Review: The Water Diviner by Andrew Anastasios & Meaghan Wilson-Anastasios

Last week I finished reading ‘The Water Diviner’. It was written by Andrew Anastasios and Meaghan Wilson-Anastasios. Andrew was a co-writer on the script for the film starring Russell Crowe, which I unfortunately missed at the cinema and will now have to wait until its DVD release before I can watch and review it.

The book follows the story of Joshua Conner, an Australian man whose sons went missing after the landing at Gallipoli in World War I. After the death of his wife, Conner ventures over to Turkey in search of his sons so they might be buried next to their mother. Along the way he discovers that his eldest son may have survived and the recovery mission becomes a rescue mission. He befriends a young Turkish boy, who he feels a kinship with. He also forms a bond with a Turkish soldier who fought at Gallipoli against his sons and the other Australians.

THE GOOD:

This is a very compelling story. While I was reading the book, I was constantly intrigued. I wanted to delve deeper and deeper with Conner as he travelled through his story. The story is very well researched. The attention to detail in the flashbacks of the battle scenes is amazing. They didn’t shy away from the gory and terrifying parts of the war. From what I understand, the authors took inspiration from actual accounts from the war.

Another part of the story I loved is the fact that there were no ‘bad guys’ or ‘good guys’ in the story. It would have been very easy for the authors to paint the Turkish soldiers in a bad light, but that didn’t happen at all. In fact, the Turkish characters are the heart of the story. Without them Conner’s story would have been very different and possibly terrible to read. It displays excellently how war is not about ‘good guys’ versus ‘bad guys’. War is terrible on all sides and each side is fighting for something they are will to kill and die for. This book understands and shows that.

THE BAD:

I’m going to be real. It’s not that well-written. Now, it’s no Fifty Shades of Grey. That is the worst written book I have ever read (I mean, didn’t she have a thesaurus? Why was the chick ‘flushed’ all the time?). The thing with this book is that I was very aware that these people seemed very inexperienced in novel writing. If the story was so compelling I probably wouldn’t have made it past the first few chapters. The chapters before he gets to Turkey were so hard to get through. They seemed all over the place and like the authors were trying to cram way too much information into them.

The only other problem I had was that on top of not being well written, it wasn’t edited all that well either. I found multiple mistakes, including spelling mistakes. At one point I found the word ‘they’ where the word ‘the’ should have been. To be honest, I was a bit embarrassed for them. I would feel bad if I had worked so hard on a book only to have it published with such silly little mistakes that shouldn’t have been missed.

THE OVERALL: 

I really liked this book. Once I got past the first chapters I was engrossed in the story. I would definitely recommend this to anyone who is interested in war history and wants a realistic fictional story. I will issue this warning though: the scenes in which battle conditions are talked about are fairly graphic. The authors obviously wanted to be as realistic as fiction would allow them, and some of the scenes can be confronting. If this isn’t the kind of thing you would be okay reading, I would stay away. It’s a shame it wasn’t better written and edited. It could have been a truly spectacular read if it was. 

Review: Wild

So yesterday my beautiful bestie and I decided we were going to do something different and go for walks around some national parks and animal sanctuaries. I had even planned on doing a blog on our little adventure, complete with tons of pictures and funny anecdotes. But alas, the temperature was a son of a bitch. I think it was about 35 degrees (and the ‘Real Feel’ on my phone said 44). It was so hot!! So, we decided to go shopping and then to a movie. On the upside, I got a post out of the day anyway.

We decided to see ‘Wild’, since Kate really wanted to see it. Honestly, I wasn’t too concerned with it at all. It wasn’t on my list to see, but I’m willing to watch anything I can get a review out of.

Here’s what the movie is about:

Cheryl Strayed, played by Reese Witherspoon decides to walk 1,100 miles (around 1,800km). The movie is told in flashbacks of her memories while she journeys along the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT). At age 22 her mother, played by Laura Dern passed away suddenly. This sent Cheryl spiralling for the next few years, while she tried to quell her all-consuming grief, until it culminated in her decision to walk the PCT.

