The Subtle Art of Not Giving A #@$! by Mark Manson

Posted on October 26, 2018 by Nina Soden

TITLE: The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A #@%!
AUTHOR: Mark Manson

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★★
Story: ★★★★
Characters: N/A
Appearance: ★★★
Overall: ★★★★ (4)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
In this generation-defining self-help guide, a superstar blogger cuts through the crap to show us how to stop trying to be “positive” all the time so that we can truly become better, happier people.
For decades, we’ve been told that positive thinking is the key to a happy, rich life. “F**k positivity,” Mark Manson says. “Let’s be honest, shit is f**ked and we have to live with it.” In his wildly popular Internet blog, Manson doesn’t sugarcoat or equivocate. He tells it like it is—a dose of raw, refreshing, honest truth that is sorely lacking today. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k is his antidote to the coddling, let’s-all-feel-good mindset that has infected modern society and spoiled a generation, rewarding them with gold medals just for showing up.
Manson makes the argument, backed both by academic research and well-timed poop jokes, that improving our lives hinges not on our ability to turn lemons into lemonade, but on learning to stomach lemons better. Human beings are flawed and limited—”not everybody can be extraordinary, there are winners and losers in society, and some of it is not fair or your fault.” Manson advises us to get to know our limitations and accept them. Once we embrace our fears, faults, and uncertainties, once we stop running and avoiding and start confronting painful truths, we can begin to find the courage, perseverance, honesty, responsibility, curiosity, and forgiveness we seek.
There are only so many things we can give a f**k about so we need to figure out which ones really matter, Manson makes clear. While money is nice, caring about what you do with your life is better, because true wealth is about experience. A much-needed grab-you-by-the-shoulders-and-look-you-in-the-eye moment of real-talk, filled with entertaining stories and profane, ruthless humor, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k is a refreshing slap for a generation to help them lead contented, grounded lives.

Buy it HERE on Amazon!

THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: Mark Manson could be a comedian, easily. His writing style is fun, light, energetic, and full of laughs. However, it is also full of insight and wisdom.

STORY: Obviously, The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A #@%! Isn’t a novel – I’d classify it as self-help.

Mark covers so many important life lessons in this book, but some of the main topics that stood out to me were:

The Value of Suffering “If suffering is inevitable, if our problems in life are unavoidable, then the question we should be asking is not “How do I stop suffering?” but “Why am I suffering—for what purpose?””
The Choice “Choosing to not respond to the events in our lives is still a response to the events in our lives.”
Rejection Makes Your Life Better “…we need to reject something. Otherwise, we stand for nothing.”

This is a really quick read, with lots of relatable stories/examples throughout. So, if you are the type of person who is constantly GIVING A #@%! About everything… then this just might be the book for you. You’ll read it and laugh. You’ll read it an relate. You’ll read it and realize what you are doing wrong, could be doing better, and should be doing now to stop GIVING A #@%! about everything.

APPEARANCE: The cover shown above is very similar to the one I have, but also slightly different. Where this one says ‘THE SUBTLE ART OF NOT GIVING A F*UCK’ mine says, ‘THE SUBTLE ART OF NOT GIVING A #@%!’. I like the one I have better, no real reason other than #@%! Seems to be a bit subtler than F*UCK.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “The desire for more positive experience is itself a negative experience. And, paradoxically, the acceptance of one’s negative experience is itself a positive experience.”

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

My 2 Cents… A Quiet Place

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Movie: A Quiet Place
Director: John Krasinski
Writer(s): Bryan Woods, Scott Beck, and John Krasinski
Stars: Emily Blunt, John Krasinski, Millicent Simmonds, and Noah Jupe

Blurb:
In a post-apocalyptic world, a family is forced to live in silence while hiding from monsters with ultra-sensitive hearing.

Storyline:
Two parents do what it takes to keep their children safe in a world full of creatures hunting every sound they can hear. Not a sound can be heard from the family hiding in silence, but all it takes is one noise and everything can go wrong.

