Ian Laird’s books on Goodreads (2,105 books) (original) (raw)

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| ------------------------ | ------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------- | --------------- | -------------------- | ----------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----- | ---------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------- | | ------ | | | checkbox | position | cover Piranesi | title Piranesi | author Clarke, Susanna | isbn 163557563X | isbn13 9781635575637 | asin 163557563X | num pages 272pp | avg rating 4.23 | num ratings 320,573 | date pub Sep 15, 2020 | date pub edition Sep 15, 2020 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Oct 01, 2024 | owned | format Hardcover | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Guide to the National Gallery of Ancient art at Palazzo Barberini | title Guide to the National Gallery of Ancient art at Palazzo Barberini | author Onori, Lorenza Mochi | isbn 8898302126 | isbn13 9788898302123 | asin 8898302126 | num pages unknown | avg rating 3.17 | num ratings 6 | date pub 1992 | date pub edition Jan 01, 2015 | Ian's rating liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review The Palazzo Barberini in Rome is the home of the Italian National Gallery of Ancient Art. It is full of mainly, but not exclusively, Renaissance art o The Palazzo Barberini in Rome is the home of the Italian National Gallery of Ancient Art. It is full of mainly, but not exclusively, Renaissance art of a high order. No doubt it is a magnificent collection housed in a wonderful building.The subject matter of the artists is overwhelmingly religious portraiture alongside mythological scenes, featuring some pretty big names like Titian, Caravaggio, Furini, Raphael, Bernini and Pietro Da Cortona plus scores of Italians I haven’t actually heard of, plus a smattering of quite well known ‘foreigners’, including Hans Holbein whose portrait of the hefty Henry VIII of England (p45), looks very familiar, El Greco and Nicholas Poussin.Now this is not to my taste, my interest in visual art starts about the time of JWM Turner, say 1800, which is way after all those pious people stopped looking skyward. However I was stuck by the Caravaggio action pic of Judith beheading Holofernes (pp88-89). No doubt Judith was annoyed with Holofernes, but also mad at the total absence of women painters in the collection (I do understand the historical reasons why this is so). I was also taken by two tremendously atypical paintings by Bartolomeo Pazzarotti (1529-1592), a new artist to me who created sometime between 1578 and 1590 two smiling meatworkers among the carcasses with a boar’s head also prominent in (The Butcher’s Shop) (p61), and a senior couple with baskets of seafood along with spectacular crustaceans laid out on their table (The Fishmonger’s Shop) (p62). The lady seems to be telling the gentleman to stop handling the fish so much but that’s only speculation. This is a wonderful catalogue for enthusiasts of religious art from Italy. ...more | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 8 | # times read 1 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 25, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view (with text) | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Frick Collection: Handbook of Paintings | title Frick Collection: Handbook of Paintings | author SCALA | isbn 1857593286 | isbn13 9781857593280 | asin 1857593286 | num pages 168pp | avg rating 4.46 | num ratings 46 | date pub Jan 01, 1955 | date pub edition Jul 06, 2006 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 25, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Hairy Maclary's Rumpus at the Vet | title Hairy Maclary's Rumpus at the Vet | author Dodd, Lynley | isbn 014054240X | isbn13 9780140542400 | asin 014054240X | num pages 32pp | avg rating 4.20 | num ratings 808 | date pub Dec 12, 1989 | date pub edition Mar 24, 2009 | Ian's rating really liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 1 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 25, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Slinky Malinki | title Slinky Malinki | author Dodd, Lynley | isbn 1582461481 | isbn13 9781582461489 | asin 1582461481 | num pages 32pp | avg rating 4.37 | num ratings 3,161 | date pub Jan 01, 1991 | date pub edition Apr 01, 2005 | Ian's rating really liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 1 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 25, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Hairy Maclary from Donaldson's Dairy | title Hairy Maclary from Donaldson's Dairy | author Dodd, Lynley | isbn 0670913502 | isbn13 9780670913503 | asin 0670913502 | num pages 36pp | avg rating 4.30 | num ratings 14,469 | date pub 1983 | date pub edition Jul 04, 2002 | Ian's rating really liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 1 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 25, 2024 | owned | format Board book | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Lincoln in the Bardo | title Lincoln in the Bardo | author Saunders, George | isbn 1408871750 | isbn13 9781408871751 | asin 1408871750 | num pages 343pp | avg rating 3.75 | num ratings 160,696 | date pub Jan 01, 2017 | date pub edition Feb 08, 2018 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 10, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Comet in Moominland (The Moomins, #2) | title Comet in Moominland(The Moomins, #2) | author Jansson, Tove | isbn 0312608888 | isbn13 9780312608880 | asin 0312608888 | num pages 158pp | avg rating 4.24 | num ratings 19,962 | date pub 1946 | date pub edition Apr 27, 2010 | Ian's rating really liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review One of the great joys of reading is finding a story with illustrations which enhance the tale. Such is the case here with the added advantage that the One of the great joys of reading is finding a story with illustrations which enhance the tale. Such is the case here with the added advantage that the illustrator is the author herself, who always considered her art as important as her writing. Tove Jansson trained in art schools in Stockholm, Helsinki and Paris for nearly a decade between 1930 and 1938 (she was born in 1914), and she applied her artistic skill to her writing thereafter.The story itself is charming, as many have observed, full of creature characters with distinct personalities: the adventurous Moonmintroll, the timorous Sniff, and fellow travellers Snufkin the mouth organist, the indolent muskrat philosopher and the Hemulen, who is an obsessive philatelist, oblivious of the dangers of a comet hurtling towards the Earth, the shop steward snork and his sister the snork maiden, she of the changing colour and eye for a bauble, as well as for Moonintroll himself. The charm comes from the details of the everyday; coffee and cake, dancing and shopping along the way, in conjunction with the eccentric and the odd. Moomintroll’s party finds Snufkin living in a tent in a desolate bleak place with ‘that black velvet tree with the beautiful grey colours beyond’ (p45), Moominpappa is constantly updating his memoirs as events occur (it has been suggested that Jansson based Moominpappa and Moominmamma, the latter insisting on bringing a cake as they flee the oncoming comet, on her own parents, a sculptor and illustrator respectively). There are chain smoking astronomers calculating the exact moment of impact of the comet but with no thought of the cataclysmic effect if it hits. All the while this is taking place under a reddening sky as the adventurers travel on the seabed where oceans have disappeared.Jansson’s wonderful illustrations depict exactly what is happening on the page, in a dark style which I would call Nordic mythological for want of a better term. When our travellers rest for the night on a high pointed rock in the empty sea, with their stilts leaning against the rock face, each of the characters is impeccably drawn just as you might imagine from the text including a wide awake Moomintroll on watch at the top. There are many of these epic illustrations and many more I would describe almost as beautifully drawn doodles in a minor key.There are many fine collaborations between authors and illustrators: Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake, Kenneth Graham and A A Milne with E H Shepherd, Jules Feiffer for Norman Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth, but there is something extra special when a gifted author turns out to be an equally gifted illustrator, witness Rudyard Kipling’s Just So Stories, noting that The Jungle Book was originally illustrated by John Lockwood Kipling, father of Rudyard Kipling. James Thurber drew whimsical cartoon figures for his own stories, and Antoine Saint-Exupery created an other world for The Little Prince. Would The Hobbit be the same without Tolkien’s drawings? And then there is Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit fixed in our minds as he is drawn by Potter herself. One final one I enjoyed with my son, Lynley Dodd’s Hairy Maclary series: Hairy Maclary: Five Lynley Dodd Stories. ...more | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 5 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 10, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view (with text) | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Rewording the Brain | title Rewording the Brain | author Astle, David | isbn 1760295485 | isbn13 9781760295486 | asin 1760295485 | num pages 315pp | avg rating 4.18 | num ratings 78 | date pub unknown | date pub edition Oct 01, 2018 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 10, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Nothing Sacred: Selected Writings (Virago Modern Classics) | title Nothing Sacred: Selected Writings | author Carter, Angela | isbn 0860682692 | isbn13 9780860682691 | asin 0860682692 | num pages 226pp | avg rating 3.91 | num ratings 