Diva's Own Choiciest

The Diva has chosen based on her own review

Best authors for Epic Fantasy:

• Elizabeth Haydon- The Symphony of Ages series is simply to DIE for. And if you haven't died yet... um..
  
• Sara Douglass - Australian author of the Axis Trilogy and Wayfarers Redemption
• David Farland- The Runelords series. Now this is a work of art.
• Mercedes Lackey- She has so many beautifully written fantasy work, however, it's really hard to buy her books cos she tends to co-write lots of them too.
• Barb & J.C. Hendee -Great series of the Noble Dead. High dark fantasy about a vengeful Damphir and a loyal albeit comical half Elf. Oh and a little Fey wolf too.
  
• Graham Edwards- If you like Dragons. It is all about dragons, in fact you ARE the dragon.
  
• Maggie Furey - A recipe of fantastic creatures & magical lore
• Chris Bunch - The Dragonmaster trilogy. Unfortunately he passed on after a long battle with a lung ailment.
• David & Leigh Eddings - written several best-selling series of fantasy novels
• Tad Williams - I've only read The Flower War but it seems really good already
• J.R.R. Tolkien- Lord of The Rings, The Hobbit...

Best authors for Chick Lit:

• Jill Mansell - ‘Slick, sexy, funny stories’ Daily Telegraph
• Jane Green - ' Cancel all engagements and read it' Tatler
• Wendy Holden - ‘So funny and readable you worry about the calorie content’ The Sunday Times
• Marian Keyes - ' Marian Keyes is chick-lit's class act' Independent
• Gaby Humptmann- German author of Searching for An Impotent Man
  
• Cathy Kelly - 'Summer Street is the new Wisteria Lane’ – Marian Keyes.
• Fiona Walker - 'A rollercoaster of a read' Hello
• Sarah Ingham - Kissing Frogs is certainly a Cinderella story of proportions.
• Girls Night In - Every time you buy a copy of the Night books, £1 is donated to programs helping children in war-affected countries like Africa, Afghanistan and Iraq.
• Martine Oborne - Getting Even teaches forgiveness and the consequence of a festering hate gone too long. Set among seriously humourous characters, it's a really fun read before bed

Best authors for Classic/ Medieval:

• Homer - The Iliad, aka Troy
  
• Dante Alighieri - The Divine Comedy. His central work, the Divina Commedia (originally called "Commedia" and later called "Divina" by Boccaccio hence "Divina Commedia"), is considered the greatest literary work composed in the Italian language and a masterpiece of world literature

Niche music in Singapore? Or not?

Tell me out of these that are mentioned below, which do you know/ have you heard of:

• Rammstein
• The 69 Eyes
• Within Temptation
• Virgin Black
• After Forever
• Nightwish
• Otep
• Rabia Sorda

There's just so many more and these are the more 'mainstream' ones as it is.

Oh please, if you don't know Rammestein then you ought to shoot yourself, like now! Rammstein has had massive success across the world, spanning to every nation! Here's something to refresh that lil brain of yours...

Feuer Frei - xXx - movie


They have a variety of related styles, including industrial metal, electronic with influences of punk rock and gothic rock. Their songs are mostly sung in German but have be widely popular in many countries especially America.

Rammstein took its name indirectly from the western German town of Ramstein-Miesenbach, site of a flight show disaster on August 28, 1988. The band's signature song, the eponymous 'Rammestein', is a commemoration of the tragedy that took place at the Ramstain Air Base.

Mein Teil (the butcher song I called it)


Du Riechst So Gut (My absolute favourite. little mix of EBM there)

• Till Lindemann – vocals
• Richard Z. Kruspe – lead guitars, backing vocals
• Paul Landers – rhythm guitars, backing vocals
• Oliver Riedel – bass guitar
• Christoph Schneider – drums
• Christian Lorenz – keyboards

Of Music, Games and Sector9 Longboards...

Call me a music idiot, but I lean towards the least common type of music that's being played on air often nowadays. At the shop, we play Buddha Bar and Sex Lounge and Brazil Lounge and frankly after listening to the SAME discs over and over and over and over again for almost 3 years, I'm totally SICK SICK SICK of it! Just today I went and bought 3 dics from Gramophone; Putumayo World Music: World Groove, Latin Lounge and Congo to Cuba. Awesome! After catching Miami Vice, I think I'm in love with Cuban and Latin music now. Not the palpitating raps but the chill-out grooves! (People say that the show had been a disappointment, I think it's pretty fine.. Gong Li was beautiful, Collin Farrell was sexy, Jamie Foxx was, well, a fox.) I'm particularly fond of the third track in Latin Lounge; Siempre Me Quedara by BeBe.

