F. Scott Fitzgerald Book Series ASMR!!!

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New videos every Monday and Thursday!

 

Book Series ASMR:

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Art Deco Page Turning ASMR!!!

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New videos every Monday and Thursday!

 

Page Turning ASMR with Flapper Vibes:

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"Polly's Secret" Book Review

Polly's Secret by Harriet A. Nash
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Polly Jane Brooks is the youngest daughter of a landlord who owns a hotel in a little town. Polly dreams of bigger things in her life besides work. In particular, she doesn't like to miss the ball happening tonight, with her specially made silk dress and dance slippers sitting away in her room while she toils with her sister in the kitchen, making food for the guests. A sick and elderly traveler arrives at the hotel. Polly is ordered to bring him some gruel and it is there that she makes a solemn promise to keep the deeds to his house and property safe from greedy relatives until his son, William Train, should arrive back from India and claim them.

Since no one else has read this (I had to manually add the book), I feel obligated to provide an honest review. Here I go.

This is a growing-up tale about a young girl in a small town in Massachusetts. The ending is as happy as you would expect. The women get married and they all get rich, and the bad guys are shamed though not outright punished because that would be a bad trait to develop in a young woman.

It's cute and quaint in its way. It has a nice charm to it and it has all of the ideals from when it was written. It has aged considerably. The book does a good job of looking like it's neutral but it doesn't quite spare anyone. There is some anti-feminist and a few racist remarks that are subtle because this book strives to be a book written for young girls. I didn't mind that too much, but it did rankle my pc sensibilities a bit. There was one word that I didn't expect to see but wasn't surprised to see considering when it was written. To give a hint: It was published during the 1920's when the Ku Klux Klan was at its peak in membership and "Birth of a Nation" was a huge movie for its time. I'm sure you know what word I'm referring to now, but I will not state it here.

There's a scene where basically everyone pulls their daughters from the only school in town. Polly seems perturbed by this but is quickly quieted by the local old spinsters down the block. Although other women lament not being able to understand their husbands at times. And pretty much everyone gets married to the one they are "most suited" for even if it seems to be kind of against their will. But that's to be expected.

They didn't treat the older sister as well as the younger. She marries the richer husband, for most of the book anyway, but they keep saying how plain she is, how matronly, how dull, how dumb. Especially next to Polly, who is beautiful and smart and fun. But Deborah's work ethic is much better; all the more ironic that she gets a rich husband and doesn't have to do anything but have kids. She must be bored out of her mind.

The book's very into the idea of honest men doing honest work on the farm rather than becoming lawyers and doctors. The most intelligent person in the town is the schoolteacher and he's kind of nasty but makes a few good points. But he is chastised into retirement onto his farm and the only other teacher is a nonentity.

It was a cute, like I said. It has aged a bit, but its romanticism of the old way of life won't be lost on a few people. As far as I can tell, the author got the accent down right, but I'm not sure if all the poor people speak like that. The few illustrations it has are beautiful. Not sure if I should marker that word out or not. It does bother me that some young person will read it and wonder what the hell it is doing in this book.

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I give you 3.5 out of 5 yonder stars.

Typeface Review: "Gill Sans"

What It Looks Like:

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It's History: "Gill Sans is a humanist sans-serif typeface created in 1926 by Eric Gill. It was developed further, into a complete type family, after being commissioned by Stanley Morison to compete with the families of Erbar, Futura, and Kabel. In 1928, Gill Sans was released by Monotype Corporation.

"The uppercase characters of Gill Sans are based on Roman capitals like those found in Caslon and Baskerville. There are fourteen styles in the family. Gill Sans is distributed as a system font with Mac OS X and is bundled with some Microsoft products as Gill Sans MT." (Source #1)

"Originally designed as a display face, like the Johnston Underground letters to which it owes a considerable debt of influence, the clarity of Gill Sans subsequently led to its adoption as a text face. Gill Sans is a quintessential Humanist Sans typeface: a monoline form based upon classical proportions. [Eric] Gill was primarily a lettercutter, who approached the industrial processes of commercial type design with some initial reluctance, and his first face for Monotype reflects his grounding in the proportions of the Roman letter." (Source #2)

Picture found here.

What Type of Font It Is: Humanist Sans Serif - "Within the context of sans serif faces, the term 'Humanist' refers to faces based upon a classical or early Humanist model, in which the underlying proportions are derived from the Roman capital letter.

