I love this album. I don’t think there’s a single bum song on it – for me, this is Prince’s finest moment!

By The Way is a brilliant album. There’s not a single dud song on it, which is pretty impressive, given how many tracks there are. My personal favourites are On Mercury, By The Way, Can’t Stop, and Minor Thing.

Listen and enjoy!

Homicide: Life On The Street is just amazing. To use a cliche, it is ‘gritty’, can be very moving, and the acting is uniformly excellent (at least until Jon Seda joined the cast at the end of season 5)!

The show focuses on a Police Homicide unit. Unlike shows like CSI, it doesn’t rely on special effects, and the characters don’t all look like they should be sashaying down a catwalk. Instead, we get to see them doing their job – sometimes with an unsatisfying result – and how the job affects their lives. Just like in real life, sometimes, the criminals are never caught. Sometimes a case stretches on for week, rather than getting all neatly wrapped up in one episode. And in one of the episodes in the first season, there is actually no crime for them to solve. Instead, we see the squad sitting around chatting in the squad room, reading the paper etc., doing all the things that people do when they have nothing else to do.

Personally my favourite character is Meldrick Lewis, played by Clark Johnson, although the favourite of most viewers seems to be Frank Pembleton, played by Andre Braugher. But all of the characters – particularly in the earlier seasons – bring their own special ingredient to the mix.

All I can say is – if you haven’t seen it, get it!!

I never got into Sex And The City when it was on tv. It was only when I developed a crush on Chris Noth that I decided to watch it, and treated myself to all six seasons.

This show is funny, moving and sad in equal parts. I was really happy with the ending, but I won’t spoil it for anyone who still hasn’t seen it.

Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon, Kristin Davis and Kim Cattrall are perfect as Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha, and the friendship and support that they provide for each other is lovely to see.

I love Bryan Ferry’s voice – it’s just so sensual. Generally however, I prefer his solo stuff to Roxy Music, but that’s not to say that Roxy Music weren’t a great band. This CD has all of their best tracks, and for me, the stand out tracks are More Than This and Same Old Scene.

I’ve been a fan of the original Law and Order series for some time, but somehow expected this to not be as good. However, having finally gotten around to watching season 1 of SVU, I can see that my fears were unfounded! This show is excellent – as good as the original series.

Christopher Meloni and Mariska Hargitay are the two main characters, Elliott Stabler and Olivia Benson, who work in the Special Victims Unit of the NYPD, and the series follows the cases they work on.

The acting by everybody is excellent. It’s also good to see the character of John Munch (from Homicide: Life On The Street – another superb show) in another show.

I’m starting season 2 this weekend!

This book was on my bookshelf waiting to be read for ages – I wish I had picked it up sooner, because it was much better than I had expected.

The story focuses on Lena, a girl from Alabama but now living in Chicago. She hasn’t been back to Alabama for 10 years, but two reasons force her to return. One is her boyfriend Burr, who says that if she doesn’t introduce him to her family (who she also has as little contact with as possible), they have no future. The other reason is a secret from her past, which is revealed throughout the story.

I found this book hard to put down, and definitely recommend it!

This album isn’t awful – it’s just not very good. The two best songs on the album were both released as singles – Dare and Feel Good Inc. Other than that, there are a couple of quite good tracks and a few tracks which I would be happy never to listen to again!

It’s hard to believe that the characters from the tv show Sex And The City (one of my very favourite shows) were based on characters from this book! The Carrie Bradshaw in this book is nothing like the lovely, warm Carrie who we saw on our screens. Miranda has just a small role in this book, and Charlotte’s role is virtually non-existent (she is an English journalist)! Only Samantha Jones seems to bear any resemblence to the character in the show.

I was disappointed in the book. There was none of the warmth and humour I was expecting.

This book is beautiful. It is very atmospheric, and there are some very touching moments in it. I found myself getting completely lost in the story, and the characters are all very believeable.

It tells the story of how a girl named Griet becomes a maid to the artist Johannes Vermeer and his family. However, she finds herself drawn to Vermeer, which has consequences for everybody. I don’t want to say more than that, because I don’t want to give anything away!

I would definitely recommend this book, even for those who are not fans of historical fiction (I’m a recent convert to the genere myself) – it’s not a long book, and I enjoyed it so much, I just wanted to read it greedily in one sitting!