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★★
Story: ★★★★★
Acting: ★★★★★
Overall: ★★★★★ (5)

My 2 Cents:
Oh my goodness… This movie was incredible. Husband and wife team John Krasinski and Emily Blunt both star in this amazing, sit on the edge of your seat, thriller.

The concept of this movie is simple… be quiet or you’ll die. I’ll be honest with you, when I clicked play on this one I was expecting a horror film, nothing more. I thought there would be some pop-out-at-you thrills and an interesting concept. I had no idea the acting would be so unbelievable.

There is very little dialogue, which meant that the story had to be strong and the acting even stronger. The film, directed by John Krasinski, relied heavily on the use of visual cues and ACTING. In reality, I walked away knowing it wasn’t just a horror/thriller film, it is a piece of art.

Watching Emily Blunt, in the “delivery scene” – I won’t say more – was intense. I was holding my breath the whole time.

Blunt and Krasinski have amazing onscreen chemistry, not surprising, and the family dynamics between them and the two young actors that play their children is breathtakingly believable. As the movie begins, we are thrown right into the story, with little to no backstory, you are immediately immersed in the love, pain, and fear these people live with day in and day out. I was on the edge of my seat – in a good way – from the time the movie started until the credits rolled.

Have you seen A Quiet Place? If so, what did you think? Comment below and let me know.

You can watch the official trailer here:

I Am Not A Serial Killer by Dan Wells

Posted on October 19, 2018 by Nina Soden

TITLE: I AM NOT A SERIAL KILLER
AUTHOR: Dan Wells

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★★
Story: ★★★★★
Characters: ★★★★★
Appearance: ★★★★★
Overall: ★★★★★ (5)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
John Wayne Cleaver is dangerous, and he knows it.
He’s spent his life doing his best not to live up to his potential.
He’s obsessed with serial killers, but really doesn’t want to become one. So for his own sake, and the safety of those around him, he lives by rigid rules he’s written for himself, practicing normal life as if it were a private religion that could save him from damnation.
Dead bodies are normal to John. He likes them, actually. They don’t demand or expect the empathy he’s unable to offer. Perhaps that’s what gives him the objectivity to recognize that there’s something different about the body the police have just found behind the Wash-n-Dry Laundromat—and to appreciate what that difference means.
Now, for the first time, John has to confront a danger outside himself, a threat he can’t control, a menace to everything and everyone he would love, if only he could.
Dan Wells’s debut novel, I Am Not a Serial Killer, is the first volume of a trilogy that will keep you awake and then haunt your dreams.

Buy it HERE on Amazon!

THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: I love Dan Wells’s writing style. He dives deep into the mind of a psychopath with this one and leaves you disgusted, intrigued, afraid, and sad. His use of description left me with a new determination that after death, I want to be cremated. There will be no embalming, no open casket, no mortician poking and prodding along my body to “make it pretty”.

STORY: We start of by being introduced to a young John Wayne Cleaver, the stories protagonist. He is the perfect combination of Michael C Hall’s characters in both Dexter (where he plays a psychopath) and Six Feet Under (where his family owns a funeral home). John Wayne Cleaver is the teenage version of Dexter. Although instead of an obsession with forensic science and blood, his obsession is serial killers. John has all the impulses of a psychopath… he feels the draw of the kill, but he doesn’t want to act on those impulses. Like Dexter, he has established strict rules to live by, rules he must follow to keep him “normal”.

The twist takes place when a “real” serial killer shows up in John’s town. Through John’s research we quickly learn that this serial killer isn’t like any of the others he has studied. Not even close. The supernatural aspect of this killer takes the story to a whole new level. I loved watching as John was discovering who he is, who the killer is, what the killer is, and how his inner struggle of wanting to know more about death and killing and also wanting to be normal effected his choices.

APPEARANCE: The simple cover, much like a young kid’s school notebook, was excellent. The cover artist did a wonderful job making it appealing to the eye and not overly crowded.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “The thing about boxes, is that you can open them up. Even though they’re completely boring on the outside, there might be something interesting inside. So while you’re saying all of these stupid, boring things, I’m imagining what it would be like to cut you open and see what you’ve got in there.”

