Tag: One Hit Wonder

Tony Hawks – One Hit Wonderland | Review

March 27, 2020
Authors F-J (By Surname)Non-Fiction

Title: One Hit Wonderland

Author: Tony Hawks

Type: Non-Fiction

Page Count: 310

Rating: 4/5

I picked this one up after seeing it in a charity shop and reading and enjoying Round Ireland with a Fridge. Hawks has a quirky sense of humour, but it’s one of the rare instances where someone’s sense of humour comes across really well in the written page and where it doesn’t annoy me.

Here, we basically follow what happens when Hawks decides to head abroad to try to record a follow up to a one hit wonder that he had before I was even born. He meets a colourful supporting cast of characters along the way of course, and overall we end up with a fun little book that you can whizz through in a couple of days.

I actually read this while everyone was locked down because of Coronavirus, and it was the perfect read for that because it helped to take my mind away to a time where the world wasn’t quite in the state that it’s in today. It’s weird, I haven’t seen anyone I know for a week or so, and so just the very idea of going outside and spending time with people feels like something I did half a year away.

All in all then, I was pretty happy with this book and I still plan to eventually read everything that Hawks has published. The list is disappointingly short, and he must be about due something by now, but perhaps he’s no longer taking silly bets and going off on crazy madcap adventures. I don’t know, I haven’t looked him up.

Would I recommend this one? Definitely, and it’s actually one of those where I think you’ll find something no matter what kind of stuff you normally read. It’s just loads of fun.

Learn more about One Hit Wonderland.

Daphne du Maurier – My Cousin Rachel | Review

October 31, 2018
Authors A-E (By Surname)Fiction

Title: My Cousin Rachel

Author: Daphne du Maurier

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 322

Rating: 2/5

 

Daphne du Maurier - My Cousin Rachel

Daphne du Maurier – My Cousin Rachel

 

I had high hopes for this after enjoying Rebecca, but I can’t help but feel as though du Maurier is a one trick pony after reading this. It was pretty much the same book, but without the successful execution, and that made it a bit of a slog from start to finish. With Rebecca, I couldn’t put it down. With this, I had to read 20 pages a night just to make sure that I picked it up, and even then it helped to put me to sleep.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with the writing style. It’s more that the pacing is way off, to the point at which it’s hard to get interested in any of the characters because nothing seems to happen to them. There were a few great bits of prose, but they were interspersed with so much unnecessary drivel that instead of being the jewels in a crown, they were more like scraping up the crumbs from the bottom of a bag of crisps.

I wanted to love this one, and I went into it just assuming that I would do. After reading it, I’m hesitant to give du Maurier another go, although I do have Frenchman’s Creek and I enjoyed some of her short stories. This one, though, was a big disappointment, and it felt a bit like going to see a one hit wonder in concert and discovering that other than their one hit, they just play covers and sound like a pub band. Maybe my expectations were too high.

All in all, I say skip this one, especially if you’ve read du Maurier before and you weren’t too keen on her. I just hope this wasn’t her at her best because if it is, it doesn’t bode well for her others.

 

Daphne du Maurier

Daphne du Maurier

 

Click here to buy My Cousin Rachel.