Blog Tour - TALKING AS FAST AS I CAN by Lauren Graham

Hi everyone, Rinny here. OMG I have been waiting for today for so long! I cannot even describe or more like I do not want to admit to my reaction when a few weeks ago, I came across the email in our inbox inviting us to take part in this tour from the lovely Grace at Little, Brown Book Group. I have an awful feeling I was more excited about this opportunity than anything else in my life. ( apologies to my family and friends lol). Since I was in my late teens the tv show Gilmore Girls has been a huge part of my life and joint number one of two different shows as my ultimate best tv show. I drive my family crazy still rewatching this show at least 2 times a year (maybe more). I had an awful but awesome realisation last night that I have rewatched this show so much that my husband who has no interest in it probably could ace any Gilmore Girls question he was faced with lol. My daughter now presumes that it is Gilmore girls I am watching.   

It is my go to show when my health issues or life are getting me down or when I am busy and need something on that will distract me as I cannot stand silence. It makes me smile, laugh, cry and even angry at points regardless of how many times I have watched it, I just adore it. It is just so different to what many tv shows in the past few years have brought us. There is just something heartwarming and comfortable about the show and I find as i grow older I always come away with a different view, a different character I relate too, a new appreciation for a side character or two and some new pieces that I am sure I have missed in the last 100 rewatches lol. The wit, pop culture references and not to mention the sheer amount of books referenced in the show is incredible. The recent surge in new generations of fans discovering the show just proves how awesome, relatable and timeless it is.  Anyway, I have kind of rambled off from my purpose. Naturally, I am a huge Lauren Graham fan so I could not refuse the opportunity to help promote her new book. I wish you the best Lauren Graham and hope both the revival and your new book's release do great 😊. 

Blurb

From the star of the much-loved television shows Gilmore Girls and Parenthood, and the author of the New York Times bestselling novel Someday, Someday, Maybe, comes a collection of candid and hilarious essays.

In Talking as Fast as I Can, Lauren Graham hits pause for a moment and looks back on her life, sharing laugh-out-loud stories about growing up, starting out as an actress, and years later, sitting in her trailer on the Parenthood set and asking herself, “Did you, um, make it?” She opens up about the challenges of being single in Hollywood (“Strangers were worried about me; that’s how long I was single!”), the time she was asked to audition her butt for a role, and her experience being a judge on Project Runway (“It’s like I had a fashion-induced blackout.”).

In “What It Was Like, Part One,” for the first time Graham settles in for an epic Gilmore Girls marathon and reflects on being cast as the fast-talking Lorelai Gilmore. The essay “What It Was Like, Part Two” reveals how it felt to pick up the role again nine years later, and what doing so meant to her.

Some more things you will learn about Lauren: She once tried to go vegan just to bond with Ellen DeGeneres, she’s aware that meeting guys at awards shows has its pitfalls (“If you’re meeting someone for the first time after three hours of hair, makeup, and styling, you’ve already set the bar too high.”), and she’s a card-carrying REI shopper (“My bungee cords now earn points!).

         

Complete with black-and-white photos and excerpts from the diary Graham kept during the filming of the recent Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, this book is like a cozy night in, catching up with your best friend, laughing and swapping stories, and—of course—talking as fast as you can.

Book Links

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(Review coming soon!)

A different kind of Blog Tour

Apart from just being excited about Gilmore Girls in general, the revival and the fact that I get to help promote Lauren's book on my blog! This tour is a little different instead of reviews and excerpts which could contain spoilers for A year in a life, everyone taking part will be sharing their fave Loralie moment or moments from the original 7 seasons of Gilmore Girls. Why not join in the fun and comment below with yours? Just please keep it spoiler-free about the revival, tho I would be happy to chat wth you on the opinionated cupcakes FB page about the revival. I sat all day and watched them all so many feels and tears. I require a rewatch already to try and process what I feel lol. Feel free to try and guess my fave moment from the revival on our twitter or FB (not in the comments here). A small hint it is in the Fall, not the end and prob not what you are thinking lol.

Anyway, back to the blog tour, I tried so very hard to pick my faveourite moment it didn't work, so i tried to pick just a couple of moments....... it didn't work. So I have decided to pick one moment (a super hard near impossible task) from each of the original series. Let's begin.....

Season 1 - Episode 2

This might seem like an unusual moment to pick but hands downI love this moment and is one of my fave's from this season. Just because the more I rewatched it made me realize this is one of my that's so Loralie moments. The moment being after sleeping in and leaving all her 'good' clothes at the cleaners Loralie reveals begrudgingly to not only Rory's new headmaster but her mum Emily that under her coat she is wearing a tiny tie-dyed top, Daisy Mae shorts, and cowboy boots not ideal at all on Rory's first day at Chilton. Even though embarrassed she handles it with her usual wit and I just love her for it.

Loralie: "......laundry day"

Loralie "....no, because that would be embarrassing."

Season 2 -  Episode 16

There s s many possible moments to choose from season 2 seeing Loralie graduate and her parents so proud, her 'picnic' with Luke, helping Richard set up his new business's office. My fave moment, however, is when Emily and Loralie are at the spa as reluctant as Loralie is to be 'stuck' with Emily, the two may have their ups and downs whilst there but they bond a little and I love that. Especially the scene where Loralie gets Emily to try  the 'Vicious Trollop' lipstick just found it so funny.

Season 3 - Episode 22

One of my fave episodes in the whole of the Gilmore Girls saga but my one moment is where Loralie holds up the paper having written on it so Rory can see that Loralie and Sookie had got the inn! Just a perfect moment amongst a lot of great moments. Both our girls accomplishing their goals at the time. Loved it! This moment made me get teary all over again having finally stopped crying over Rory's speech.

Season 4 - Episode 22

The Dragonfly inn opening and Luke and Loralie's kiss FINALLY! I loved that kiss! and this episode 

Season 5 - Episode 3

Every time I rewatch this episode I just love the moment it is revealed to Loralie that Luke has kept the Horoscope she gave him when they first met on which she had written  'today a crazy woman will come in, give her coffee and she will go away.'

Season 6 - Episode 9

How can  pick any other moment except when Rory returns home? I can't, the moment as Loralie is talking to her on the phone and looks out the window to see her pulling up and still talking on the phone goes out to greet her just makes me smile and tugs my heart strings so hard. 

Season 7 - Episode 11 + 12

We come to the end of our journey (well, it was that way for years not anymore yay!) I found this season tough to pick just one moment we have the moment where Luke and Loralie kiss at the Bon Voyage party, Loralie mediating between Lane and Mrs Kim and plenty more. I am kinda cheating as my moment is really a series of moments all involving Loralie's character reference letter about Luke. Her why can't I write this letter is legendary to somehow manage to get to "Monkey, monkey pants" beats any rant i have heard lol. In Episode 12 where we have the judge and Christopher reading the letter at the same time, so many emotions and a beautiful letter that only Loralie could have written about Luke. This moment in particular always makes me so emotional. Tor between feeling sorry for Christoper being blindsided by the letter and caught up in the words of the letter, the sense they make as Luke really is a good guy and my own personal feelings being on ship #TeamLuke.


Wow, that was hard (I honestly think I could spend a week just writing about moments I love and not be done) but loved reliving my fave moments in my head and yet again I am rewatching seasons 1 -7  (on 4. If you have never watched this show give it a try and if you have give it a try again lol. So I am away now to work on the plan to live in a town just like Stars Hollow.

About the Author 

Lauren Graham is an actress best known for her roles on the critically acclaimed series Gilmore Girls and Parenthood. She is the New York Times bestselling author of Someday, Someday, Maybe. Graham has performed on Broadway and appeared in such films as Bad Santa, Evan Almighty, and Because I Said So. She holds a BA in English from Barnard College and an MFA in acting from Southern Methodist University. She lives in New York and Los Angeles.

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*** Rinny Reviews *** Our Zoo by June Mottershead

Disclaimer : I was Provided a free copy of this book from Netgalley in return for an honest review.

Title: Our Zoo

Author: June Mottershead

          Publish Date: October 9th 2014 

           Published by: Headline

Genre: Memoir

Goodreads 

Synopsis

Until I brought friends back from school I didn't realise that most people didn't have baby lions in their bedrooms when they were sick, or bring parrots into the house so they wouldn't catch cold.'