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/QUn7OqNRz8U

Watch the movie trailer here:
https://youtu.be/WQBnWWWU-gU

My 2 Cents…Extinction

Posted on October 14, 2018 by Nina Soden

Movie: Extinction
Director: Ben Young
Writers: Spenser Cohen and Brad Kane
Story by: Spenser Cohen
Cast: Michael Pena, Lizzy Caplin, Amelia Crouch, Erica Tremblay

IMDB DESCRIPTION:
A father has a recurring dream of losing his family. His nightmare turns into reality when the planet is invaded by a force bent on destruction. Fighting for their lives, he comes to realize an unknown strength to keep them safe from harm.

REVIEW:
WOW, just wow!!! Michael Pena and Lizzy Caplin played off each other beautifully!!! I had no idea what to expect when I hit play… I hadn’t even seen a trailer at the time, but I’m glad I watched it.

The story was unique and the plot twist was crazy – I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING!!! The directing, the cinematography, and even the CG all worked perfectly to create a tight film. It’s fast paced with so much action that you’ll be on the edge of your seat the whole time!

Have you seen it? If not, watch it – it’s on Netflix. If you have seen it, what did you think?

Watch the Movie Trailer Here:

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt3201640/?ref_=fn_al_tt_0

GONE by Lisa McMann

Posted on October 12, 2018 by Nina Soden

TITLE: GONE
AUTHOR: Lisa McMann

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★★
Story: ★★★★
Characters: ★★★★★
Appearance: ★★★★
Overall: ★★★★★ (4.5)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
Things should be great for Janie—she has graduated from high school and is spending her summer with Cabel, the guy she’s totally in love with. But deep down she’s panicking about how she’s going to survive her future when getting sucked into other people’s dreams is really starting to take its toll.

Things get even more complicated when she meets her father for the very first time—and he’s in a coma. As Janie uncovers his secret past, she begins to realize that the choice thought she had has more dire consequences than she ever imagined.

Buy it HERE on Amazon!

BOOK BLURB:
OPEN YOUR EYES.

Janie thought she knew what her future held. And she thought she’d made her peace with it. But she can’t handle dragging Cabel down with her.

She knows he will stay with her, despite what she sees in his dreams. He’s amazing. And she’s a train wreck. Janie sees only one way to give him the life he deserves: She has to disappear. And it’s going to kill them both.

Then a stranger enters her life—and everything unravels. The future Janie once faced now has an ominous twist, and her choices are more dire than she’d ever thought possible. She alone must decide between the lesser of two evils. And time is running out…

EXCERPT FOR GONE:
He reaches toward her, his fingers black and bloody, his eyes deranged, unblinking. Janie is paralyzed. His cold hands reach around her neck, squeezing tight, tighter, until Janie has no breath left. She’s unable to move, unable to think. As his grasp tightens further around Janie’s neck, his face turns sickly alabaster. He strains harder and begins to shake.

Janie is dying.

She has no fight left in her.

It’s over.

THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: Out of all three of the books in this series, I think this is the only one that is truly YA. Lisa McMann’s writing style has been consistent and enjoyable although I think there were a few more typo’s and editing issues in this book than there were in the previous two books.

STORY: What would you do if out of nowhere the father you’ve never known is back in your life? The kicker… he is unconscious and dying.

Although I like the way GONE ended, it doesn’t feel like a true ending to the story. It seems like there could be another book to really tie up all the loose ends and give us closer with Janie and Cabel and what fate brings to her.

I’m looking forward to seeing what else Lisa McMann has written and what she come out with next.

APPEARANCE: There are two covers for this book. I have the simple black and green cover with the lonely chair in the middle. It is intriguing and grabbed my attention the moment I saw it. The other cover, with the photo of who I can only image is meant to be Janie and Cabel is not my favorite. I prefer to conger up the images of the characters on my own, as I read. These to people just don’t really bring the characters to life for me.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “I lurve you, too, you big lumpy monster man.”

