How to Create Aesthetic Playlists for Books.

Hello!

This post will be a little different compared to my book reviews and the monthly playlists, as I am taking my process to create aesthetically pleasing playlists for your current or favorite book(s).

I have been making mixes of music for YEARS! It started while I was in middle school, I would create CDs of my favorite songs of that time and/or mood. I had party, sad, happy, etc CDs in my collection, literally I have more burn CDs than actual artist/band albums. Back then, it was fun to arrange these two-to-three-minute songs in a way that would mimic a soundtrack.

When I was ending my last semester of freshman year, my English teacher made up a hefty final for us. He told us that we were to pick out a book, read it and do at least projects that would feature certain things that take place within the book. We were given a list of different projects we were allowed to do and I was pulled into creating a playlist of songs that I thought would fit the book itself. However, I did one better, I was using a CD-Rom that was called, “Jam Trax” and it was a kid version of what actual music producers use Pro Tools. This was made for children, so it provided you with an array of beats and instruments, but you were allowed to add your own sounds and vocals too. I didn’t just create a soundtrack, I made a score based on the events happening in the book, which was “Sister Spy (Alias #4)” by Laura Peyton Roberts.

Another element to the final was we were also allowed to grade ourselves and I remember giving myself a B-, I didn’t want to be cocky and give myself an A but I also didn’t want to barely pass either, so that’s why I went with a B- because it felt like a fair grade to me. What surprised me was the note I got on the whole thing, “You should have had an A.”

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Last year, I just had the need to go back to when I created that final project. I was busy reading Melanie Karsak’s first Viking series, “The Road to Valhalla” and I was thinking of various songs that would be aesthetically pleasing; my intention was to do something simple because I was weary whether or not I would continue reading the series, but when I finished the first book, I had a whole playlist that reminded me of certain characters and scenes. I was curious to see what this would be like with the rest of the books and I can tell you, I have 114 songs on it based on all six books.

Here are some advice in creating your own aesthetic playlist based on your current read or maybe a favorite series in the past.

Find the main character’s theme first.

In “The Road to Valhalla” series, we follow Hervor’s quest into finding who her father was and discover the secrets hidden among her family.

One of the things that is important to Hervor is for her love of Odin, who is the main deity, he is like father to all of the Vikings as he represents knowledge and power. He is the Allfather of the Norse mythology.

While I was in the throes of the book, I couldn’t exactly pinpoint the right song that felt Hervor’s theme. It wasn’t until I found like five Vikings playlists on Spotify that I decided to listen to these Old Norse styled songs, and there was one that finally spoke to me. It was Foresaga’s “Allfather” and this has a hauntingly calm about it. I felt a sense of self the first time I listened to it, and I knew this was the way I wanted to start Hervor’s playlist.

I ended up finding a theme for the majority of the characters in the first book. Hervor’s mother Svafa is dealing with what we would call amnesia and I gave her “Imaginary” by Evanescence. For Hervor’s best friend and thrall to the family Eydis, I found “Volva” by Vinnie Camaileri. It is an instrumental of a bunch of shamanism vibes and it fits well with her. Eydis is a devotee of the trickster God Loki, and been known to receive visions from the Gods, and the Vikings word for these types of people are called Volvas.

Focus on key words to help inspire you.

We live in a world where we hashtag a lot of random words, sometimes we include them in ways that will create traffic on that post. Let’s say you are advertising a book you really enjoyed, and oddly enough it’s about the Vikings and their culture and beliefs. You want it to be accessible to certain demographic groups, not just your audience, You need to think about the words to include in the actual post. Here are some easy key words to keep in mind.

• Historical fiction – it is important to include the words “historical fiction” as that category is a very popular type of fiction. You need to remember the terminology as well, because that will definitely help you out too!
  • Vikings
  • Norse Mythology
  • Old Norse
  • Gods & Goddesses: Odin, Freyja, Freyr, Loki, Thor, etc.
  • Scandinavia – Denmark, Greenland, Norway, Iceland and Sweden. They all have their own Viking stories, but it is easier to say “Scandinavia” to keep it simple for you and others.
• Warrior terms – Within the Viking world, you hear a lot about them raiding various cities around the world. They will include both male and female along for the ride. The women that were apart of the scrimmage were called “shield maidens” and they will train their children very early on, They use a mix of different weapons, some are lengendary and others are ordinary to everyday life.
  • Tyrfing – it was a cursed dwarven sword and used amongst Hervor and her father, uncles and grandfather.
  • Steel swords
  • Decoerated shields
  • Bow & arrows
  • Fiire – you have to remember they did have guns, but they knew fire was a handy element, and something else they used was whale oil. They would hunt whales to collect various bones, blubber, and oil for everyday usage.

When it comes to create an aesthetic playlist, it might also be helpful to search for fantasy and medieval playlists on Spotify. This is definitely an easier resource in case you don’t have enough material to work with in the beginning. People have also created their own bookish playlists so don’t deny yourself to have a look on their stuff too. It might also draw out the genre of music you want to use for the entire thing. For the first series, I went with a mixture of cinematic pop artists like Ruelle, FJØRA, Hidden Citizens, but I also included a lot of hard rock bands too, such as Within Temptation, Papa Roach, and Halestorm. However, for the second series “The Shadows of Valhalla” has more artists like Gealdyr, Danheim, Peyton Parrish as they make music in the same way as Foresaga.

Okay, I think I am officially done with this post. I know I gave more than enough of ideas to stir around in your head to probably give you a major headache but go slowly with it. Once you start though, it can be difficult to stop, so that’s my final piece of advice there. If you’d like to check out both of my aesthetic playlists here are the links. The Road to Valhalla and The Shadows of Valhalla. I hope everyone enjoyed learning a bit more about the Viking world past and present.

Have you made an aesthetic playlist before? If so, what was it inspired by and what kind of music did you use for it?

The Goodreads Challenge | What I’m Doing For 2023

Hello my friends!

It is time for a brand-new Goodreads Reading Challenge post. Want to learn what I wanted to accomplish with my reading plans for each year? Here are my 2020, 2021, and 2022 posts.

This is my fourth year giving you an insight of what I would like to accomplish for 2023. I actually enjoy doing these types of posts, as it gives all of us (you and me) a chance to write out my intentions for the next 356 days, but let’s get real. there’s no way I will be reading everyday this year. It’s cool for when it happens in a whole month, but after a while it kind of loses its luster.

What is my annual goal?

Just before Christmas, I had a family friend ask me about what my goal would be, and I’m sure everyone wants to know as well. I’ve kept a fairly hush-hush about it; last year I wasn’t totally 100% certain I would actually make it to 40 books, mainly because I tend to forget to factor in the holiday festivities in November and December. They tend to take a lot of my energy and the last thing I usually want to do is read a whole book.

However, I made it well passed 40, I ended up with 54 books. I find it a good thing to not only show myself that I can get it done, but I can surpass the initial goal too. You always hope it can happen, but life can throw you a curveball here and there and everything can take a backseat.

So, for 2023, I am hoping to get through 50 books, but also not discriminating towards its size. I think that’s another thing to keep in mind, the term “book” doesn’t mean you have to read something that’s over 300+ pages. I count any format, whether it’s a novel, short story or audiobook.

What about other certain challenges?

In a way to see if I could handle some pressure in 2022, I decided I wanted to do two challenges. My overall goal was to hit 40 books, mainly having two equal sides of twenty books; I had 20 books of normal titles and 20 more that were focused on classics or had become a film or TV adaption. For the most part, being able to do this was easy, my only real issue was time. I flew passed the first 20 books, but I only managed to reach 19 books on the other list.

For my first time doing something like this, I am very pleased with myself. I figured I would only get to five books, so this was really cool to see at the end of the year. It was fun and interesting to see how much I would enjoy out of these classics, because I tried to stay in and around classics like Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I wasn’t a bookworm as a child, reading wasn’t fun for me in school so to be able to rediscover some of these books really opened my eyes on certain parts of literature.

And with that being said, I will continue with this challenge, and I will definitely put each book into my blue journal where I have the others listed with their mini reviews. This time though, I’m not giving myself a limit on a number, I just want to focus on children’s books, middle grade and other classics for that specific goal.

What do I hope to discover this year?

I want to read more or less the same of the books I’ve been into lately, but I would like to include more of children’s books, mainly fairy tales. I’ve already crossed off three of them; two were written by Hans Christian Anderson, The Snow Queen and Thumbelina and my first story by one of the Grimm brothers: Cinderella by Wilhelm Grimm.

I would love to get out of the historical fiction books sometime, although I’m in no rush to make this happen. I’ve just completed my first of the year, which the review will hopefully come out on Friday, and I’d finish my second if I knew it wouldn’t possibly ruin what could be featured in Melanie Karsak’s final book in The Shadows of Valhalla series. I recently just found a sleuth of Viking Sagas on Kindle Unlimited, and it’s been interesting to see the “origins” of both Hervor of The Road to Valhalla series and Ervie’s section. So, at the moment, I am holding off on it until I can get my toes on the Gambit of Swords this spring.

Speaking of Melanie’s books, I think this might be the year I decide to dive into William Speakeare’s Macbeth as it was part of the original story behind her Celtic Blood series. I know it may not exactly discuss Lady Macbeth as much as Highland Vengeance and Highland Queen, but I might understand the character Macbeth a bit more, at least that is my hope for it. I am prepared for the poetry part of the story, the Viking Sagas are mostly written in verse anyways, so I should be fine on that end, but I am thinking of listening to the audiobook instead of actually reading it.

For Christmas, I did get a large clutch of books – ones bought by family and others I got myself, so I am really going to try to dive into those books, especially the physical as I tend to ignore those unless I am at my mom’s work apparently…

Other than that, I am pretty much open to everything else. If you want to keep up with my overall goal or the books I read this year, you can find me on Goodreads, click here.

What about you, what kind of books do you hope to get into for 2023? And of course, what is your ultimate goal for the new year?

Blogmas | Annual Holiday DIY Project

Hello!

I love being able to do something creative around the holidays.

It’s become a bit of a tradition to do ornaments and now that I have been exploring the dot painting world, it has really opened a bunch of ideas in my mind and it’s fun to share them with my loved ones and of course blog about them. My only regret is that not every person will get one in the mail.

Sidenote: For the past month, I’ve had three bouts of stomach flu or whatever – I no longer believe it was stomach flu, but I’m also terrified to go down that road to find out what is exactly going on with my gut. Anyways, since I was down and out for several weeks, I was even more scared to do anything constructive because it would always come back to bite in the ass–literally! I know, TMI but you gotta laugh, right?

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What you will need for this project:

• Unfinished wooden ornaments – depending on which product you choose, sometimes you will be given string, multicolored beads, paint markers
• Acrylic paint – I used two different brands of paint: Bunny Barn and DecoArt
• 3 Paintbrushes – a large, medium and smaller brush
• Palette container
• Damp and dry wash cloth
• Cup of water
• Dotting tools

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Last Christmas, I went back to the brand I used in my 2021 ornaments because they had two different collections, and I swore I had saved the others in one of the folders, but I guess I didn’t, which really bugged me in late October, so when I went looking for these characters days later, I had hoped I didn’t purchase the same designs! The ones I did find though, they had trees, bells, and snowflakes, but I really liked the others in the batch that I choose to overlook them and do my best to make every single ornament unique and I hope you (and their owners!) enjoy what I was able to do this time around.

The first day I only went in with eight characters and their base coats – for at least three of the ornaments were only painted in one color: the stars, snowflakes and hearts. Technically, the silver bells are only color, but they have a layer of glitter on top of them. I’d just like to point out the glitter wasn’t my idea; this was an addition made by my mother! For a woman who has panicked everytime I have paint out, she went all in with the glitter, I was actually very proud of her! Honestly, I didn’t know what I exactly wanted to do for these three and I went back and forth more on the hearts, but I do think keeping them as they are, is just as festive!

Once I had finished painting those guys, I moved onto the next few as i tried to do four at a time, but that really depended on the colors I still had available on my palette, so I did the baubles, snowmen, and angels, as they didn’t require much in the first layer. The snowmen were fairly simple as I just went to paint most of it in white and added the black on the arms, face and top hat. I had the thought of putting a neon orange nose of them but I figured all hell would break loose if I did so they went without their standard carrot nose. I just realized I didn’t even give them a scarf either. Oops!

The baubles were another easy-going ornament for me as I just used a color called “pure blue” and it is beautiful! I was tempted to use it everywhere but that was also part of the problem with it, since the shade was so vibrant, it was somewhat difficult for my mom to remove on the brushes, skin, …floor. It’s the same blue that reminds me of that scene in Harriet the Spy where her classmates “accidentally” pour a jug of blue paint on her. The last scene of her frantically scrubbing it off, is exactly how my mom had to remove it as well! Back to the baubles though, after they had dried, I grabbed my rustic gold and painted the section where you thread the string on top of it and it actually makes it look really good! I was worried I’d regret my decision there because when it dries, it tends to soak into the surface and instead of becoming lighter as acrylic paint normally does, it can look dark, but thankfully, the blue stands out just enough to balance out that dullness it can have at the end of the day.

This photo was taken before the wings of the angels (and the trees were decorated!) were taken.

The angel. I was somewhat thrilled to have a small stack of heavenly angels as a part of my holiday project. I was conflicted though because I wanted to keep them with a simple design, but also make them to be individuals as well; in the end I went with the latter as it just seemed better to go in this route in case, I got a little overzealous with making sure every angel was different from the other. So, they all received a sky-blue gown, white wings and light-yellow face/halo.

Next, I went to the reindeer, stocking, trees, and despite doing the Christmas trees last year, I was thoroughly excited to be a little more creative–sickness be damned at this point!

Anyways, I started with my trees, and I managed to remember the precise shade I had for my original tree project back in 2020, and it had a bluesy green color and I thought it made the trees more winter-y, which is what I really wanted to showcase a natural look with some decorations here and there. Every tree had the standard blue-green coat, brown trunk and yellow/red on top for the star. When I finished with the basic things, I moved on to create their overall look with yellow, red and blue dots everywhere; some trees had a design I enjoyed creating last Christmas and I definitely went for it on some of them, while the others have a couple or few smaller dots that make them seem cute and meek at the same time.

As for the reindeer, I knew they would appear this year, but since I thought, I was going to have that other collection, I figured I’d only have to focus my attention on the face of the reindeer themselves, whereas with the batch I ended up with, were made with the whole body intact, I was a little nervous on how to make them “believable” if that makes sense. Although I will admit, I did create a little Rudolph face on the bells last Christmas as an added bonus to the mix, and I absolutely loved that idea, but I was concerned on whether I’d feel comfortable making a harness over the chest and front legs like they were all a part and ready to carry Santa’s sleigh through the night sky. I didn’t use a pencil outline for any of my initial designs for when I started on the dot process, I just went with my gut and I’m happy to say it actually worked out in the end of the day.

To round off this cluster of ornaments, we have the innocent stocking. My mindset going into this one was to basically copy what my actual stocking looks like, it’s a ruby red with white topper or ruffle, I don’t really know what that part of the sock/stocking would be, but then again, I’ve never had to care of the correct term. Anywho, when I went into painting, I used this beautiful red shade that definitely captured the same color that of red-hot cinnamon candies, but that damn topper was difficult. My mom had thought of using the silver glitter again, and at one point I had agreed with it, but then I changed my mind when I suddenly found myself with two stockings with bright blue… Honestly, I don’t regret it. It’s really pretty! The other two were never painted actually painted; if I had the confidence to do it, they were going to have a textured fur look in that area but again, I still loved how they turned out too!

