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  This week's question is submitted by Emma!

Do you read books translation? What are the last 3 books in translation you read?

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My Answer: 

I don't think I have ever read a book that has been translated to English. I have picked up the The Millennium trilogy (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest) by the late Stieg Larsson at a thrift store, but I haven't gotten around to reading them yet.

Available on DVD from Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment through Amazon's manufacture on demand (MOD) is Last Man Standing: The Complete First Season and Last Man Standing: The Complete Second Season.

Tim Allen returned to television with the family-sitcom Last Man Standing in 2011. He plays Mike Baxter, the marketing director for the sporting goods store, Outdoor Man, which is owned by  Edward "Ed" Alzate (played by Héctor Elizondo). After spending several years traveling around the world promoting the store and working on the yearly calender, Mike decides to change the store's marketing tactics by vlogging. This also gives him more free time to spend his with wife, Vanessa (played by Nancy Travis) and their three daughters - Kristin, Mandy and Eve. The eldest daughter, Kristen, has a son, Boyd.

Despite premiering to over twelve-million viewers on Tuesday nights, the ratings dropped to half that by the end of the season. The series managed to get picked up for a second season, but with many changes, including the change in showrunner and the move to Friday nights.  Actress Alexandra Krosney, who plays Kristin, was replaced with actress Amanda Fuller. The grandson, Boyd, magically aged three years, now played by Flynn Morrison. Jordan Masterson takes over the role of Boyd's father, Ryan Vogelson. Another major change was the added political tone, in which Mike would bunt heads with Ryan over politics.

The series has maintained decent ratings since moving to Friday nights and will begin its fourth season in the fall. Typically, television shows are released on DVD a few months after a season ends, but for some reason Last Man Standing never received traditional DVD releases, but instead seasons one and two were released through the Amazon's manufacture on demand (MOD).

The episodes featured on the sets are:

Modern Nature-Inspired Quilts
by Bernadette Mayr
Publisher: Design Originals (Fox Chapel Publishing)
Pub. Date: July 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-1574218602
Pages: 128
Buy Link: Amazon

Review:

I guess you can probably call me a polymath, as I have a wide variety of interests. Besides from reading books and writing short stories, I do like making crafts, which may sound a little odd coming from a man. My mother was a craftier, so naturally I picked up a few crafting hobbies. My favorite is cross stitching or what is known to others as needlepoint. By now you are probably wondering why I'm reviewing a quilt book and not a cross stitch book. Well, my mother is a quilter, as well as a few aunts and friends, so I'm well educated in the hobby. Though I have never actually sewn a quilt, I do have respect for the craft.

There are many quilts books by different authors published monthly, but the cover of Modern Nature-Inspired Quilts by Bernadette Mayr caught my eye. I quickly asked the publisher if I could the review the title and they kindly sent me complimentary copy to review.

There are twenty-five quilt project featured in the book and they are not your traditional patterns. The author, Bernadette Mayr, along with her sister Irmgard Stangl, uses a more contemporary approach; featuring geometric patterns, like free-form shapes and lines, but with an artistic flair. The patches in the patterns are irregular in size and shape, so you never have to worry about using a ruler to measure the correct size.

Lullaby
Director: Andrew Levitas
Starring: Garrett Hedlund, Richard Jenkins, Jessica Brown Findlay, Anne Archer, Jennifer Hudson, Jessica Barden, Terrence Howard, Amy Adams
Studio: ARC Entertainment
Release Date: July 29, 2014
Retail: $20.99
ASIN: B00I1O36KS
Running Time: 117 minutes
Rating: R

Review:

Typically, I avoid drama-type films, but after reading the press release for Lullaby, I requested to review an advance copy of the DVD, which will be available on July 29th. Lullaby is an independent film, written and directed by Andrew Levitas. It was filmed in 2012 and was finally released to theaters in a limited-run last month.

Lullaby centers on twenty-six-year-old wannabe musician, Jonathan Lowenstein (played by Garrett Hedlund) arriving at the hospital to visit his father, Robert (played by Richard Jenkins), who has been fighting cancer for the past twelve years. Jonathan has been estranged from his parents and his younger sister, Karen (played by Jessica Brown Findlay), for two-years when he left for California to pursue a music career. Upon visiting his parents (Anne Archer plays his mother, Rachel), he learns that his father is ready to die and wants his doctor (played by Terrence Howard) to remove the ventilator in less than 48 hours.