"Humanist Sans typefaces function well for the setting of extended text, though they do not as a rule provide for very economical setting because most have a lower x-height than the Grotesques. Heavier weights may be effectively used for smaller quantities of text, and benefit from generous leading.

"Humanist Sans faces are notable for their compatibility with classic serif types, and can be paired with a number of Humanist, Garalde, and Transitional faces that are based upon similar Roman proportions." (Source #3)

Picture found here.

How You Can Design With It: "Gill Sans has a less mechanical feel to it than typefaces like Futura, because of its basis in Roman tradition. The lowercase letters are modeled on the lowercase Carolignian script, which is especially noticeable in the two-story lowercase “a” and “g”. This basis in traditional, classical typefaces gives Gill Sans a more refined look than many other sans serif typefaces.

"Gill Sans is ideal for display uses, and can be used successfully as a text font at larger sizes. It’s best suited for modern designs, though it can be combined successfully with more traditional typefaces for classic designs." (Source #1)

Where You Can Get It: You can purchase it at LinoType, MyFonts, FontShop, Webtype, Fonts.com, Ascender Fonts, Microsoft, and Adobe. You can also download a free version at UFonts and FontPalace.

Descriptive Terms for It: 1920s, classic, display, Eric Gill, Humanist Sans, modern, poster, poster design, and sans serif.

Picture found here.

Sources:
- #1 - http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2011/08/the-most-popular-fonts-used-by-designers/
- #2 - "The Complete Typographer: A Manual for Designing with Type" by Will Hill, 2nd Edition, p. 112
- #3 - "The Complete Typographer: A Manual for Designing with Type" by Will Hill, 2nd Edition, p. 110

Examples:

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"Flapper" Book Review

Flapper: A Madcap Story of Sex, Style, Celebrity, and the Women Who Made America Modern by Joshua Zeitz
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

"Blithely flinging aside the Victorian manners that kept her disapproving mother corseted, the New Woman of the 1920s puffed cigarettes, snuck gin, hiked her hemlines, danced the Charleston, and necked in roadsters. More important, she earned her own keep, controlled her own destiny, and secured liberties that modern women take for granted. Her newfound freedom heralded a radical change in American culture.

"Whisking us from the Alabama country club where Zelda Sayre first caught the eye of F. Scott Fitzgerald to Muncie, Indiana, where would-be flappers begged their mothers for silk stockings, to the Manhattan speakeasies where patrons partied till daybreak, historian Joshua Zeitz brings the era to exhilarating life. This is the story of America’s first sexual revolution, its first merchants of cool, its first celebrities, and its most sparkling advertisement for the right to pursue happiness.

"The men and women who made the flapper were a diverse lot. 

"There was Coco Chanel, the French orphan who redefined the feminine form and silhouette, helping to free women from the torturous corsets and crinolines that had served as tools of social control. 

"Three thousand miles away, Lois Long, the daughter of a Connecticut clergyman, christened herself 'Lipstick' and gave New Yorker readers a thrilling entrée into Manhattan’s extravagant Jazz Age nightlife.

"In California, where orange groves gave way to studio lots and fairytale mansions, three of America’s first celebrities—Clara Bow, Colleen Moore, and Louise Brooks, Hollywood’s great flapper triumvirate—fired the imaginations of millions of filmgoers.

"Dallas-born fashion artist Gordon Conway and Utah-born cartoonist John Held crafted magazine covers that captured the electricity of the social revolution sweeping the United States.

"Bruce Barton and Edward Bernays, pioneers of advertising and public relations, taught big business how to harness the dreams and anxieties of a newly industrial America—and a nation of consumers was born.

"Towering above all were Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald, whose swift ascent and spectacular fall embodied the glamour and excess of the era that would come to an abrupt end on Black Tuesday, when the stock market collapsed and rendered the age of abundance and frivolity instantly obsolete.

"With its heady cocktail of storytelling and big ideas, Flapper is a dazzling look at the women who launched the first truly modern decade."

I've always liked and had an interest in the flapper and the 1920's. It seemed unusual that in such a short amount of time, not even two decades, the flapper changed the course of women in American society and it was fascinating to read about how and why this occurred. All of these changes happening at once: women entering the workforce, people moving en masse to cities, the proliferation of ready-made clothing, a whole new genre of music being played in the streets, the Feminist Movement, Prohibition and speakeasies, the movie industry and the birth of Hollywood and celebrity, and with that, the new gossip rags. It seems sad that, with the flick of a switch, the flapper was no more. The economy grew so large that it couldn't contain itself and it collapsed. Very like what just so recently happened.

