on the soles of his feet and the scent of baked earth pleased him. The big thick glass was icy in his hands. When he set it down, the tinkle of the ice cubes sounded personal.”
Ian McEwan, Lessons

 

“There are not enough jam jars to can this
summer sky at night. I want to spread those
little meteors on a hunk of still-warm bread this
winter. Any trace left on the knife will make a kitchen sink like that evening air

the cool night before
star showers: so sticky so warm so full of light”
Aimee Nezhukumatathil

 

“The thing about a deep summer’s evening is that it is filled with an array of sounds that never intrude on the silence because they were created to accentuate it, not fill it.”
Craig D. Lounsbrough

 

Meeting someone on a summer’s evening is like giving a dead flame new life.”
Caleb Azumah Nelson, Open Water

 

“And I spent a wonderful summer, below the trees in the Godavari, writing my poetry.”
Avijeet Das, Why the Silhouette?

 

What are your favorite bookish summer quotes?

Movie Review: That Night


That Night
Director: Zachary Trussell
Writer: Zachary Trussell
Stars: Julio Alexander, Oscar Mansky, Julie Gester, Maureen Azzun, Boogie Williams, Kendall McCarthy, Michael C. Hyatt, and Alexander Louis
Rated: 3 Stars (6 stars on IMDB)
Review by: Astilbe

THAT NIGHT tells the story of a young unknown artist who is forced to confront his career ambitions and win back his ex-girlfriend during a drunken night in Chicago with his irreverent friends. Any night out in a big city has the potential to be a good night, the risk of being a bad night, and typically ends up somewhere in between, but only some nights can claim to be “That Night”—the night where little choices lead to big decisions, chance encounters to second chances, Uber drivers keep themselves busy in the strangest of ways and taking the wrong pill can be really bad for the upholstery. For STACY, an artist with one eye on the future of design and the other stuck looking hopelessly at his ex-lover, that night is tonight—and the city, Chicago. So yes, there will be drinking.

Anything can happen overnight.

I loved this film’s varied sense of humor. There was something here for everyone, whether you like jokes about the pitfalls of accidentally taking the wrong medication or how one should properly milk an almond. All of the characters had a good sense of humour and weren’t afraid to gently poke fun at themselves or others if the conversation warranted it. There is definitely something to be said for that!

It would have been helpful to have more character development. I don’t mind watching stories about people who may not be terribly likeable at first glance as those can often be the most interesting characters of them all, but I was hoping to see everyone mature a bit more as a result of their wild night. There were a few signs that the protagonist was going to work on his flaws, and I appreciated that. Had I seen it in his friends, too, I would have happily chosen a higher rating.

The romantic storyline was fresh and realistic, and I’m saying this as a viewer who was honestly not that impressed with it in the beginning. It’s always nice to be proven wrong, especially with something as creative as this. I loved the way the director included little hints about where he was going with the romance early on while still leaving space to interpret them in multiple ways. That’s a fantastic way to foreshadow the conclusion without spelling things out too directly, and it makes me want to see more from these characters and this crew.

That Night kept me guessing.

Friday Five Writing Prompt Challenge for July 7, 2023

Each Friday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly five word writing prompt. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

Today’s five words to use as your prompt are:

log, panel, long, senior, popular

Thank you for joining our Friday Five Writing Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. Kel @ rewritingkel  2. Echo Ishii  

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Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge for July 5, 2023

Each Wednesday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly “blog hop”. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

Today’s topic is: How I Stay Cool in Heat Waves

Thank you for joining our Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. Tanith Davenport  5. Stephanie @ Books Less Travelled  
2. George L Thomas  6. Patrick Prescott  
3. Lydia Schoch  7. Priscilla King  
4. M | RAIN CITY READS  8. Kate Hill  

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June Book of the Month Poll Winner ~ Seven Tales From King Arthur’s Court by John Erskine, Albert Seligman (editor)


Seven Tales From King Arthur’s Court by John Erskine, Albert Seligman (editor)
Publisher: Markosia Enterprises Ltd.
Genre: Young Adult (14 – 18 y.o.), Sci-Fi/Fantasy, Romance, Action/Adventure, Historical
Rating: 5 Stars
Reviewed by Astilbe

Voted BoM by LASR Readers 2013 copy

These “Seven Tales” were published in 1940 in The American Weekly Sunday magazine and have never been seen since. They showcase watercolors by English artist Edmund Dulac, who was one of the Golden Age illustrators. The texts were written by noted American author and musician John Erskine.

READ THE FULL REVIEW HERE!

Friday Five Writing Prompt Challenge for June 30, 2023

Each Friday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly five word writing prompt. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

Today’s five words to use as your prompt are:

slam, moral, summit, calm, eliminate

Thank you for joining our Friday Five Writing Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. Kel @ rewritingkel  

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