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Book review: Dominik Gaida – Brynmor University 1: Geheimnisse („Secrets“)
My first book choice in 2024 was taken following an entirely practical approach: the first part of the Brynmor University trilogy by Dominic Gaida had been waiting and smiling at me from my shelf for several weeks and I always postponed it. Until I read that part 2 will come out in February 2024 and so I decided to give it a read to see if it would be worth to wait for the second part – or to even pre-order it. Spoiler: For me personally, it is.
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Album review: Fiddler’s Green – The Green Machine
Happy new year I guess. It’s been a while and I wanted to publish this review much earlier, especially given that the CD was in my post box a week before the album was actually published. But first there were Christmas holidays, then were exams to mark and now I’m back to work. I didn’t even manage to finish my 2023 recaps, but who cares – let’s start 2024 with this review.
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My 2023 reading recap
2023 was somehow a special year because I finally found back to reading books. I also started buying more books (and of course I haven’t read that many of them, that’s the law. Maybe I’m more of a book dragon than a book worm). Actually I bought so many new books that we had to get a third bookshelf (and then I had to buy even more books so that the shelf wouldn’t look super empty). Yet, my reading list of 2023 isn’t super impressive. Under the cut you’ll find out a bit more, but be prepared: My impressive count of books read in 2023 is 17 (actually 19, but…
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My 2023 concert recap
Last year, when I was asked how many concerts we go to on average within a year, I excused the 14 concerts and 2 festivals as an exception because there were so many shows that had been postponed because of the pandemic. Little did I know. I didn’t anticipate what would happen this year, after I quit 2 time-consuming hobbies, out of which one was fairly expensive as well. Things escalated. I went to concerts. I enjoyed it. Join my concert recap of 2023 🙂
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Book review: F.T. Lukens – In Deeper Waters
F.T. Lukens has my heart in a tight grip. And it all started with So This Is Ever After, a book I randomly discovered as an Amazon recommendation. When I found a copy in the local bookstore I couldn’t get my hands on it fast enough because the summary had sounded so tempting. And I was hooked. I discovered that there were even more books by F.T. Lukens and started running after an English copy – until there was a sale on English books online and I used the opportunity to order both a copy of In Deeper Waters and Spell Bound. Since then, I had been waiting for the…
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Comic review: Bad Omens „Concrete Jungle“ Issues 1-3
Ohaaaa, the excitement. I’m not so much of a comic reader. I read manga, I read graphic novels, but for some reason I’ve never felt really close to most western comics (despite spending my childhood reading Micky Mouse comics). I can’t say why. But I made an exception when I found out that Noah Sebastian of Bad Omens was involved in creating a comic (at this point I must say that I’d also make this exception for Gerard Way’s comics. Yes, I am a victim to nerdy musicians that turn into comic authors / artists). And not just any comic, it’s actually a Bad Omens themed comic featuring Bad Omens…
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Book review: Gry Kappel Jensen – Forget Me Not (Rosenholm Trilogy 2)
It feels a little weird to start reviewing a book series with part 2, but it’s been a bit too long ago that I read part 1 to be able to write a review. If you haven’t read part 1, you should not read the review of part 2, because the summary includes spoilers for part 1. Maybe if I ever find the time and motivation to re-read part 1, I’ll add a review of that one as well. But for now I’ll just do part 2 because I finished reading this one very recently.
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Concert review: Eisheilige Nacht, PLWM Dortmund, 22 December 2023
For me, it was the first "Eisheilige Nacht" ever. On the one hand because I had "forgotten" about Subway to Sally until they released their new album Himmelfahrt this year, which was an absolute banger. On the other hand, the dates never really fit my schedule. This year though, the date fit, the location fit and the line up made my heart beat faster, as it included Fiddler's Green, one of my favourite bands for several years now, and Letzte Instanz, one of my teenage loves that I've never seen live before. So off I went to the PLWM in Dortmund for my last concert of 2023.
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Book review: Andreas Dutter – Starlight in our Dreams
Felix, a young man from rural Austria, moves to Cork for his studies. A big step, as he's generally a rather shy, insecure young man who is highly influenced by a) his belief in Astrology and the fact that his identity is determined by him being Pisces and b) his childhood in an Austrian village, where people weren't exactly accepting towards his sexuality. In Cork, he tries to start a new life. He moves in with a girl, Cara, he met online who is just as much (if not even more) into Astrology as he is, and takes up Cultural Studies at the UCC. Right at the beginning, he meets…
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Concert review: Future Palace & Envyyou, Helios 37 Cologne, 03 December 2023
Second to last concert of the year. We’d seen Future Palace as support for Electric Callboy three times during their TEKKNO tour and I was blown away by the energy of this band. And I really wanted to go see them afterwards, but if I remember correctly, their Cologne show was sold out. Good thing they added a bonus show I got tickets for. And I didn’t regret it.