Some of it I already knew about, like how the advertising business started (I have a degree in graphic design and we had to learn about it), I knew most of the authors and the Lost Generation set, the clothing and their designers (although I did not know about Mademoiselle Vionnet and Paul Poiret), and I had heard about the Hollywood starlets, but didn't know much about them so that was interesting.

Lois Long/Lipstick was a fascinating person and I would love to read more about her. Her persona reminded me of the tv series and book series "Gossip Girl". It wouldn't surprise me at all if the original author had been inspired.

I didn't realize how racist everything was, but that shouldn't really be a surprise I guess. Sadly, this book was very white-washed. African American flappers were briefly discussed, but there was no mention of musicians, or how Jazz music started, no Langston Hughes?! Come on now, his poetry is absolutely beautiful and some of the only poetry I ever liked! A Chinese American actress was mentioned, but she wasn't spoken about in depth like the other actresses in the book. I would've liked to have known where she came from and where she ended up. Jazz music was such an important part of this time period and, as an American, I take pride in it because it is one of the few art forms that America came up with and gave to the rest of the world. Think about it, most other popular music forms started elsewhere and is very old and steeped in tradition. In comparison, Jazz is very new to this world.

Also, artists of the time and the Art Deco movement was missing completely. Not even mentioned. Very disappointed with that. Cole Porter and the Ziegfeld Follies were mentioned, but they weren't the only things happening on Broadway.

Even with all that information missing, I enjoyed reading it. It was more of an incomplete summarization of an era, rather than a well thought-out history. It could've used some more psychological assessment of the people of the age. I mean, Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung were right there. Overall, I would consider this a good book to start off reading about the 1920s. Just don't expect A LOT of information about the era.

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I give this book 3 out of 5 stars.

Typeface Review: "Crescendo"

What It Looks Like:

Picture available here.

Its History: "Designed by Patrick Griffin and Nancy Harris Rouemy in 2011 and published by Canada Type." (Source #1)

"Canada Type is an independent font development studio based in Toronto. The studio was founded in 2004 by Rebecca Alaccari and Patrick Griffin, as a means to perform professional type solutions to creative indviduals and departments all over the world." (Source #2)

What Type of Font It Is: Ornamental - "the form of the letter itself is determined by some decorative or figurative intention. The Ornamental form may thus be composed of foliage, rustic woodwork, the human form, or abstract elements. The majority of Ornamental faces from the 19th century are capital only, and necessarily designed for use at larger sizes." (Source #3)

Picture available here.

How You Can Design With It: Meant mainly to be used as a display text. Best used in logos, posters, book covers, large containers, etc. "Decorative and Ornamental letters are, by definition, display faces and seldom, if ever, suited to the setting of any more than a small number of words." (Source #3)

Where You Can Get It: Available for purchase here: http://www.fontshop.com/search/?q=Crescendo.

Descriptive Terms For It: 1920s, art deco, art nouveau, book covers, decorative, display, flapper, poster, poster design, posters, logo, logo design, logos, and ornamental.

Sources:
-#1 - http://www.fontshop.com/fonts/downloads/canada_type/crescendo_ot/
-#2 - http://www.fontshop.com/fonts/foundry/canada_type/
-#3 - "The Complete Typographer: A Manual for Designing with Type" by Will Hill, 2nd Edition, p. 160

Examples:

Picture available here.

Picture available here.

"Diva" Book Review

Diva by Jillian Larkin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

"Parties, bad boys, speakeasies—life in Manhattan has become a woozy blur for Clara Knowles. If Marcus Eastman truly loved her, how could he have fallen for another girl so quickly? Their romance mustn't have been as magical as Clara thought. And if she has to be unhappy, she's going to drag everyone else down to the depths of despair right along with her.

"Being a Barnard girl is the stuff of Lorraine Dyer's dreams. Finding out that Marcus is marrying a gold digger who may or may not be named Anastasia? A nightmare. The old Lorraine would have sat by and let the chips fall where they may, but she's grown up a lot these past few months. She can't bear to see Marcus lose a chance for true love. But will anyone listen to her?

