I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: YOLA-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #70 (August 25, 2020).

Yola is a Britiish singer with an amazing voice.  She is quarantining in Nashville and for this Home Concert, she is playig in a lovely backyard in Nashville with guitarist Jordan Tice.

Yola has one album out (and an EP) and her songs are full of soul and energy.  And that voice!

These four songs are stripped to just acoustic guitar (Tice plays lead on some of the tracks).  They are

 beautiful interpretations of songs from her 2019 album Walk Through Fire and her 2016 EP Orphan Offering that pull back the intensity I associate with Yola’s music, but are still passionate and fervent.

I’ve enjoyed hearing the recorded versions of these songs but hearing them stripped down to just melody and her voice, the sound even better.

“Faraway Look” is a gorgeous song with a terrific melody.  It sounds really quite different with the acoustic guitar but her voice is perfectly suited to it regardless of what kind of music backs it up.  And the way she can hold those notes is really stunning.

“Dead And Gone” feels more relevant now than when she wrote it for her 2016 EP.  This song is a little darker with some nice soloing notes from Tice.

“Love Is Light” is a beautiful ballad with a fantastic vocal melody.

I love the final song, “It Ain’t Easier.”  It’s got two great vocal lines back to back in the chorus.  I could listen to her sing it all night long.  And those little grace notes at the end are pretty awesome.

[READ: August 23, 2020] Malamander

I don’t often pick out children’s books to read.  Although I’m rarely disappointed when I find one that looks good.  My daughter and I were in Barnes & Noble and I saw this book.  The title, cover and description sounded really fun.  So I decided to buy it.  And I’m glad I did.  It was a fast, engaging read and the start of a promising series.

The book is set in Eerie-on-Sea.  Eerie-on-Sea is a wonderful place to vacation in the summer (when it is known as Cheerie-on-Sea).  But nobody wants to be there in the winter.  Sometimes not even the people who live there want to be there.  It’s bleak. It’s cold.  It’s windy.  And there is the legend of the fearsome Malamander.

When people visit they stay in The Grand Nautilus Hotel.  The Hotel’s Lost-and-Founder is 12 year old Herbie Lemon.  Perhaps you’ve never heard of a Lost-and-Founder, but you should have–who else is in charge of making sure everyone gets their lost items back?

Herbie is very good at his job.  But a big surprise happens when a girl climbs through the window of his office and asks him to hide her.  He does as she asks–who wouldn’t–just as two men come to Herbie’s door.  One is Mr. Mollusc, the manger of the Hotel who dislikes Herbie and dislikes the whole idea of the Lost-and Founder.  Fortunately for Herbie, Mr Mollusc is not the owner.  The owner, Lady Kraken, LOVES having a Lost -and Founder, she finds it essentially to running a good hotel.  The other man is large and scary with a hook for a hand.  Herbie and the girl, Violet, call him Boat Hook Man.

The girl is Violet Parma.  Her parents went missing from the hotel 12 years ago, when Violet was a baby  Violet was orphaned and raised by her Aunt.  She has now come all the way back to Eerie-on-Sea by herself to find out what she she can about her missing parents (she is sure they are not dead).  Coincidentally, Herb is also an orphan.  He was found by Lady Kraken and that’s how he got the job.

Lady Kraken rarely leaves her attic loft.  But she is very aware of what is going on in the community.  The hotel has a cameraluna on top of it.  The moon lights up the skylight and projects images of the entire town onto her desk to create a three-dimensional miniature of Eerie on-Sea.  Lady Kraken sees all (unless its cloudy).

Violet asks Herbie to help her, but there is very little he can do.  The only things left from Violet’s parents were two suitcases and her mother’s boots.  The boots are there but the suitcases are gone–somebody snatched them without telling Herbie (he’s pretty furious about that, because he takes his job very seriously).

They don’t have many clues.  Except for one strange card that comes from the Eerie Book Dispensary.  It’s a card from The Mermonkey. The Mermonkey is a contraption that determines what book you should read.  It gives you a card with code and the book that it gives Violet is called Malamander by Captain K.

While they are looking for the book, they run into local author Sebstian Eels. He’s definitely a strange fellow and he makes Violet uncomfortable.  When he finds out that she is the daughter of Peter Parma, he becomes very interested in her.

For it out that Peter and Sebastian were both writing books about the Malaander.  Her father believed it existed while Sebastian maintained that it was just a myth.  If only she could get her hands on her father’s manuscript–maybe that would provide answers for her.

When they leave the building they run into Mrs Fossil.  Mrs Fossil is on the beach collecting things.  She runs the local Flotsamporium which is made up of all of the things she finds on the beach–some valuable, but most just pretty–like the red Coprolite that she has just found.

There are several mysteries n this story.  In addition to Violet’s parents being lost, why is Boat Hook Man after Violet (she swears she has no idea who he is or why he is after her).  Why is Sebastian Eels so creepy?  Why does Mr Mollusc hate Herbie so much?  Why does the island’s doctor want that Coprolite so badly?  And what’s that creepy thing slinking around his office?

Oh and did that cat just talk?

And just what is the Malamander?

Because, yes, it does exist and it possesses something pretty magical.  Early on we see the Malamander–or shadows of it.  It even attacked Mrs Fossil.  As the story progresses we learn about it and some of its secrets.  Like that its egg is very powerful.  Anyone who holds it is granted their every wish–unless it gets the egg back.  The book by Captian K explains this curse and how it destroyed his ship and crew.

As the drama increases, the children find themselves in grave danger.  Just who is helping Boat Hook Man (and just how real is he?).  Even Lady Kraken is involved in the secrets somehow.

And when Herbie and Violet find themselves hiding in a wreckage as the tide is going up and the Malander is just a few feet from them and a man with a harpoon gun is also nearby, well, there’s a lot of peril all at once.

The book has some great illustrations by Tom Booth–his characters are expressive and amusing–a perfect companion to this charming story.  Herbie also proves to be a very funny narrator–directly addressing the reader and adding funny comments about the peril along the way.

The books ends in a pretty satisfying manner but with plenty of loose ends to allow for a sequel.  That sequel Gargantis is out already and the first four chapters of it are appended to the paperback edition of the book.  I will certainly be reading it.