Jonathan has never been able to express his emotions to others, so he tries to bottle up his feelings for his father. To make matters worse, he bumps into his ex-girlfriend (played by Amy Adams), who is now married, and must deal with his past feelings for her. His relationship with his sister is a rocky one and they bunt heads, as Karen wants to stop her father from dying. Only after befriending a terminally-ill teenager (played by Jessica Barden), does he finally understands that life is short and he must be there for his family.

The Legend of Billie Jean: Special "Fair Is Fair" Edition
Director: Matthew Robbins
Starring: Helen Slater, Keith Gordon, Christian Slater, Peter Coyote
Studio: Mill Creek Entertainment
Release Date: July 22, 2014
Retail: $9.98
Running Time: 95 mnutes
Rating: PG-13
Buy Link: Amazon

Review:

Arriving on DVD and Blu-ray for the first time on Tuesday July 22, 2014 is the classic teenage-drama, The Legend of Bille Jean: Special "Fair Is Fair" Edition, directed by Matthew Robbins and starring Helen Slater, Keith Gordon, Christian Slater and Peter Coyote. The Blu-ray includes a commentary track with stars Helen Slater & Yeardley Smith.

Billie Jean was released in the summer of 1985 and centers on Billie Jean Davy (played by Helen Slater) confronting the bully that wrecked her brother Binx's (played by Christian Slater) scooter in the attempt to get him to pay the $608 bill to fix it. The bully's father, Mr. Pyatt, offers to pay for the bill in installments, but wants Billie to give him sexual favors in exchange for the money. Billie says no and tries to storm off, but results in Mr. Pyatt getting somewhat violent. This is where Binx accidentally shoots Mr. Pyatt.

Now consider to be criminals by the law enforcement, Bille and Binx skips town with their best friends,Putter (played Yeardley Smith) and Ophelia (played by Martha Gehman) in tow. As the media starts to the cover their crimes, teenagers across America consider Billie Jean to be a hero.

With nowhere else to turn, Billie, Brinx, Putter and Ophelia seek refuge at the home of the teenage son, Lloyd Muldaur (played by Keith Gordon), of the district attorney, whom they agree to take hostage and ransom for $608.

It is important for everyone to be fluent in another language, especially in Spanish and Chinese. Though learning how to speak German has never crossed my mind, I had so much fun learning a bit of Spanish and French with the Pimsleur Approach that I eagerly signed up to review the German Level 1 program.

I recall having a foreign exchange student during my high school years that was from Germany. When she arrived, she didn't know very much English and nobody else, including the teachers, knew how to speak German. In this situation, it would have been nice to be fluent in the language.

The Pimsleur approach was created by Dr. Paul Pimsleur, who first released the program in 1963 and later unveiled it to the Harvard community in 1980. The program doesn't involve the use of textbooks or software, but instead it only involves listening to audio CDs. Our brains are already pre-wired to learn a new language and all you have to do is let your brain absorb the language. Many have people have purchased the program over the years, including the FBI.

It seems the zombie mayhem is never going to die down, especially with the fifth season of The Walking Dead just around the corner, its spinoff coming sometime in 2015 and of course there is the sixth and final Resident Evil film scheduled to be released in the next couple of years. The Walking Dead is based off of the comic series of the same name; actually there are many zombie theme comics and graphic novels on the market today, including Zombies VS. Robots. The popular comic book series has spun-off into its own anthology series, featuring short stores by talented authors. The fifth installment was released by IDW this past spring.

No Man's Land has the typical zombie plot set in a post-apocalyptic world, but with an added twist - robots have been built to protect the remaining humans from the hoard of flesh-eating zombies. Similar to the Terminator films, some of the robots have reprogrammed themselves and others have been reprogrammed by humans, all of which has caused an apocalyptic hellscape on Earth.

The majority of the stories are about a small band of humans struggling to live in this zombie/robot world. The humans must put aside their differences if they are going to survive living in the No Man's Land.