book review
Xena: Their Courage Changed Our World
Full confession I am in it, I wrote two stories about how Xena led me to writing again, and then led me to my shows Chatting With Sherri and Sherri's Playhouse.
It is a great big beautiful book full of wonderful stories and lots of the most important thing that Xena teaches, Love.
Review
I have always have had a mystical side to my nature. I love magic and mystery. So a
perfect series of stories, (which according to Agatha Christie, was never meant to be a series,) is the Harley Quin short stories. You never know what your going to get when you read them. Romance? Adventure? Mystery? Scandal? Death? It has all of it, very
charmingly told through the eyes of an older man who has not really lived life but observed it, Mr. Satterhwaite. Until he meets the mysterious Mr. Quin, he really feels that is his lot in life to observe and listen. He knew a lot of important people, appreciated
beauty, listened to some of the greatest stories by just being a good listener, but he had never really lived a life that he felt was complete. Until one day he met Mr. Quin and through his encouragement (though Mr. Quin denied it,) he discovered he could
be part of the drama, not just a part of it, but a pivotal part.
I won't tell you what the dramas are, you have to read the book.
reviews
A Presumption
of Death by Jill Paton Walsh
I have enjoyed all the books of the series written by Jill Paton Walsh
but I have to say this is the weakest one. I figured out who did it about halfway through the book. Unlike Gaudy Night, where Harriet was very interesting through the first half of the book and in this one I truly missed both Peter and Bunter. Once they show
up things pick up and it become very enjoyable but it is more then half way through and that was really hard on the reader.
I won’t tell how they showed up or where or why because that would be spoilers but they were
very enjoyable reunions. I do like the way that Ms Walsh writes all the characters she really understands them and I feel that Dorothy Sayers is there in spirit but I am sorry of the books she had written this book is not my favorite because of the plot and
really the lack of the zing in the story line. (I do love all the others she wrote so I am being extremely honest here.)
More Than Love: An Intimate Portrait of My Mother, Natalie Wood by Natasha Gregson Wagner
I have loved Natalie Wood since I was a small child. I saw her on talk shows in the 70’s with Robert Wagner who I also adore, or by herself. She was always funny, intelligent
and adorable. She was my favorite actress as kid (I wanted to be an actress, not many brunettes for a brunette who wanted to be an actress to look up to, she was also extremely talented.) My favorite movies are Cash McCall and Love With a Proper Stranger.
She was also great in comedy and I adored her in Sex and The Single Girl and Bob, Carol, Ted and Alice. In other words I am a fan.
When Natalie was going to be in Anastasia in LA at the Music Center I was so excited, I squealed when
we got the postcard advertising it. (I still have it somewhere.) I lived at home, I was going to college and working but I knew I did not have enough money to go to the play and pay my bills, My Dad promised to get them for the whole family when they came
on the market.
Of course that was not to be. I was so stunned when I heard what happened, and heart broken. It is hard to explain, I never met her, or even got a glimpse of her in person.
When all the speculation
started with her sister Lana I was shocked, it was obvious she didn’t like Robert Wagner in her book, (which I did read) but she never accused him of anything like she did later. When she accuse him, I was very angry. I am a life long murder mystery
fan and what she and the ship’s captain said happened, had way too many holes in it, it made no sense.
I was so excited to read Natasha Gregson Wagner book, I saw the advertisement for it after I saw her HBO special, Natalie Wood,
What Remains Behind. I loved all the stuff about Natalie’s life in the documentary, her career and family life. It was beautiful. At the end, I was nodding my head and agreeing with her and the people she was interviewing, they knew best, everyone else
in blogs and podcasts are just speculating. The biggest thing for me was that Christopher Walken and Robert Wagner didn’t really like each other and were not friends, why would Christopher back him up, if it was a lie, so I knew that all this fodder
was just trumped up stuff, to make money. So sad. And unfair.
So I bought the book, it was very good, it is very hard to write the dark side of your life, the hard stuff for you to grapple with and to do it for the public, wow! I think
Nastasha did a great job and she obviously researched her Mom’s life very thoroughly. She is so lucky to have so much, I treasure the pieces I have my parents, I don’t have as much as she does but the bits and pieces are precious. I felt so bad
as I read how she had desperately wanted to keep her parents home, that she was scared something would happen to them and then when it did, her life just spiraled.
I also noticed as I read all the things that Lana had wrong, dates that
things happened, the bust of James Dean disappearing, (obliviously not true, it was right there in storage,) even what Natalie was wearing on that last Thanksgiving. Also Natasha explaining her attitude to two tiny kids who just lost their Mom, her sister
was cold and cruel. It made me realize her book was not true at all.
I love the happy ending for Natalie’s kids though, they deserve it. And I really hope people stop talking about her passing and focus on what great actress she
was, maybe even have a Natalie Wood Film Festival. That would be so cool.
Thank you Natasha, from one daughter to another.
Article for Flapper Press
Poetry- Broken
Broken — by Sherri Rabinowitz
Broken like a bird with a broken wing
Even a missing feather
The poor little thing can't fly
I feel broken
Alone
Unloved
Not able to fly
I am the bird with the broken wing
Broken Alone
Poetry
Spirit of a Dandelion Petal
Such a pretty flower,
It looks like any other,
But when one blows gently,
It flies apart, sensationally!
You want to cry,
It is a tragedy, but no, as you see the petals part,
you give an amazed start!
Because each petal is itself,
an individual,
whole and complete,
a dream like spirit that
flies its own path.
Each petal is an angel of beauty,
Fluttering in its own very short flight,
to freedom.
To check out my poetry and more; https://www.flapperpress.com/blog/writing-submissions-may-2019?fbclid=IwAR0aX1lOMAdPkzeoPN__4oye7gFl0WzibZPR9xmmfvls37bNIwEAv_xNP7A
Poem published on Flapper Press
Hear My Voice
Hear my voice!
I cry out;
Die to be heard;
Drowned out by the
Reasoned and unreasonable;
Male and female;
Demanding I change my thoughts
To their own;
I am denied my voice!
My creativity!
My feelings!
Myself!
—Sherri Rabinowitz
Latest comments