Unexpected Book, TV and Movie Delights of the summer of '15

Labor Day. Unofficial End to Summer. But summer of 2015 had a few unexpected delights…

Books…
Re-read Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret. How ahead of the time was Judy Blume? unexpectedly fresh and relevant, especially since I have a ten-year-old daughter!

Television series…
Humans on AMC… Synths, a.k.a. synthetic robots, more humane than humans complete with British accents. A British drama complete with robots—a futuristic take on the ‘Upstairs/Downstairs’ life with lots of plot turns and heart. I've read this is renewed for a second season!

The Strain on FX… The second season of New York City under siege from pulp fiction-inspired, Nazi-backing, vampire-infected creatures took the idea that NYC could be a dangerous place to bring up kids to new levels with a fabulous multi-racial cast. Expect more STRAIN next summer!

Movies…
Jurassic World…Saw this with my kids and found, unexpectedly, it was lot of fun for me—and made me think again: how cool would a real Jurassic Park be?

Mr. Holmes…I went for the cast Ian McKellen as the aging Sherlock Holmes, and one of my all-time favorite actresses, Laura Linney as his housekeeper. What I didn’t expect is how much this was a movie about the process of writing. If you are a writer, go immediately to see.

I Believe in Unicorns…I streamed this absolute delight of an indie film about first love on Amazon…and now I believe in unicorns.


So here we are at another Labor Day, which has a special meaning to me. The setting of my new young adult novel, BEFORE MY EYES,is Labor Day weekend on Long Island, New York. If you haven’t read BEFORE MY EYES yet, I urge you to do so this Labor Day. I find there’s something unexpectedly metaphysically rewarding about reading books at the moment, or in the place, that they are set.

Onward to autumn!

Caroline