Week in Review #16

This week I reviewed five books!

25. Olive and Oscar: The Favorite Hat. Ariel Bernstein. Illustrated by Marc Rosenthal. 2026. 32 pages. [Source: Library] [5 stars, early reader, animal fantasy, friendship]
26. Bad Banana. Michael Rex. 2026. 32 pages. [Source: Library] [4 stars, beginning reader, early reader, humor]
27. Board book: Just Because. Mac Barnett. Illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault. 2026. 32 pages. [Source: Library] [5 stars, bedtime book, board book, imagination, creativity, curiosity]
28. Board book: Fix This Book! A Dinosaur Broke It! Silver Dolphins Books. 2026. 10 pages. [Source: Library] [5 stars, board book, interactive]
29. Richard Scarry's Great Mystery Collection. Richard Scarry. 2025. (1969, 1975) 96 pages. [Source: Library] [4 stars, picture books, mysteries]

Century of Viewing #16

1950s

• 1953 War of the Worlds Sharing this classic sci-fi with my most favorite person in the world was AWESOME. I love science fiction. This one may not be a super faithful adaptation to H.G. Well's novel, but, it's a thousand times better than some of the other adaptations out there.
• 1955 To Hell and Back Very much a war movie. I don't know that I like war movies. I was interested in this one because Audie Murphy is starring as himself in a bio pic which I thought was unusual and unique.

1960s

• 1968 Countdown. Science fiction. In this version of the space race, America is sending a man to the moon to wait for an Apollo flight to come rescue him. Sound like a bad idea? How about sending someone unqualified. After the Russians have already sent a man to the moon. What could go wrong? We don't know because the movie ends before anything exciting could happen.

1990s

• 1994 Forrest Gump Great soundtrack! Great story! SO many memories of watching this one. And it is SO quotable. It has been a few years since I last watched it.

2000s

• 2007 The Sunshine Can't decide between apocalyptic, horror, disaster, and sci-fi???? I may have a movie for you. Icarus II is off to save the world, or, at least attempt to save humanity. BUT they are just one or two decisions away from a complete and total fail. Mostly. If it can go wrong, it will go wrong. The characters are extremely VERY human, which is a strength for the movie. I didn't care for a plot twist near the end. But I liked parts of it.

2010s

• 2015 Home Home. ONE of my favorite, favorite, favorite animated movies. I love how OH (the Boov alien) finds a family. And Tip and Pig find a great friend too. So the Boov are best at all the running away. But Oh chooses to run towards the danger in this movie. He has promised to help Tip find Mimom. Such a fun movie with all the feels.

2020s

• 2023 The Moon Can't decide between apocalyptic, horror, disaster, and sci-fi???? I may have a movie for you. Icarus II is off to save the world, or, at least attempt to save humanity. BUT they are just one or two decisions away from a complete and total fail. Mostly. If it can go wrong, it will go wrong. The characters are extremely VERY human, which is a strength for the movie. I didn't care for a plot twist near the end. But I liked parts of it.
• 2026 Trust Me The False Prophet A Netflix documentary--four parts that felt like it should be four parts. Like some Netflix documentaries feel stretched thin like there's an hour's worth of great content and four parts. This wasn't that. It was fascinating/captivating yet disturbing because of the crime element. Still I think it's an important to have these conversations if only with yourself.

© 2026 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews