MADreads

Pity poor Rudolph Valentino. No, not that one. It’s not just the name and the visage that brings to mind the defining heartthrob of the silver screen, Valentino also happens to make his life in the film industry, which means he’s forever correcting people in the industry who take his name at face value. One of the few UCLA film archivists laboring to preserve Hollywood’s silver screen past, Valentino has made film his life.

Most area libraries have been closed for a few days now and many of you are social distancing and staying home (and washing your hands, natch). And if you're like me your anxieties and stresses are many, and perhaps among them is 'will I have enough books to read?' Sure, this may seem like a minor consideration in the grander, global scheme of things, but for me right now distraction of any kind helps me in de-stressing. I'm guessing the same may be true for many of you.

This book is written as an advice letter from comedian and Hollywood star Ali Wong to her daughters to read one day, presumably after they are grown, because holy smokes, it is explicit. This is described as "unfiltered" in the book blurb. Like I wrote in the title to this review, I grew up listening to George Carlin, Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy (one of Ali Wong's favorite comics and someone she also listened to as a kid). If you don't know who these comedians are and/or think they are old fuddy-duddies, then you are the perfect demographic for Ali Wong.

The Lusitania has recently been sunk. World War I is ongoing and the United States is trying to stay neutral. That is the setting for a new historical mystery set in 1915 New York City. The main character of A Front Page Affair is a privileged young woman journalist who has started working at the New York Sentinel. Capability Weeks, aka Kitty, works for the Ladies page editor as an apprentice. Her first assignment is to cover a society party, the Independence Day gala north of the city. At the party a man she has interviewed has been shot and killed.