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/egF8D-6DMyQ

My 2 Cents…Like Father

Posted on October 7, 2018 by Nina Soden

Movie: Like Father
Director: Lauren Miller Rogen
Writer: Lauren Miller Rogen (screenplay)
Story by: Anders Bard and Lauren Miller Rogen
Cast: Kristen Bell, Kelsey Grammer

IMDB DESCRIPTION:
A workaholic woman who is left at the altar takes her honeymoon trip away with her overachieving father who left her mother because he believed his family was holding back his career.

REVIEW:
I had no idea what to expect with this one, but I loved it!!!! I don’t think the online reviews do it justice. It’s a heartfelt story about realistic family relationships. Besides, with today’s society being so addicted to technology, I’m sure Bell’s character hits a little to close to home for many people.

Aside from being an amazing advertisement for Royal Caribbean cruises, the movie is about tragedy, loss, and failed expectations and how we overcome them.

There’s a great lesson to be learned all wrapped up in an entertaining package.

I say watch it! What do you say? Have you seen Like Father and I’d so, what did you think?

Watch the Movie Trailer Here:

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt7170950/?ref_=fn_al_tt_0

My 2 Cents… Book Club

Posted on September 30, 2018 by Nina Soden

Movie: Book Club
Director: Bill Holderman
Writers: Bill Holderman and Erin Simms
Cast: Diane Keaton, Jane Fonda, Candice Bergen, Mary Steenburgen,

IMDB DESCRIPTION:
Four lifelong friends have their lives forever changed after reading 50 Shades of Grey in their monthly book club.

REVIEW:
Amazing cast!!! I just have to put that out there right from the start. This is a comedy, which is obvious if you’ve seen the trailer, but it’s so much more than just a comedy! The script dives into some pretty serious topics too; grief from the lose of a spouse, retirement, adult children who end up parenting their parents, dating in your later years, and the cause and effect of life choices!

I definitely recommend this one. I laughed so hard and truly enjoyed the wonderful characters these talented women brought to life.

Now, the real question… who wants to start a book club with me?!?! I’m ready to commit to a night a month to discussing books and drinking wine!

So, have you seen Book Club? Have you read Fifty Shades Of Grey? If you answered yes, to either of these questions, what did you think? Please share your thoughts!

Watch the movie trailer here:

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt6857166/?ref_=fn_al_tt_0

Wake by Lisa McMann

Posted on September 28, 2018 by Nina Soden

TITLE: WAKE
AUTHOR: Lisa McMann

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★
Story: ★★★★
Characters: ★★★★
Appearance: ★★★★
Overall: ★★★★ (4)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
Not all dreams are sweet.

For seventeen-year-old Janie, getting sucked into other people’s dreams is getting old. Especially the falling dreams, the naked-but-nobody- notices dreams, and the sex-crazed dreams. Janie’s seen enough fantasy booty to last her a lifetime.

She can’t tell anybody about what she does — they’d never believe her, or worse, they’d think she’s a freak. So Janie lives on the fringe, cursed with an ability she doesn’t want and can’t control.

Then she falls into a gruesome nightmare, one that chills her to the bone. For the first time, Janie is more than a witness to someone else’s twisted psyche. She is a participant….

Buy it HERE on Amazon!
THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: This is a quick read. The style is unique in that it is broken down by date and time instead of chapters. It starts when Janie is a little girl and moves quickly with large breaks in time. Then, as she gets older and starts high school the breaks in time become smaller and smaller until they are hours or minutes apart. The result leaves the reader feeling like a voyeur, peaking in on Janie’s life. It is a very effective style for this story, but I don’t think it would work in every situation.

STORY: I picked this book up at a used bookstore, with no idea what it was about. When I read the back cover, I was instantly intrigued. As an author, about six months ago, I outlined a story idea that had to do with entering other people’s dreams. So, finding a book that dealt with the same topic, although very different, was exciting.