I find listening to Loungy music once in a while very mind blowingly sensually erotically relaxing... Metal and Industrial music comes on when I'm mentally preparing myself to do something hard, like studying. Oldies soothe me to sleep and when I'm preparing for work, doing my make up. Anybody can have a large selection of musical favourties, however, I'm not into modern teeny booper pop and RnB unfortunately. Tell me I'm not musically inclined enough just because I dislike what many others call Top Chart Hits, and I'll say 'yes' I'm not. I'm entitled to my own world of music. I simply don't appreciate these new types, they all sound thealike. Same logic goes to others who are indifferent to oldies and trash/speed metal music. Anyway, you need a nice sinewy body to twist and roll hips and such to like these RnB/ Hiphop types. I personally like to root to the same spot and shake a little to the left and right. Just a little, not too much, my tummy will vibrate..

I'm old at heart really, I love Engelbert Humperdinck, Johnny Mathis, The Carpenters, Shirley Bassey, Frank Sinatra and the likes.. I've come to like industrial type music like German band Rammestein, electronic punk such as Prodigy and French metal type like The Enhancer and Aqme, the latters being introduced to me by this adorable friend of mine, a Belgian guy I keep in contact with over MSN. He's always sending me great songs. He's a darling and really cute and he introduced me to Hellsing a year ago, I just took an interest in it, like, 10 mins ago. He's a great lover of the Japanese manga comic and anime, I think he keeps a collection of these things. The last night I heard, he's looking for the twin pistols of his favourite character Alucard, twin guns called Joshua, (Balls : 13 mm explosives , Powders Mabelle NNA-9 , Shoots 9 and it's 42.75 cm long) and Jackal, which is an insane gun (weighing 17.5 kg and 39cm long, Balls: Heart solid silver of Macedonia filled with blessed mercury , Powders: Mabelle NNA-9 , shoots : 6). He got these facts from a French site. So let me know if anyone can find the replica.. They kinda look like Ebony and Ivory in Devil May Cry to those who play PS2 games but twice the size of those awesome guns that nv ever run out of bullets.

Walk through action games are absolutely funtastic!!! I love these action games! Devil May Cry, Devil May Cry2, and Devil May Cry: Dante's Awakening are my THE BEST games ever! I'm not sure about you, but I've enjoyed venting the chiseled half-demon's revenge on renegade monsters, and there's nothing like killing a horde of monsters when you're having a bad day and feeling really pissed off! Other games to relieve tension may be Dynasty Warriors, Drakengard, Onimusha: Demon Siege, Chaos Legion, Crimson Sea and other action games with enemies attacking like avenging waves and the annilation is absolute satisfaction... Devil May Cry 4 has recently launched their official Japan Website on the 8th of September and lucky crew at Gamespot have tried their hands on the new game, read about it: TGS-06 Devil May Cry Hands-on. Check out the cheat codes and DMC info at Devil May Cry, Devil May Cry 2, Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening. The gameplay is great, visuals are stunning and the main protagonist is such a fox man! Pwhor! I admit, I judge games by their covers! Capcom produces some of best games so far that I've played. The other fav game from the same company has to be Onimusha 3: Demon Siege, both characters take on the models of Takeshi Kaneshiro and Jean Reno in a modern France and epic Japan. Visuals are the best of the Onimusha series. Other games of interests are The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, but I had difficulties controlling the characters cos there were so many things to control. The cute Belgian, Christophe, is an avid gamer and is so much better at this game. Shadow Hearts: Convenant is the only RPG game that I ever played, alas, before I could complete the game, the ex and I broke up. Haha the Urbz and The Sims: Bustin Out is hell of a fun too, once you get over the controls!

I don't like horror games, they give me the creeps but don't say I haven't tried any, I played Fatal Frame 2: Crimson Butterfly and Resident Evil: Outbreak. After playing Fatal Frame 2 under the blanket, sweaty palms and the volume down, I decided I'm really not a horror sort or person. I roared when the door shook announcing the arrival of the first ghost coinciding when my ex's room door shook upon impact of a big fist. Taking photos of ghosts... that's madness!


Eddy likes war and car racing games and also games that generally levitate the status of gangsters like Grand Thef Auto. He's got a Playstation2, Xbox 360 and PSP. He's scary when he plays games cos he yells curses and throws the controller anyhow. Sometimes I'd just snatch the controller from him when he dies so I can play instead of watching the controller whizz past. He has finished Burnout Revenge already and now on the verge of continuing what he hasn't finished, Midnight Club, Battlefield2.... I can't remember what he has anymore... Too bad he can't play PS2 games anymore. He threw the controller during Midnight in the Club and his console is gone from all the abuse...















Really quite fun once you get used to it.














A tension reliever.



























I bought a Sector9 Longboard for Eddy last month. It's just reached me and Cor! it took me long enought to wrap the thing. It's long and the box sucks. Ended up like a pancake. Eddy has always been into these 'board games'. Skateboards, long boards, carveboards, snowboards, you name it. He's really into extreme sports too, a real extremist. This Bombhills Longboard wa meant for his birthday on the 28th of October, but I couldn't resist giving it to him more than a month early!