THE GOOD:

I went into this thinking it would bore me a bit, and be kind of mushy. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for inspirational movies, but I prefer the ones that are more real and raw in their emotions. I don’t really go in for the ‘feel-good’ inspirational stuff (unless it’s ‘The Blind Side’, that’s awesome). With that in mind, it was with trepidation that I entered that cinema and sat down. I was wrong.

This movie is most certainly inspirational, but there is nothing ‘feel good’ about her journey. She battled death, divorce, drugs and drowning in her own grief and self-loathing. It didn’t shy away from real parts of life, which let’s face it, can be utterly disgusting sometimes. For example, she can’t figure out her gas burner and has to eat ‘cold mush’ for days, resulting in a shot of her ‘cold mush poo’. Yep, poo. She covered it with rocks, but still. Also, the movie opens with her removing her boot to find one of her big toe nails hanging mostly off. Yuck! Even more disgusting is her pulling it off completely. Double yuck! Despite being grossed out, I was also highly impressed by the movies decision not to shy away from that kind of stuff. It’s real and the movie would have been less without it.

The chemistry between Witherspoon and Dern is great. Even when they’re at odds it works. The same goes for Witherspoon’s chemistry with her other co-stars. The best performance from her, however, comes in the scenes where she’s alone on the trail. She goes through a barrage of emotions; happy, angry, frustrated, frightened, starving, disgusted (mostly with her own personal hygiene). Witherspoon helps you get lost with her and helps you feel what Cheryl is feeling.

THE BAD:

I can’t fault this movie too much, but it isn’t flawless. One thing I found a little hard to swallow was Witherspoon as a junior in college. It wasn’t necessarily her age, although I think a 38 year old playing an 18 year old is a bit of a stretch. I think she looked too experienced. Although her scenes with Dern were fantastic, I still couldn’t help but think ‘gee, they can’t have that much of an age gap in real life’ (I was right by the way, they’re only about 10 years apart).

The only other bigger issue I found with the movie is that you don’t really know that it’s about to end until she’s speaking the final lines, of which the last word is ‘Wild’, which I found a little cliché. I don’t necessarily think it ended badly, but it kind of just ended. She does mention the life she will go one to have, but for me, it didn’t feel like it was time to roll credits.

THE OVERALL:

I really enjoyed this movie. I don’t think it’ll come close to being the best movie I see this year (that spot’s being reserved for Jurassic World), but it was definitely poignant and beautiful without being mushy and self-important. I’m not going to lie, I kind of wanted to go hiking when I left the cinemas, but then I remembered I’m lazy and not really in need of self-discovery, so I just went home instead. It also made me want to go straight out and buy the book, which I will do very soon, and review as well. I think this is a great movie. It’s not hard to watch and I definitely left feeling empowered and inspired by her story. I think the casting of Witherspoon as Cheryl was spot on and I would definitely watch this movie again. 

January 2015 Favourites

Today I am bringing you my favourite things from January. I’ve decided that this year I’ll have a healthy mix of beauty and random stuff in my monthly favourites since I really want to branch out and cover more stuff on here.

Without any further ado or babble let’s jump in!

MODELS PREFER TAPERED FACE BRUSH:

I bought this a couple of months ago (I think) and it’s really only this month that it’s been getting a real work out. I’ve used it for both blush and setting my foundation. I’ve more recently been using it for setting foundation and I love it. I love that it’s not so huge that powder gets everywhere, but it still covers a good amount of you face in one hit. It distributes my Hourglass Ambient Light Powder beautifully. It’s so soft and glides over the face so lightly that it doesn’t disturb any of the makeup it’s going over.

#GIRLBOSS BY SOPHIA AMORUSO:

I know I have a review of this, so I won’t go into too much detail, but I wanted to mention this because I haven’t stopped thinking about it since I started and finished reading it. She gave such good advice and shared some really important lessons throughout the book. It’s so well-written and so easy to read. I highly recommend it!