178 | date pub Dec 31, 1982 | date pub edition Jan 01, 1992 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 10, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Expletives Deleted | title Expletives Deleted | author Carter, Angela | isbn 0099222817 | isbn13 9780099222811 | asin 0099222817 | num pages 240pp | avg rating 3.86 | num ratings 222 | date pub 1992 | date pub edition Jul 06, 1993 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 10, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Shaggy Dogs And Black Sheep: The Origin Of Even More Phrases We Use Everyday | title Shaggy Dogs And Black Sheep: The Origin Of Even More Phrases We Use Everyday | author Jack, Albert | isbn 0141024259 | isbn13 9780141024257 | asin 0141024259 | num pages unknown | avg rating 3.75 | num ratings 100 | date pub Sep 01, 2005 | date pub edition Nov 28, 2006 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 10, 2024 | owned | format Mass Market Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Railway Posters 1923-1947: From the Collection of the National Railway Museum, York, England | title Railway Posters 1923-1947: From the Collection of the National Railway Museum, York, England | author Cole, Beverley | isbn 1856690148 | isbn13 9781856690140 | asin 1856690148 | num pages unknown | avg rating 4.32 | num ratings 22 | date pub Apr 15, 1992 | date pub edition May 11, 1992 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 09, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover Trains: The Early Years | title Trains: The Early Years | author Cole, Beverley | isbn 3833161833 | isbn13 9783833161834 | asin 3833161833 | num pages 352pp | avg rating 5.00 | num ratings 2 | date pub Sep 22, 2011 | date pub edition Sep 15, 2011 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 09, 2024 | owned | format Hardcover | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover City of Nets: A Portrait of Hollywood in the 1940s | title City of Nets: A Portrait of Hollywood in the 1940s | author Friedrich, Otto | isbn 0747230641 | isbn13 9780747230649 | asin 0747230641 | num pages 495pp | avg rating 4.12 | num ratings 1,031 | date pub 1986 | date pub edition Jun 16, 1988 | Ian's rating really liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review This is an enthralling account of Hollywood in the forties.1939 is generally regarded as Hollywood’s greatest year, with the release of Gone with the This is an enthralling account of Hollywood in the forties.1939 is generally regarded as Hollywood’s greatest year, with the release of Gone with the Wind, The Grapes of Wrath, The Wizard of Oz, Mr Smith Goes to Washington, Stagecoach and Wuthering Heights, among others. The thirties good times continued into the early forties: all the long-time moguls were still in place and wartime cinema attendance remained high. But post war history is a different story. By 1950 the studios and the industry generally were being assailed by multiple challenges: a sharp decline in post war cinema attendance; the concomitant breathtaking rise in the number of television sets in homes across the country; the increasing independence of actors and producers aided by the cumulative impact of successive challenges to indentured contracts by stars such as Olivia de Havilland; the breakup of studio control of distribution networks and the increasing interest of HUAC in weeding out communist influence in the film industry, read Hollywood.The author, a long time journalist, editor and writer of non-fiction, novels and children’s books, takes a refreshingly novel approach by examining each year of the decade in turn, while sometimes going back into the past and into the future. He also has a unique take on source material which I will come to.In the main he chooses a biographical approach to the lives of the stars, producers, directors and especially studio heads. He nevertheless pursues a number of themes which he revisits through several years, notably industrial activity, demonstrably corrupt and usually fractious; the impact of the war on Hollywood, especially the mute reaction of the mostly Jewish studio executives to the treatment of Jews by the Germans; and the efforts of Congress, especially HUAC, to rid the town of communists or at least gain political capital from seeming to do so.Friedrich gives full coverage to film production, providing copious detail of the work of individual filmmakers which is usually unflattering: from L B Mayer, he of the enormous all-white office to the habitually inebriated Raymond Chandler to the cynical Billy Wilder, the politically savvy Ronald Reagan, bombastic Orson Welles and European refugees like Michael Curtiz (“you think I know fuck nothing. Well, I tell you I know fuck all!’), Thomas Mann, Arnold Schoenberg, Igor Stravinsky and Berthold Brecht. The refugee writers and composers contain an unusually high proportion of square pegs obliged to fit round holes.What is remarkably refreshing is that Friedrich eschewed