Category: Review

A photograph from the inspirational bin – 32

This is a spot behind a group of restaurants at Victoria Point, Queensland.

But it could be anywhere, like a spot we saw on a boat trip on a river in the Daintree, in far north Queensland

So, this could be a spot, not far inland from the ocean where smugglers, or drug runners come ashore, in a place so remote they would never get caught.

Unless an enterprising federal agent comes up with a plan to track them from the ocean side using satellite images, or reported sightings of suspicious activity.

My money is on a random sighting, a vague report files in a small town police station, and a body washed up in shore, apparently the victim of a crocodile attack. Or not a crocodile.

It cold be a fishing trip gone wrong in a backwater stream, a weekend away by a dialled group of friends, who are not really friends, which all comes to a head when one of the friends go missing.

Or, I’d you like the idea of historical drama, a story about the first expedition from the bottom of Australia to the very top, for the first time, with all the hazards of rivers to cross, paths to create though the bush, the heat, the animals, the local inhabitants who have yet to see Europeans.

To be honest, I would not want to be one of those early explorers, especially those who went inland and struck desert, or died just short of their goal.

Just as an aside, we did learn about these people, Hume and Hovell, Blaxland, Wentworth and Lawson, Burke and Wills, and others.

A photograph from the inspirational bin – 32

This is a spot behind a group of restaurants at Victoria Point, Queensland.

But it could be anywhere, like a spot we saw on a boat trip on a river in the Daintree, in far north Queensland

So, this could be a spot, not far inland from the ocean where smugglers, or drug runners come ashore, in a place so remote they would never get caught.

Unless an enterprising federal agent comes up with a plan to track them from the ocean side using satellite images, or reported sightings of suspicious activity.

My money is on a random sighting, a vague report files in a small town police station, and a body washed up in shore, apparently the victim of a crocodile attack. Or not a crocodile.

It cold be a fishing trip gone wrong in a backwater stream, a weekend away by a dialled group of friends, who are not really friends, which all comes to a head when one of the friends go missing.

Or, I’d you like the idea of historical drama, a story about the first expedition from the bottom of Australia to the very top, for the first time, with all the hazards of rivers to cross, paths to create though the bush, the heat, the animals, the local inhabitants who have yet to see Europeans.

To be honest, I would not want to be one of those early explorers, especially those who went inland and struck desert, or died just short of their goal.

Just as an aside, we did learn about these people, Hume and Hovell, Blaxland, Wentworth and Lawson, Burke and Wills, and others.

Searching for locations: Hong Kong Park, Hong Kong

After arriving in Hong Kong early in the morning, we were taken to the Hong Kong Conrad Hotel where we were staying for several days.  We had a short sleep, then I took the grandchildren for a walk and we found Hong Kong Park, with a Fountain Plaza, waterways, a waterfall, and turtles.

2013-12-28 11.24.02

Part of the fountain area.

2013-12-28 11.31.57

Turtles resting on a rock

2013-12-28 11.31.36

A turtle about to go in the water

2013-12-28 11.35.26

The waterfall.

It was a pleasant surprise to find this park in such a highly built-up area.

Nearby was a multi-story underground shopping center that was huge, and very conveniently accessible from our hotel.

Trying to get off, or is that on, the merry-go-round

Self-published authors are fully aware that perhaps the easiest part of the writing journey is the actual writing.  Well, compared to the marketing aspect I believe it is.

I have read a lot of articles, suggestions and tips and tricks to market the book to the reading public.  It is, to say the least, a lot harder to market eBooks than perhaps their hard or paper-covered relatives.

This is despite the millions of eReaders out there.

Then there is that other fickle part of the publishing cycle, the need for reviews.

Proper reviews of course.

As we are learning, reviews can be bought, and in more ways than one.  What happened to finding writers of the same genre and offering to buy one copy and write a review in return for a buy one copy and write a review.

I’ve noticed that all the current best selling novelists do the same for their fellow novelists though I guess when you get to be a best-seller, you might not have to buy a copy, so I can only dream of attaining such lofty heights in the publishing world.

But until I reach such rarefied air, I guess I have to figure out how to appeal to my fellow writers, and, of course, hope that my work is good enough.