Here’s something funny for you, now that I’m officially done with these ornaments and they should be getting to their rightful places soon, I’ve already decided on what I’m doing next year. If I can find a bunch of them, my plain is to do gingerbread men and women. As much as I enjoy the variety packs, only having one character may be easier on me as I can just give my heart to my design process. What do you think about this idea?

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Do you have any special Christmas crafts you do for or with your family? For those who do not have anything, but have your own ideas though, what is it? Share with me in the comments!

Blogmas | Our Advent Calendars

Hello!

Even though I am an American, I thoroughly enjoy advent calendars! I like the fact that every day you get a little something to do or eat, depending on your preferred calendar!

What is an Advent Calendar?

An advent calendar is a special way to countdown to Christmas. It is originally celebrated and made with candles and wreaths in Germany, but as with everything in the modern world, it exploded into the mainstream, and we’ve added candy to the mix.

I think I was introduced to them around 2014. It would have been the first time I’d watch Zoe Sugg’s vlogmas on YouTube. Honestly, by that time I had been introduced to the bulk of the blogging community, so they could have helped me along the way as well. Anyways, I thought it was an interesting way to get ready for the holiday festivities.

Afterwards, my nana received a simple advent calendar from one of the charities she supports, and they sent a naked tree, and your job was to decorate the scene from the first of December to Christmas day. She would put it up on the refrigerator and anytime I came over to visit, it would be the first thing I’d do, but on the days when I didn’t, my nana would say papaw did it for me and that sounds like something he’d do. I think the longer we did it, he started to enjoy it just as much too!

The day I wrote this post, this picture popped up on my Facebook Memories and I’ve never been happier!

Fast forward to 2021, I wanted to get my own advent calendar. It had been some time since I did one and I thought it was time to bring it back. I had also hoped I could persuade my parents to do it with me, and within four days they became as excited as I was on what would be inside the little envelopes. I managed to find a very affordable Harry Potter calendar that opens up like a giant book and considering neither one of my parents know anything about Harry Potter, I think they enjoyed learning more about it through the various memorabilia. and they definitely understand my love for everything Harry Potter now.

Our 2022 Advent Calendar!

I can’t deny to you, I’ve been searching for this year’s advent calendar since May, and I feel absolutely no shame for it either.

Originally, I wanted to get either a calendar dedicated to puzzles or socks. I watched Alexandra Roselyn on YouTube last year and she had two different calendars, one for tea and the other was for jigsaw puzzles. I was kind of curious about whether I’d have enough patience to do a puzzle with my parents, and honestly, I doubt they’d last long with it. Now, about the socks, my mom has a lot of various socks and I point them out to her all of the time because they rarely go with her outfits or seasons, so I figured this would be a winner for us but the prices for these kinds of calendars can be expensive. When I looked through Amazon back in August, the prices stayed around $40 and as much as I knew we’d have fun and get use out of them, I just didn’t believe at the time it was worth it.

I actually told my mom about the sock advent calendar, and she was very stunned, and told me next year we need to get one together… I told you, she likes her socks!

Anyways, my mom ended up finding this year’s advent calendars. The first is a red box with little holiday scene and you have to look for whatever day(s) you are on and your job is to break the cardboard door to find a little treasure. A mini ornament. When my mom took these pictures below, we had missed the first two days, so we have a set of golden bells with a red bow in the middle of them, and a little snowman decorated with mittens, a scarf and Santa hat on top. We really love this calendar the most, it is absolutely adorable and since my Christmas tree is on a medium size, it is better to decorate it with mini ornaments so these prizes will be very well-loved with me once we are finished with it.

In each photo of the calendars, I’ve included the link, so if you’d like to purchase or put them in a folder for next year’s Christmas season you can.