Overall, I think the story was interesting. You can empathize with Janie, as well as the other characters. You’re emotionally invested as a reader and want to know how Janie and Cabel will get out of their crappy home life situations and where the story will take them. There is a twist… which I will not give away… but it allows you some closure. If there were a stand-alone book, it would work. However, it isn’t and I’m very excited to read book 2 (FADE) which I had to order online. Book 3 (GONE) was available at the used bookstore and I picked it up when I bought this one. So, I’ll be reading that one soon enough.

APPEARANCE: There are two covers for this book. I have the simple back cover with the floating pillow and purple text. I love the simplicity of this cover – it was the reason I picked up the book in the first place. The second cover (see above) probably wouldn’t have caught my eye. I may have missed out on this book all together.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “Your seat adjustor you ass. We have to pull them together. It’s a bench seat. As you can see.”

I’m not really sure why this is my favorite quote. It just made me laugh really hard when I read it. I suppose it was just the perfect line to show the true Janie and how comfortable she was in that moment. There are other lines, ones with more emotion, more sentiment, more… just more, but this one made me laugh.

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/zSrvcuhzqcc

My 2 Cents… DUDE!

Posted on September 23, 2018 by Nina Soden

Movie: Dude
Director: Olivia Milch
Writer: Olivia Milch
Stars: Lucy Hale, Kathryn Prescott, Alexandra Shipp, and Awkwafina

Blurb:
A group of teenage girlfriends deal with life after high school.

Storyline:
DUDE is a grounded comedy about dealing with first losses in life–leaving your best friends, the death of loved ones, and the passage of time–and that odd mixture of grief and nostalgia experienced by young people as they try to understand these losses. It is also about getting stoned with your friends in your car while listening to hip-hop.

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★
Story: ★★★
Acting: ★★★★
Overall: ★★★★ (3.66)

My 2 Cents:
Netflix recommended this movie to me because I had just finished watching Life Sentence also with Lucy Hale. I did sit through the entire hour and 37 minutes of Dude, although I’m pretty sure I’ll never get that time back. It wasn’t that it was a bad movie, it just wasn’t what I was expecting. Definitely not another typical teen comedy where girl meets boy, they fall in love, break up, and eventually end up together again.

Right from the start, a mix-match group of high school aged girls are smoking weed, drinking, and cussing like gangsters. As a mom, this put me on edge. One of my biggest fears is that I’m not raising my kids right and they somehow end up going down the wrong path and end up like the teens in this movie.

Back to reality… I’ll leave my parenting choices out of this.

The acting was good, especially Lucy Hale. [SPOILER ALERT] During the party scene… when Lily finds herself alone with the overly aggressive boy that she only partly knows, Lucy shows just how good her acting chops really are.

The directing, not bad… I can see why she made the choices she made.

The writing wasn’t bad either, and I’m sure there are more high school kids out there living lives just like the ones seen in this film than I’d like to believe. Overall, I think it was a good movie, but I do hope it’s not one my kids watch while staying up late watching Netflix on their iPads.

You can watch the official movie trailers here:

The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks

Posted on September 21, 2018 by Nina Soden

TITLE: The Notebook
AUTHOR: Nicholas Sparks

RATING OVERVIEW
Writing: ★★★★★
Story: ★★★★★
Characters: ★★★★★
Appearance: ★★★★★
Overall: ★★★★★ (5)

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:
Every so often a love story so captures our hearts that it becomes more than a story-it becomes an experience to remember forever. The Notebook is such a book. It is a celebration of how passion can be ageless and timeless, a tale that moves us to laughter and tears and makes us believe in true love all over again… At thirty-one, Noah Calhoun, back in coastal North Carolina after World War II, is haunted by images of the girl he lost more than a decade earlier. At twenty-nine, socialite Allie Nelson is about to marry a wealthy lawyer, but she cannot stop thinking about the boy who long ago stole her heart. Thus begins the story of a love so enduring and deep it can turn tragedy into triumph, and may even have the power to create a miracle…

Buy it HERE on Amazon!