"Now that the charges against her have been dropped, Gloria Carmody is spending the last dizzying days of summer on Long Island, yachting on the sound and palling around with socialites at Forrest Hamilton's swanky villa. Beneath her smile, though, Gloria's keeping a secret. One that could have deadly consequences . . ."

I really enjoyed this one. I liked how all of the strings were pulled together in the end.

*SPOILERS* Read at own risk:

Lorraine gets redeemed and a new reliable love of her own. Clara and Marcus get back together. Jerome and Gloria find each other at long last. The right people get arrested.

The only thing I didn't like, which is to be expected, was Ruby and Forrest. I liked them as characters, I liked their story, I liked how they referenced Gloria and Jay Gatsby from Fitzgerald's little literary classic. But I had been hoping for a different ending for those two characters in this story. I even loved them to an extent, but it was never meant to be.

But an otherwise wonderful ending to an excellent series. I hope for more from Ms. Larkin in the near future.


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"Ingenue" Book Review

Ingenue by Jillian Larkin
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"Power . . . love . . . scandal . . .

"There’s never enough to go around.

"In the city that never sleeps, Lorraine Dyer is wide awake. Ever since she exposed Clara Knowles for the tramp she was—and lost her closest confidante in the process—Lorraine has spent every second scheming to make her selfish, lovesick ex–best friend pay for what she did. No one crosses Lorraine. Not even Gloria.

"True love conquers everything—or so Gloria Carmody crazily believed. She and Jerome Johnson can barely scrape together cash for their rent, let alone have a moment to whisper sweet nothings in the dark. And if they thought escaping Chicago meant they’d get away with murder . . . they were dead wrong.

"Clara was sure that once handsome, charming Marcus Eastman discovered her shameful secret, he’d drop her like a bad habit. Instead, he swept her off her feet and whisked her away to New York. Being with Marcus is a breath of fresh air—and a chance for Clara to leave her wild flapper ways firmly in the past. Except the dazzling parties and bright lights won’t stop whispering her name. . . .

"INGENUE is the second novel in the sexy, dangerous, and ridiculously romantic Flappers series set in the Roaring Twenties . . . where revenge is a dish best served cold."

I had a hard time rating this one. While I enjoyed it, it wasn't as good as the first one. So my rating is actually a 3.5 but I put it as 4 stars.

It was pretty good, I felt so much sympathy for many of the characters. Excepting maybe the mob bosses. I even felt sympathy for Lorraine - she really is a dumb duck.

I liked seeing things from Vera's point of view, the first book just made her look like a bitch. I missed Marcus though - his romantic gestures filled me with hope in the last book.

Also the humor that was in the last book wasn't here in this one. It's understandable though, because people are starving and other people plan on killing other people. This book made the actions of the characters have much more serious consequences.

It was very cathartic to go from those rich houses in the first book to the almost starving Gloria and Jerome and kind of normal Clara and Lorraine's apartments. I felt slightly closer to the characters in that way. I find it slightly ironic that the dresses were still awesome, even though everyone was poor.

*SPOILERS*

We finally meet Gloria's dad, who turns out to be the jerk we always knew him to be.

The ending was good, but I would've liked the assassin to have been someone we already met. That part felt really odd.

Still gonna read the third one though.


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"Vixen" Book Review

Vixen by Jillian Larkin
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"Jazz . . . Booze . . . Boys . . . It’s a dangerous combination.

"Every girl wants what she can’t have. Seventeen-year-old Gloria Carmody wants the flapper lifestyle—and the bobbed hair, cigarettes, and music-filled nights that go with it. Now that she’s engaged to Sebastian Grey, scion of one of Chicago’s most powerful families, Gloria’s party days are over before they’ve even begun . . . or are they?

"Clara Knowles, Gloria’s goody-two-shoes cousin, has arrived to make sure the high-society wedding comes off without a hitch—but Clara isn’t as lily-white as she appears. Seems she has some dirty little secrets of her own that she’ll do anything to keep hidden. . . .

"Lorraine Dyer, Gloria’s social-climbing best friend, is tired of living in Gloria’s shadow. When Lorraine’s envy spills over into desperate spite, no one is safe. And someone’s going to be very sorry. . . .

"From debut author Jillian Larkin, VIXEN is the first novel in the sexy, dangerous, and ridiculously romantic new series set in the Roaring Twenties . . . when anything goes."