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For the second calendar, my mom thought this would be an interesting because we both enjoy watching crime dramas–she’s currently on a Scandal kick whereas I am watching FBI. The crimes you get to try and solve are based on Sir Arthur Cohen Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, it is all with a British theme, which isn’t quite ideal, I’ve had to help mom as she didn’t understand some of the names and phrases. The “crimes” themselves are mostly rated PG. This calendar is set up like one of those calendars you flip over to the next and it just sits on your desk. As you’ve might’ve guessed, this isn’t our favorite, but it’s still technically early so we’ll really see if we change our tune after Christmas.

Maybe next year I can do a little list of advent calendars that seem like they could be fun to do with your family. It would also be nice to give you something around a reasonable budget too! If this is something you would like to see in next year’s Blogmas content, please let me know down in the comments.

Are you and your family doing an advent calendar this year? If so, what is the theme behind it? If you’ve done an advent calendar since you were young, what do you look for when you go to purchase them?

Top 8 Spooky Films!

Hello!

You can tell I haven’t done on these posts in a while, mainly because I had forgotten how to actually start it. Oops!

I’m also talking about a different subject too, I normally don’t talk about “spooky” things, especially in the month of October. I mentioned in my recent review for Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wall-Paper” last week that even though I love the occasional vampire, witch and werewolf subgenres, I am still very tame when it comes to anything in the “horror” category. To be perfectly honest with you, none of these films are too over the top, at least from my standpoint–you might have another point of view and that’s fine and dandy. We all have our limits for this time of the year and if you’re interested in boarding your horizons a bit, I think you should consider the list below.

Now, shall we?

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Before we start, I wanted to give you a level to go with each movie in the hopes to help you see how “creepy” it is, so imagine that number one is the safest whereas 10 is not only the highest but frightening on the whole thing, but as you get to five, you’ve hit a good medium between those feelings, okay?

The Gift (2000)

One of the first movies I was suggested to watch was The Gift. When you have both of your parents telling you to check it out, that is usually a good candidate, especially in the psychological section. For the most part, that’s what I’d say about all of these films but this one was different because it still has some of my usual themes within it.

The Gift is about a woman who is known to be a little out there. She is more of a healer than a witch, but now she is starting to have visions of another woman who is mysteriously missing, and she is haunted by this girl and feels certain that she is dead. It stars Cate Blanchett, Katie Holmes, and Keanu Reeves in very strong roles. Despite for some intense scenes, I’d still give it a 6 1/2 on the “creepy” scale.

What Lies Beneath (2000)

Now with this film, I was told to watch it for basically two years; at one point my mom was watching it in the living room, and I was slightly intrigued by the start of it. A few days later I decided to actually watch it and even though I thought it was really good, that doesn’t mean I’ll be watching it for a while. I would definitely put it at an eight, because of a scene that shows a Ouija board. I hate those things and that scene almost made me run for the hills!

The Prodigy (2019)

This one is very interesting because it focuses on a reincarnation outlook with some creepy stuff involved as we follow a couple on the quest on having a baby and on the day their child is born, a serial killer is also taking his last breaths at the same hospital! When the killer realizes this, he gets to recreate his life in the eyes of this little boy.

In my defense, the first time I ever saw the trailer, I didn’t think it looked too bad, I thought in a way, it would be like The Gift in a more modern way, and I was so totally wrong! This freaked me out more than I thought it would, but I will also say that I thought it was really interesting too. I liked it for those moments, but that means it belongs higher on my scale, so I’d say it’s an eight or nine. However, I do have an alternative for you. If you are interested in reincarnation or a “Freaky Friday” kind of scare, I think “Freaky” with Vince Vaughan and Kathryn Newton would be a more comic and safer idea instead.

Fantasy Island (2019)

A little bit after I completed The Prodigy, I actually noticed a change in myself and I definitely wanted more psychological thrillers, nothing like Final Destination or Saw (although I do want to check out “Spiral” soon!) and I always seemed to watch their trailers first, but as we’ve found out with the last one, I don’t know if going about it this way is a good thing in general.