interviews relying almost exclusively on secondary sources. He does use some primary material, notably the hearing transcripts of several congressional committees, particularly HUAC. Thus he is neither beholden to any of his subjects nor swayed by any personal charisma of protagonists who might have been still around (the book was published in 1986). He tells the story like it is; or at least an accepted version of the truth. I recognised accounts of events from books with which I am familiar, for example, Robert Mitchum’s marijuana bust, Edward G Robinson’s plight with HUAC; Raymond Chandler’s drinking, especially the way he wrote the Blue Dahlia, in a constant state of non-sobriety; and L B Mayer’s histrionics.But Friedrich puts this all together convincingly cross referencing his material to keep the stories consistent. I have never read anything about these days in Hollywood as broad in scope and so successfully managed. A look at Friedrich’s sources tells us a great deal: his bibliography runs for 13 pages, more than 550 volumes of biography, autobiography, congressional hearings, history and some fiction by writers who also worked in Hollywood in the forties. Pretty impressive. Highly recommended. ...more | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 7 | # times read 1 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 04, 2024 | owned | format Hardcover | actions view (with text) | | | | | checkbox | position | cover The Lover (Bloomsbury Classic) | title The Lover | author Duras, Marguerite | isbn 0747516030 | isbn13 9780747516033 | asin 0747516030 | num pages 122pp | avg rating 3.72 | num ratings 60,583 | date pub 1984 | date pub edition 1993 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 04, 2024 | owned | format Hardcover | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover World Atlas of Tea | title World Atlas of Tea | author Smith, Krisi | isbn 1784720933 | isbn13 9781784720933 | asin 1784720933 | num pages 240pp | avg rating 4.16 | num ratings 63 | date pub Sep 2016 | date pub edition Sep 08, 2016 | Ian's rating | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 0 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Sep 02, 2024 | owned | format Hardcover | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover The Far Side® Observer | title The Far Side® Observer | author Larson, Gary | isbn 0836220986 | isbn13 9780836220988 | asin 0836220986 | num pages 104pp | avg rating 4.38 | num ratings 1,381 | date pub Sep 1987 | date pub edition Jan 01, 1987 | Ian's rating liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review There was a time when I thought Gary Larson’s The Far Side was the bee’s knees, the ants’ pants and just incredibly funny.But that time has passed sad There was a time when I thought Gary Larson’s The Far Side was the bee’s knees, the ants’ pants and just incredibly funny.But that time has passed sadly. I loved his cows and snakes and bears and chickens with their imaginative amalgam of animal and button-down human traits. And there are some stand out stand alones here, including an all-time favourite: ‘Dizzy Gillespie’s seventh birthday party’, with young Dizzy’s cheeks puffed out, which I had stuck in a notebook of mine for years. I particularly like the Nile crocodiles craving cheesecake after devouring the contents of a tour boat.But they get a bit samish in this eighth collection when read all through at once. Better to dip into occasionally for old times’ sake. The handsome tenth anniversary history has much more lasting value as Larson unfolds his cartooning life from childhood scribbles to syndication: The PreHistory of The Far Side: A 10th Anniversary Exhibit ...more | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 5 | # times read 1 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Aug 28, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view (with text) | | | | | checkbox | position | cover 配色事典―大正・昭和の色彩ノート (青幻舎ビジュアル文庫シリーズ) | title 配色事典―大正・昭和の色彩ノート | author Wada, Sanzo | isbn 4861522471 | isbn13 9784861522475 | asin 4861522471 | num pages 256pp | avg rating 4.67 | num ratings 327 | date pub Jan 01, 2011 | date pub edition Dec 31, 2010 | Ian's rating liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 1 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Aug 12, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | | | checkbox | position | cover 配色事典 応用編 (青幻舎ビジュアル文庫シリーズ) | title 配色事典 応用編 | author Wada, Sanzo | isbn 4861527724 | isbn13 9784861527722 | asin 4861527724 | num pages 336pp | avg rating 4.58 | num ratings 43 | date pub Jan 03, 2020 | date pub edition Jan 03, 2020 | Ian's rating really liked it | my rating 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars add to shelves | review None | notes Notes are private! | comments 0 | votes 0 | # times read 1 | date started not set | date read not set | date added Aug 12, 2024 | owned | format Paperback | actions view | | | |

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