Chester Zoo is counted among the top 10 zoos in the world and, with over 11,000 animals and 400 species, it is the most visited wildlife attraction in Britain. Unlike other zoos that owe their existence to philanthropists, explorers or big game hunters, Chester Zoo was the brainchild of one working-class man with a dream he had nurtured since he was a boy: to build a zoo without bars.

June Mottorshead was four years old when her father, George, moved his family to Upton, two miles out Chester, to begin the process of turning his dream into a reality. With no other children around to play with - her sister Muriel was 10 years older - June's friends became the animals. Her closest companion was an orphaned chimpanzee which her sister hadshe hand reared, and for six years the two were inseparable. June soon became the poster girl for Chester Zoo and photographs of her cuddling lion clubs, head-butting a goat or opening the beak of a pelican soon graced the front pages of British newspapers. She was 13 when war was declared on 1939 and, with the backbone of the staff headed for the front, it fell to June to take over as head keeper. Keeping the zoo running while the war waged was no easy task. Despite rationing the animals had to be fed and all of them - penguins, elephants, leopards, tigers, lions, kangaroos and polar bears - needed to be moved into secure locked quarters inside as soon as the air raid siren sounded.

June, now in her eighties, is the guardian of her family's legacy and here in Our Zoo, she tells

Review

About 6 years ago I moved to England from Scotland to live with the man I love and went on to marry a year later. I left all my family and friends and most of my belongings behind and one of my favourite memories of that time was our first family trip out ( me, my husband, his daughter and my mother in law), we went to Chester Zoo. I loved it I fell in love with the place right there and then. I have always had a love for animals some might call it an obsession lol. I always wanted dreamed of working in a zoo. Unfortunately on going health issues hasn't allowed this. Below is some photos I took that day.

Recently you might have heard or watched Our Zoo on the BBC, a drama program about the life of the Mottershead family and how Chester Zoo began. It is a wonderful series and I hope we get a season two and many more to follow the story. That being said of course as it is a television show although based on the true events that happened, it is also dramatized and has changes for obvious reasons.

A few days ago I was browsing Netgalley and couldn't believe when I saw that this book was being released. I knew I had to request it. I could not pass up the opportunity of finding out more about what actually happened and getting to know the family and animals a little more. I was not disappointed.

This book has a magical feel to it not only do we hear a first person account of the different troubles that the family and the zoo faced, we find out all about the animals that were on the journey along side them. We get to know June, her family and friends (human and animal). It did not feel like i was reading a book but sitting snuggled up listening to a grandparent telling me stories from their childhood. A wonderful feeling that I can honestly say a book has never ever gave me before.

This book takes you through all the emotions, I laughed and I cried. It was a heart warming and heartbreaking roller-coaster. We follow the story of the early days of the zoo highs and lows through June's retelling. From Mary the chimp to Pelly the pelican. From opening the zoo's gate to surviving the rationing during the war. It is truly a remarkable story. What a life June has lead, what she has seen and done is amazing.  Most people dream to work with animals in a zoo or go see them, but to live in a zoo it is so unbelievably wonderful and beyond what anyone could think it would be like. As well as a lot of sacrifice and hard work.

I also thought that the book was beautiful not only its cover but cute illustrations above each new chapter of different animals. At the beginning is a map showing the zoo grounds and dates each new exhibit etc was added.You also get to know not only about the animals and their different personalities. We get to learn little facts about the species and different animals which as a animal lover I adored.

The only things I did not like were only small details and in no way had a negative impact on my enjoyment of the book. At times i felt we were jumping back and forth in time within a paragraph or two. This made the book feel a little disjointed at times. Perhaps it was just me though because like I said it did not have a negative impact on me.The only other thing was it seemed to end so abruptly which perhaps because I would like to read more and more never ending tales of the zoo felt disappointing.

I have only ever read one memoir/auto biography before. I was in my teens and if  I am honest not much of it stayed with me. However this book has touched me in many ways and will stay with me for a very long time. I would love to read more stories about the family and Chester Zoo. I would recommend this book to any one who has ever visited Chester Zoo or has a love for animals great and small. I am already planning on buying a few copies of this book as part of Christmas presents for family and a copy for myself. Hands down my favourite read of this year so far.

My Rating : 

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