When I suggested this to my dad, he made it apparent to me that there could be an older version of this film, I know there is/was a TV show on FOX with Rosalyn Sanchez last year, but I was never able to check it out in time. Anyways, this movie was actually lighthearted in the beginning, but you knew shit was going to hit the fan sometime. It had a nice balance of “oh, this is fine” to “here we go” and ultimately “oh damn!” but I enjoyed myself all the same. I’d give it a solid six, mainly because of the events happening at the end.

Escape Room (2019)

I’ve heard about these damn escape rooms all the time. I first heard about them while watching an episode of Jeopardy! and I thought why in the world would anyone want to lock themselves with a bunch of random people in the hopes to finding a series of keys to get out of there. I mean, I barely wanted to work in groups with people I know because I can do things easier on my own!

And then I decided to watch this sucker and was sucked into it immediately, but since this was a movie, the rules can change, and your outcome can have some deadly consequences. I truly loved this movie, like I am patiently waiting for the day the second shows up on my guide for Starz (because that’s where the other premiered on!). If you would like another film like this, try to search for Play Or Die. This one has more British actors in it so the accents are heightened and the plot for the main character is more mysterious.

Crawl (2019)

I feel really bad for adding this to this list after the lower half of the States are recovering after the damage of Hurricane Ian in Florida, Puerto Rico and others as we speak, but this was a creepy but realistic take that most of us would not think about but probably should afterwards.

This film follows a father, daughter duo getting stuck in the midst of an intense hurricane and their home is infested with massive and hungry crocodiles. If you thought sharks were bad, this will show you to fear these beasts even more! As the characters are trying to escape, they try not to tempt monsters hiding in the water. As someone who hasn’t watched Jaws, I’d give this movie a big 10 because evetime you believe it’s done, all hell breaks loose for the characters.

Old (2020)

This year, I had decided on two movies I desperately wanted to see and luckily, they appeared on HBOMax. I was a happy camper, and the first was M. Night Shyamalan’s Old. I saw the trailer and knew from experience that when dealing with Shyamalan’s work, it would be slightly horrifying! However, it didn’t stop me from watching it.

Old is about a group of people who come to this resort, and they are each invited to visit a beach with beautiful views and relaxing atmosphere, which is true, but there is a bad side to it too. They get their first clue when they find a woman dead on the shore and it looks like she’d been there for a very, long time but hasn’t. In a matter of five hours, each of the residents become older and lose a number of things in the process, their eyesight, memory, beauty, and one of the children becomes an adult, gives birth right there in front of her parents.

This movie was right up my alley, but it also seemed too weird, and I didn’t particular enjoy the ending of it either. I would give it a good seven out of ten because there were a lot of freaky moments–obviously! Now if you’d ask me on general enjoyment, I’d tell you it was a four.

Last Night In Soho (2021)

After I had watched Old, I was a bit skeptic on how Last Night In Soho would turn out for me. The main reason why I had wanted to see it was because stars Thomasin McKenzie (who was also in Old!) and Anya Taylor-Johnson (who was in M. Night Shamalyan’s Split!) and Matt Smith. I had found it just before House of the Dragon would start and I wanted to get a sense of Matt’s work before it had premiered a couple of months later.

My thoughts on Last Night In Soho are completely different to Old; I actually loved it so much that I told my parents it was one of the best films I’d seen in a while. I would actually put it on the same list I put Murder On the Orient Express. It was that amazing!

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Honestly, this is a pretty hefty list with a lot of different options. I’ve done other movies lists in the past, I’ve even done a few Halloween-y posts a couple of years ago, so it’s nice to update what I’ve enjoyed since then and let you test your waters in the near future.

Which film(s) are you thinking about checking out soon? Do you have any others that fit well with this list that I might enjoy too? Let me know in the comments below!