Unapologetic Reviews

Danny the Champion of the World by Roald Dahl was my second read for the 2026 Popsugar Challenge , for the prompt “ A book with a dad as the primary caregiver .” Although written as a children’s book, it works just as well for adult readers; it is simple on the surface, but pointed in what it chooses to show. The book was published in the UK in 1976, and it very much belongs to its place and time. This is an unmistakably British story. Danny lives with his father in a gypsy caravan , which for non-British readers is essentially a mobile home without electricity, plumbing, or gas. They are poor, they run a small petrol station, and they live on the edges of society in more ways than one. When Danny discovers that his father once poached pheasants from the nearby woods, the story begins to open up. The woods belong to the local landowner, Mr Hazell , a man who is enormously wealthy and deeply unpleasant. On the surface, the novel is about poaching and the small adventures that come wi...

You Wanna Be on Top? by Sarah Hartshorne is a sharp, funny, and at times, disturbing memoir about her time on America’s Next Top Model , specifically cycle 9 . I came to this book with surprisingly little memory of that season. I watched Top Model as it aired, over a decade ago. Living outside the US now means there is no easy, legal way to revisit it; the show exists mostly as cultural residue, Tyra quotes and vague recollections. Sarah is a great storyteller. I listened to the audiobook, just over seven and a half hours long, and finished it in about three days because I kept finding excuses to press play. Sarah narrates it herself, and her stand up background shows immediately. The timing is precise; the delivery casual but deliberate; the jokes land cleanly. At times it feels less like an audiobook and more like a very long, very personal stand up set. I laughed out loud more than once. But this is not just a funny book. That is where it gets interesting. There is a recurring t...

The Princess and the Grilled Cheese Sandwich is a short, self contained comic by Deya Muniz , inspired by her relationship with her wife . It is the kind of book you can read in one sitting. I read it on the bus home from work, yet it still manages to feel complete. The full story is available at the end of the book, so I will avoid spoilers here. The premise is simple and playful. In an alternative history world loosely reminiscent of seventeenth century France , a Countess presents as a Count. The reason why she needs to pretend to be a man is obvious, the Count has no male heirs, and that’s not a good thing even in this world. What really carries the book is its tone. The side characters are sweet and humorous. There is a lightness to the dialogue and the situations, and of course an abundance of grilled cheese sandwiches , that keeps everything warm and approachable. The art supports this perfectly. Soft lines , expressive faces , and a colour palette that feels very feminine ....

I wanted to watch a cute, funny and romantic drama, and that is just what I got. I do remember watching the previous version of Itazura na Kiss , but I don't remember much of it. It didn't seem to have much of an impact, and that version was only 9 episodes, while this one is 16. The story is a love triangle, sort of. From the start we know that Kotoko is in love with Irie-kun. It's also not hard to deduct that Kin-chan is in love with Kotoko. Irie-kun doesn't even seem to know that Kotoko exists, until she presents him with a love letter that of course, no surprise, he turns down. What happens after that is years and years of Kotoko being hopelessly devoted. Yes, this drama takes place over 3-4 years. Kotoko is in class F at the beginning, and Irie is in A. Fs, people who are perhaps not that book smart, and As, who are seem to be a world apart. Can two people so different find each other? Can it work? At one point Irie confesses that he had no troubles until...

Yankee -kun to Megane-chan is a high-school drama. It has all the usual characteristics of dramas that are about teenagers. You have some fighting, studying and the troubles of growing up and figuring out your own path in life. Watching this drama you will probably not come across anything that is new on this subject, since it has been done many times before. However, this story is still worth watching just for the fun of it. It doesn't want to take itself seriously. The way the story is told makes you seriously consider that it's more like a parody of the genre, rather than an actual take on it. It doesn't lack a story and likable characters. The main protagonist is a boy names Daichi , who is the son of a doctor who has a small general clinic. He is played by the very cute Narimiya Hiroki , who has a memorable smile. He is the "Yankee". In Japan a "Yankee" is a sort of a juvenile delinquent . He skips school a lot, gets into fights and is gener...

Meitantei no Okite is one drama that doesn't take itself seriously. Well, except for the last about five minutes. The initial concept is that it takes the clichés you can find in classical detective stories and ridicules them in a style not unlike the "Horror Movie", "Date Movie", etc. method. Except for the little fact that the three main characters actually know that they are in a drama with that goal, but this only increases the hilarity of the situations. The whole thing is actually funny and the episodes provide good entertainment. For non-Japanese viewers I do have to note that the detective story concepts seem strange to us sometimes. This is because it's based on more Japanese detective stories than Western ones. The series I can find the most connection with is actually the anime "Detective Conan". Therefore I do advise watching a few episodes of that before watching this drama in order to understand some of the references. Each ...