It might be a start in getting through that difficult cycle, more reviews means more sales, etc.  And getting those first sales and reviews  …

Therein lies the conundrum.  It is a question of paying for advertising or working it out for ourselves.  I guess if I were to get more sales, I could afford the advertising … yes, back on the merry-go-round!

And yet, the harder the road, the more I enjoy what I do.  It is exhilarating while writing, it is a joy to finish the first draft, it is an accomplishment when it is published, but when you sell that first book, well, there is no other feeling like it.

I am inspired.

Now as for that advertisement and where to post it…

Searching for locations: Hong Kong Park, Hong Kong

After arriving in Hong Kong early in the morning, we were taken to the Hong Kong Conrad Hotel where we were staying for several days.  We had a short sleep, then I took the grandchildren for a walk and we found Hong Kong Park, with a Fountain Plaza, waterways, a waterfall, and turtles.

2013-12-28 11.24.02

Part of the fountain area.

2013-12-28 11.31.57

Turtles resting on a rock

2013-12-28 11.31.36

A turtle about to go in the water

2013-12-28 11.35.26

The waterfall.

It was a pleasant surprise to find this park in such a highly built-up area.

Nearby was a multi-story underground shopping center that was huge, and very conveniently accessible from our hotel.

Searching for locations: Harbour Grand Hotel, Kowloon, Hong Kong

The Harbour Grand Hotel, Kowloon, Hong Kong, is a modern, but luxurious hotel, one that our travel agent found for us.

I was initially worried that it might be too far away from central Hong Kong, but a free shuttle bus that runs at convenient times took us to and from the hotel to the Star Ferry terminal.

The luxuriousness of the hotel starts the moment you walk in the front entrance with a magnificent staircase that I assumed led up to the convention center (or perhaps where weddings are catered for) and a staircase where one could make a grand entrance or exit.  Oh, and there’s a chandelier too.

We booked into a Harbourview suite, and it was not only spacious but had that air of luxury about it that made it an experience every time you walked into it.

But the view of Hong Kong Harbour, that was the ‘piece de resistance’

I spent a lot of time staring out that window, and it was more interesting than watching the television, which we didn’t do much of.   Most of the time, when we travel, TV is limited to International English speaking news channels.

This time we had several movies included with the room, but I still preferred to watch the endless water traffic on the harbor.

The lounge area had several comfortable chairs, an area for the bar fridge and tea or coffee making facilities and on the opposite side the usual table and chairs for those who came to conduct business

The bedroom was separate to the entrance and lounge.  Notable was the fact the room had two bathrooms, one in the bedroom, and one out in the lounge, perhaps for the guests who were having friends in.

We dined in one of the restaurants, Hoi Yat Heen, where we experienced Guandong cuisine.  I tried the roasted goose for the first time, and it was interesting to say the least.

There’s no doubt where we will be staying the next time we go to Hong Kong.

Top Gun: Maverick – A review

Let’s get one thing straight from the start, I don’t like Tom Cruise.

But…

Why does he star in so many great films?

Clearly, I’m wrong about him.

Oddly enough I saw the first Top Gun movie and loved it, from my point of view, I love the planes and the flying sequences.

The latest Top Gun entry is even better.

It makes my once-upon-a-time wish to be a fighter pilot one that I should have strived harder to fulfil, but one that is impossible in this country with such a small requirement for fighter pilots.

Oh well…

Moving on.  As you would expect of the best of the best, an impossible mission is set up, and for an hour or so all of them fail, as you would expect.

Who cares.

It’s the flight sequences we’ve come to see, not Tom Cruise, or at least I’m probably the only one who has, and they are great.

Oh, and I did come to see Jennifer Connolly too, obviously taking a break from Snowpiercer and the unrelenting cold for somewhere a lot warmer.

It gets a little tense in places, but it fits the story perfectly without overplaying it or letting it dominate the story.  This is about the best pilots doing the impossible, which is no less than we could ask of them.

Similarly, the romantic undertone is played to perfection, and also doesn’t distract us from what the story is about.

My only complaint is, what is the attraction of seeing Tom Cruise without a shirt?

I give it five stars.  It really is that good!

