On June 29 there will be a full Strawberry moon so it will be awesome to see it with the best Inuyasha movies and songs.
Affections Touching Across Time (2001)
The Castle Beyond the Looking Glass (2002)
Swords of an Honorable Ruler (2003)
Fire on the Mystic Island (2004)
To begin with, these two spooky graded readers is one of the best ways to learn and improve your English level while becoming familiarized with traditional ghost stories from the United States and England.
The first one, published by Oxford Bookworms Library, is a collection of the best tales from the American author Edgar Allan Poe. The best stories are The Black Cat and The Masque of the Red Death. The Black Cat denounces the problem of alcoholism and animal rights with the black cat being a powerful ghost to denounce the evil truth. Then, the Masque of the Red Death is relevant nowadays after the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the book could have more reading activities and some famous works like the Raven should have been included.
Moving on, Penguin Readers with the book The Man with Two Shadows and Other Ghost Stories is entertaining and provides students with useful vocabulary and functional language. All ghost stories have a mysterious and surprising ending, however, from my opinion, the best ones are The Ghost Detective by Mark Lemon, 1866, and The Ghost in the Bank of England by an Anonymous writer, 1879. The Ghost Detective presents an interesting concept of ghosts living in portraits that can give signals to denounce a murder while the Ghost in the Bank of England shows the popular superstition of lucky and unlucky desks in a workplace.
Finally, the best thing about the two spooky graded readers is the wonderful illustrations drawn with classic pen-and-ink shading techniques like stippling and hatching. Moreover, the activities may be repetitive but is a good way to learn specific vocabulary and how to find and understand the main ideas and details in the stories.
In this review, I will summarize what I loved the most and disliked from Faerie Lord, an epic adventure for all readers similar to Star Wars and Dune.
First of all, the writer was brave to begin a novel with a gloomy setting such as the Gatekeeper Mr. Fogarty’s imminent death by temporal fever. Temporal fever causes all fairies and humans to age rapidly and die. Moreover, temporal fever has the side effect of having visions about possible futures. In a way, it can be compared to real world pandemics like COVID-19. Next, the young hero of the story, Henry, is just a typical high school student who has worries like becoming a teacher, falling in love, and getting along with his authoritarian mother. Then, the novel changes into an epic adventure that could have been more complex. It is quite simple because characters like the blue boy Lorquin, similar to the Native American Tonto in the Lone Ranger, is just there to make sure Henry saves his love, Blue, Queen of Hael. The same happens with the bad guy, Lord Hairstreak, is just lucky to create a pandemonium in the Fairy Realm. Still, some things were good like to bring a cute giant hare, the charno, to help the hero and his captive princess. Particularly, the charno is described the same as Lopmon from Digimon Tamers. Furthermore, the hare has a secret weapon, a magical hammer: Just like the legendary sword Excalibur of King Arthur, the hammer is the only weapon that can kill a gigantic silver dragon / Midgard serpent that threatens Henry and Blue. Mysteriously, the hammer only works when Henry and Blue use it together having the same curse as the Sword in the Stone.
To conclude, it is a fun novel showing that a fantasy story can have dark themes and still be suitable for all readers. A fun way to see fairies and demons fight for power in different Realms while at the same time learning the moral lesson about the power of love, friendship and bravery.
Here is my favorite quote from the novel, I believe everyone can relate to Henry’s relationship with his mother and the future:
“Whatever university he ended up in, he’d plod through to a mediocre degree, then become a teacher, because that’s what his mother wanted. She was a teacher. Actually she was the headmistress of a girl’s school. She kept telling him teaching was great because of the extended holidays, as if the measure of a good job was how long you could stay way from it.”(p. 10)
A Spaghetti Western Legend: Lee Van Cleef. “Best of the Bad”. My selection of his unique movies with tremendous action and extraordinary cinematography:
1952 – Kansas City Confidential (Tony)
1967 – Death Rides a Horse (Ryan)
1976 – God’s Gun (Father John and gunfighter Lewis)
1969 – Sabata
1971 – Return of Sabata
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While summer 2026 is arriving, enjoy my fan art of Alien Earth & Venom King in Black. It would be awesome if in the future there will be a movie with the two spooky aliens in a tropical jungle to save our planet.
Alien Earth Season 2 Fan Trailer
Venom 4 King in Black Fan Trailer
The Risshu-e Ceremony commemorates Nichiren Daishonin’s establishment of True Buddhism on April 28, 1253, through the public voicing of the Mystic Law for the very first time. The seed of enlightenment, the Mystic Law, was sown for all living beings and the entire universe.
Enjoy this wonderful fan trailer about Final Fantasy VII Remake & Rebirth. In the official websites, you may try out a demo and beautiful content for fans.
