Phil recommends "Box Office Poison: Hollywood's Story in a Century of Flops"

 

There is something endlessly entertaining about stories of Hollywood hubris and excess turning into spectacular failure. Tim Robey begins with the early days of Hollywood, including D.W. Griffith’s grandiose financial flop Intolerance, and takes us through a century of multi-million dollar disasters like Dr. Dolittle (1967), Dune (1984), The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, Cutthroat Island, Speed 2: Cruise Control, and many more.  Robey essentially performs an autopsy on each, telling the story of how such projects came to be in the first place…and why they failed in such dramatic fashion.  Unlike similarly-themed podcasts like How Did This Get Made?, Robey eschews the overtly comedic approach but instead lets the inherently compelling subject matter speak for itself.

 

This book is appropriate for adults.

Rion recommends "Moon of the Turning Leaves"

           

 Over a decade after complete collapse of all societal systems, residents of Shki-dnakiiwin, a small community of Anishinaabe people in Northern Canada, have noticed that the land they are living on is starting to run out of the ability to provide for them. When an elder has a vision of returning to their ancestral homelands around the Great Lakes, a group of six community members, including Evan Whitesky and his daughter, Nangohns, are sent on a scouting trip to assess the land and journey it would take to go home. Along the way, they pass through ransacked cities and encounter other survivors of the collapse, some friendly, and others dangerous. The group’s survival skills and commitment to finding their homeland are constantly put to the test, and the conclusion to the book is both satisfying and touching.

This book evoked so many feelings in me - fear, appreciation for nature, and love for the characters and some of the communities they encounter. While it is technically a sequel, it also functions as a stand-alone book, and having read both, I recommend it over Moon of the Crusted Snow (the first book in the duology). The plot moved at a consistent pace and I found myself wondering about what was next for the characters whenever I put the book down – the sign of being immersed in a very absorbing story! The use of Anishinaabemowin (the Anishinaabe language) throughout the book was beautiful, and the entire story is a testament to the resilience of indigenous communities through the most difficult of times. I highly recommend Moon of the Turning Leaves!

Age group: Adult