BOOK JACKET BLURB:
THE NOTEBOOK is an achingly tender story about the enduring power of love, a story of miracles that will stay with you forever.

Set amid the austere beauty of coaster North Carolina in 1946, THE NOTEBOOK begins with the story of Noah Calhoun, a rural Southerner returned home from World War II. Noah, thirty-one, is restoring a plantation home to its former glory, and he is haunted by images of the beautiful girl he met fourteen years earlier, a girl he loved like no other. Unable to find her, yet unwilling to forget the summer they spent together, Noah is content to live with only memories… until she unexpectedly returns to his town to see him once again.

Allie Nelson, twenty-nine, is not engaged to another man, but realizes that the original passion she felt for Noah has not dimmed with the passage of time. Still, the obstacles that once ended their previous relationship remain, and the gulf between their worlds is too vast to ignore. With her impending marriage only weeks away, Allie is forced to confront her hopes and dreams for the future, a future that only she can shape.

Like a puzzle within a puzzle, the story of Noah and Allie is just the beginning. As it unfolds, their tale miraculously becomes something different, with much higher stakes. The result is a deeply moving portrait of love itself, the tender moments and the fundamental changes that affect us all. Shining with a beauty that is rarely found in current literature, THE NOTEBOOK establishes Nicholas Sparks as a classic storyteller with a unique insight into the only emotion that really matters.

THE CRITICAL POINTS

WRITING: Nicholas Sparks has a way of transporting you, emotionally, into a world all his own. When I cracked the spine of this book, I found it hard to put it down. I was reluctant to leave Noah and Allie, wanting—needing—to know what would happen next in their epic adventure. If it weren’t for Sparks’ amazing writing style and his ability to engage the reader on a deeply emotional level, this could have been just about any other love story filling the Romance shelf of your local book store. Yet it isn’t. The Notebook stands out among the others as a true classic in my eyes.

STORY: WOW… Just WOW! I was delighted to find out that this story was based on the lives of Nicholas Sparks’ wife’s grandparents. To know that this kind of deep… unbendable… love exists doesn’t surprise me, as I am truly, madly, deeply in love with my own husband. However, to know that this kind of love, can withstand even the hardest of obstacles thrown at it, gives love a whole new meaning. I imagine this to be the kind of love my own fraternal grandparents must have shared. I remember as a child, watching them look into each other’s eyes in such a loving, longing way. Years into their marriage, and long past their youth, they still loved each other just as much as the day they first realized their love existed.

Nicholas Sparks’ story is a love story to which all love stories should be measured by. I won’t give anything away, because although I am tempted to tell you all about the story, from start to end, this is one book I don’t want to ruin for you. I want you to read it for yourself. I want you to experience it first hand, take the journey with Noah and his beloved, and find out what fourteen years apart can do to the “love” they shared during their fairytale summer romance.

APPEARANCE: The cover is simple, the view from Noah’s front porch. At first glance, the cover reminded me of On Golden Pond by Ernest Thompson. The cover didn’t draw me in, at first, but as I read I longed to sit on that porch and see the world through Noah’s eyes.

MY FAVORITE QUOTE: “…But most of all, I learned that life is about sitting on benches next to ancient creeks with my hand on her knee and sometimes, on good days, for falling in love.”

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

https://youtu.be/SIPhi_g1d10

Check out the official movie trailers here:

https://youtu.be/yDJIcYE32NU
https://youtu.be/FC6biTjEyZw

Scenes from the movie:

https://youtu.be/Z22EAeIIZM0
https://youtu.be/E1I0hAxGFXw
https://youtu.be/EemLsTG5fX8

Nina Soden

#TheRedheadedAuthor

Category Archives: reviews

The Subtle Art of Not Giving A #@$! by Mark Manson

Check out my YouTube channel and the video review below… and make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss a video.

My 2 Cents… A Quiet Place