I really liked this book and cannot wait to read the next one in this series. It's fun and sexy and rife with intrigue. The characters had life in them, which is important for a young adult book. The only problem I had with it was every once in a while the wrong name would be mentioned where someone else's name should have been. So, it needed a better editor, but overall the story was well written. I enjoyed all of the characters and even felt bad for Lorraine, she was just so stupid half of the time.

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"The Great Gatsby" Moved!!!

'The Great Gatsby' moving to Summer 2013

(EW) -- Looks like the mercurial Jay Gatsby will remain mysteriously out of reach for a bit longer.

Warner Bros. announced today that "The Great Gatsby," director Baz Luhrmann's 3-D adaptation of the seminal novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, has been pushed to Summer 2013.

Starring Leonardo DiCaprio in the title role, along with Tobey Maguire, Carey Mulligan, and Joel Edgerton, the film had been slated to open on Christmas day this year. No specific new date was indicated.

In announcing the change, Warner Bros. president of distribution Dan Fellman lauded Luhrmann's singular visual style. "We think moviegoers of all ages are going to embrace it, and it makes sense to ensure this unique film reaches the largest audience possible," he said in a statement.

International distribution chief Veronika Kwan Vanderberg added that the studio believes "The Great Gatsby" "will be the perfect summer movie around the world."

The film would have gone head to head with Quentin Tarantino's "Django Unchained," which also stars DiCaprio in a supporting role as the cruel owner of a plantation in the pre-Civil War south.

(http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/06/showbiz/movies/great-gatsby-moving-summer-2013-ew/index.html?hpt=en_c1)

My reaction: NNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! I HATE YOU WARNER BROTHERS! THAT WAS GONNA BE A CHRISTMAS GIFT TO MYSELF!!!!

Pictures to make me feel better:

Carey Mulligan (L) and
Leonardo DiCaprio. 

Leonardo DiCaprio and fancy yellow car.

(From L to R) Leonardo DiCaprio, Carey Mulligan,
and Tobey Maquire.

Carey Mulligan (L) and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Carey Mulligan (L) and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Leonardo DiCaprio as the great Gatsby.

"The Beautiful and Damned" Book Review

The Beautiful and Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"In 1921 F. Scott Fitzgerald was twenty-five and heralded as the most promising writer of his generation, owing to the success of his first novelThis Side of Paradise. Recently married to the girl of his dreams, the former Zelda Sayre, Fitzgerald built upon his sudden prosperity with The Beautiful and the Damned, a cautionary tale of reckless ambition and squandered talent set amid the glitter of Jazz Age New York.


"The novel chronicles the relationship of Anthony Patch, a Harvard-educated, aspiring writer, and his beautiful young wife, Gloria. While they wait for Anthony’s grandfather to die and pass his millions on to them, the young couple enjoys an endless string of parties, traveling, and extravagance. Beginning with the pop and fizz of life itself, The Beautiful and the Damned quickly evolves into a scathing chronicle of a dying marriage and a hedonistic society in which beauty is all too fleeting.

"A fierce parable about the illusory quality of dreams, the intractable nature of reality, and the ruin wrought by time, The Beautiful and the Damned eerily anticipates the dissipation and decline that would come to the Fitzgeralds themselves before the decade had run its course."
(http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/762103.The_Beautiful_and_Damned)

I had not read any of F. Scott Fitzgerald's work since reading "The Great Gatsby" back in high school, which I plan on re-reading before the movie remake comes out in theaters in December.

I do remember enjoying his writing. His prose is witty and intelligent and humorous without being conceited. Mr. Fitzgerald must have been a very exceptional conversationalist and much like the main character of this novel.

WARNING! Spoilers!

I didn't favor the characters too much, but who can blame them for being greedy. Who wouldn't want that kind of money? I don't blame them for their conceits or their sinful ways. They got what they wanted, but it was obviously too late to help save their marriage or their love, if it was ever really present in their lives together.

They characters weren't amazing and I'm sure I wouldn't like them in person. His writing definitely saved this story for me. If it had been done by someone else, it wouldn't be nearly as interesting. It wasn't fun to watch them loose everything, but it was an interesting moral tale. Overall, I really enjoyed this novel, but i don't know if I can compare it to "The Great Gatsby". I remember that book was far more romantic, but I will see if I am right as soon as I get to it.


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