In a word: well

At first, you would think this word has something to do with your health.

You’d be right.  “Are you well?” or “Are you well enough?”

Of course, it can cause some confusion, because how do you measure degrees of wellness.

Reasonably well, very well, not well, or just well.  Not a good descriptive word for the state of your health, maybe.

How about what if the team played well.  Not health this time, but a standard.

There’s ordinary, mediocre, as a team, brilliantly, and then there’s well.

It seems it can be used to describe an outcome.

Well, well.

Hang on, that’s something else again.

What about, then, we use the word to describe a hole in the ground with water at the bottom.

Or not if it is a drought.

A lot of people get water from a well, in fact in the olden days that was a common sight in a village.

What about those environment destroyers, oilmen.  They have oil wells, don’t they?

And when I went to school, there were ink wells on every desk.

Messy too, because I was once the ink monitor.

But if the well’s dried up?

It becomes a metaphor for a whole new bunch of stuff.

OR what about a stairwell?

And at the complexity of it all, for such a small word, tears well up in my eyes.

Searching for locations: Harbour Grand Hotel, Kowloon, Hong Kong

The Harbour Grand Hotel, Kowloon, Hong Kong, is a modern, but luxurious hotel, one that our travel agent found for us.

I was initially worried that it might be too far away from central Hong Kong, but a free shuttle bus that runs at convenient times took us to and from the hotel to the Star Ferry terminal.

The luxuriousness of the hotel starts the moment you walk in the front entrance with a magnificent staircase that I assumed led up to the convention center (or perhaps where weddings are catered for) and a staircase where one could make a grand entrance or exit.  Oh, and there’s a chandelier too.

We booked into a Harbourview suite, and it was not only spacious but had that air of luxury about it that made it an experience every time you walked into it.

But the view of Hong Kong Harbour, that was the ‘piece de resistance’

I spent a lot of time staring out that window, and it was more interesting than watching the television, which we didn’t do much of.   Most of the time, when we travel, TV is limited to International English speaking news channels.

This time we had several movies included with the room, but I still preferred to watch the endless water traffic on the harbor.

The lounge area had several comfortable chairs, an area for the bar fridge and tea or coffee making facilities and on the opposite side the usual table and chairs for those who came to conduct business

The bedroom was separate to the entrance and lounge.  Notable was the fact the room had two bathrooms, one in the bedroom, and one out in the lounge, perhaps for the guests who were having friends in.

We dined in one of the restaurants, Hoi Yat Heen, where we experienced Guandong cuisine.  I tried the roasted goose for the first time, and it was interesting to say the least.

There’s no doubt where we will be staying the next time we go to Hong Kong.

Trying to get off, or is that on, the merry-go-round

Self-published authors are fully aware that perhaps the easiest part of the writing journey is the actual writing.  Well, compared to the marketing aspect I believe it is.

I have read a lot of articles, suggestions and tips and tricks to market the book to the reading public.  It is, to say the least, a lot harder to market eBooks than perhaps their hard or paper-covered relatives.

This is despite the millions of eReaders out there.

Then there is that other fickle part of the publishing cycle, the need for reviews.

Proper reviews of course.

As we are learning, reviews can be bought, and in more ways than one.  What happened to finding writers of the same genre and offering to buy one copy and write a review in return for a buy one copy and write a review.

I’ve noticed that all the current best selling novelists do the same for their fellow novelists though I guess when you get to be a best-seller, you might not have to buy a copy, so I can only dream of attaining such lofty heights in the publishing world.

But until I reach such rarefied air, I guess I have to figure out how to appeal to my fellow writers, and, of course, hope that my work is good enough.

It might be a start in getting through that difficult cycle, more reviews means more sales, etc.  And getting those first sales and reviews  …

Therein lies the conundrum.  It is a question of paying for advertising or working it out for ourselves.  I guess if I were to get more sales, I could afford the advertising … yes, back on the merry-go-round!

And yet, the harder the road, the more I enjoy what I do.  It is exhilarating while writing, it is a joy to finish the first draft, it is an accomplishment when it is published, but when you sell that first book, well, there is no other feeling like it.

I am inspired.

Now as for that advertisement and where to post it…