Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Ghost Town


A grumpy New York Dentist, Bertram Pincus, goes in for routine surgery and leaves with the ability to see dead people in, Ghost Town. It stars the wonderful Ricky Gervais from the BBC show The Office, Greg Kinnear from As Good as it Gets and Tea Leoni from the Family Man. It is a witty movie full of laughs and the occasional touching tear as he tries to reconcile is new ability with his life.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society


The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows is a delightful fictional book told in letters with the most charming and original characters. Set in post WWII England, it tells the story around writer Juliet Ashton who is looking for the subject for her next book. Through correspondence she discovers the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society which is a reading group from Guernsey, a British island in the English channel, that was occupied by the Germans during the war. Since it does involve WWII, there are some heavy moments when the characters are describing their experiences, but the story of their lives is captivating. And as one character in the book says, "Reading good books ruins you for enjoying bad books."