M.A.C. OMEGA EYESHADOW:

I love this eyeshadow!! It’s the perfect cool brown crease shade. I wear it all the time. I’ll either wear it just in the crease, with a light shade over the lid or I’ll just slap this baby all of the lid. The other day I wore it over the top of my Bad to the Bronze Colour Tattoo from Maybelline and it looked beautiful. Another way I have been wearing this is as a contour. I find it hard to find a contour that I like, and this guy has been working a treat. It’s great because I can be really light-handed with it and it makes my contour look really natural. It makes me want to bother with contouring, which is very rare.

M.A.C. CREAMSHEEN IN PEACH BLOSSOM:

This is the lipstick I mentioned in my Christmas Haul. I got this when I used my M.A.C. gift card. I’ve worn this so much this month. I don’t honestly wear a lot of lipstick. I usually stick to lip balms and tints. This has changed how I feel about lipsticks completely. It’s so creamy and lovely on the lips. It builds nicely, but it can be sheer as well. It is the perfect peachy nude for the colour of my lips and my skin tone. It looks like my lips but better!

M.A.C. BLUSH IN LOVECLOUD:

Last M.A.C. product I promise. This was the other product I got with my gift card and I literally have not worn another blush since I bought it. It is the perfect pink. Although it is a little on the cooler side, I find it to be more neutral than anything. It’s really buildable and pigmented and has the slightest sheen to it, which gives your cheeks the perfect healthy glow. I just love this so much! It’s as good, if not better than my favourite blush, which is the Estee Lauder Pure Colour Blush in Peach Passion.

BURT’S BEES ULTRA CONDITIONING BALM:

This is the best night time lip balm I have ever used. I get really dry lips and I find that this keeps them nice and hydrated all through the night. No other lip balm I have even used, not even my Benefit ones, do that. I wouldn’t recommend this under lipstick, although I do if I don’t want a tinted one, because it’s the only untinted one I have at the moment, but if you have one that’s a little less moisturising I recommend that, because lipstick and stuff can slip and slide over the top of this balm. It makes your lips look nice and supple. I just love it so much!!!!

THE FLINTSTONES:

This is a really random one, but there is a reason to the madness. I spent the better half of this month with a terrible ear infection. I felt terrible and spent a lot of time lying in bed like a miserable bump. Usually when I’m sick I opt for watching my ‘Star Wars’ collection (yes, even Episode One), but I felt like watching ‘The Flintstones’ this time. So, I cracked out my DVDs. I have seasons one to three, and I like that there’s about seven episodes on each disc, so I didn’t have to get up to change them. I grew up watching this show. My mum use to tape them in the morning for me when I was a kid. She even sat there and took all the ads out, so the VHS was just straight cartoons, no ads. I still love this show (and I’m not embarrassed!) and am glad I had the DVDs on hand.

NOT THAT KIND OF GIRL BY LENA DUNHAM:

This isn’t a shocker. I’ve completely fallen in love with Lena Dunham and this book really cemented that. I’m hooked on her now, and if it weren’t for all the other books on my list to read, I’d read it again and again!

BAREMINERALS FOUNDATION IN FAIR:

I rediscovered this stuff this month while I was sick. There were times when I needed to venture outside and this is the foundation I would slap on quickly. This shade is pretty much a perfect match for my skin tone, and unlike every other mineral foundation/powder I’ve tried, I don’t have a reaction to it. All the others make me red and itchy, but I don’t react at all with it. I did ever so slightly with the matte formula, which I tried first, but the original formula is totally fine. It looks beautiful on my skin, and even in the crazy heat we’ve been having here, it stays nicely throughout the day. I wore it for 12 hours yesterday and it only went patchy at about hour 10 or 11.

AUDREY HEPBURN T-SHIRT:

I got this from K-Mart for about $15 a few weeks ago and have lived in it since. I got a bigger size so it was loose and I could laze about in it. It’s so comfy and it has Audrey on it, need I say more. Audrey Hepburn is my favourite actress of all time, and I admire her wholly. I didn’t even think twice about this shirt. Usually I wouldn’t spend more than a couple of bucks on a shirt I wasn’t going to wear anywhere but the house, but this is different. It Audrey Hepburn!