This week has seen the death of James Herbert, possibly the greatest horror writer of my generation.
I remember very well, the first time I saw one of his books - it was his first, The Rats, and would have been around 1979. I was at scout camp and would have been, I guess 12 years old. One of the older scouts bought it and we all sat around while he read out the most gruesome bits (and, trust me, to 12 year old me, brought up on The Famous Five etc this was an eye opener).
James Herbert was the author who got me into reading horror and for that I will be forever grateful. His were stories that really could scare the hell out of you at times but could also make you think "what if".
If it hadn't been for James Herbert, I may have missed out on the likes of Graham Masterton, Guy N Smith, Clive Barker and Shaun Hutson - and I devoured books by all these authors, and still do.
Rest in peace now Mr Herbert and thank-you
Sunday, 24 March 2013
A Beginning (The Tower and The Eye) by KIra Morgana - a review
A Beginning (The Tower and The Eye) starts out as a pretty standard Dungeons and
Dragons romp. You have your basic characters (Human, Dwarf, Cleric, Theif, Elf)
and all the cross race banter you would expect. You have a dungeon to explore
(loaded with traps, threats etc) and you have an Ancient Enemy.
When you put all these elements together you could have a run-of-the-mill story but thanks to the authors love of, and experience with all things d+d, what you get is a short story with a lot of promise for the series it is setting up.
There are twists and turns to the story that I didn't expect and an ending that left me stunned, in so much as I never saw THAT coming.
A grand start to what promises to be a classic fantasy series for years to come
When you put all these elements together you could have a run-of-the-mill story but thanks to the authors love of, and experience with all things d+d, what you get is a short story with a lot of promise for the series it is setting up.
There are twists and turns to the story that I didn't expect and an ending that left me stunned, in so much as I never saw THAT coming.
A grand start to what promises to be a classic fantasy series for years to come
Tuesday, 19 March 2013
Wheel of Time re-read (books 1-4) by Leigh Butler (a review)
WOW!!! I wasn't sure at first, reading somebody else's thoughts on a fantasy
series that is very dear to my heart, but within the first couple of chapters I
was hooked.
The chapters are broken down into two parts - What Happened (speaks for itself really, but it is a brief description of evevts in the chapter, and Commentary, which is Ms. Butler's thoughts on those events.
Each chapter is short, punchy and does exactly what it needs to to fill you in with all the salient points, but also has enough "Oh, yeah, I'd forgotten about him/her/that place/event" moments as well.
In short, Ms. Butler has done a fantastic job with this re-read and made a priceless accompaniment to The Wheel of Time series.
The chapters are broken down into two parts - What Happened (speaks for itself really, but it is a brief description of evevts in the chapter, and Commentary, which is Ms. Butler's thoughts on those events.
Each chapter is short, punchy and does exactly what it needs to to fill you in with all the salient points, but also has enough "Oh, yeah, I'd forgotten about him/her/that place/event" moments as well.
In short, Ms. Butler has done a fantastic job with this re-read and made a priceless accompaniment to The Wheel of Time series.
Monday, 18 March 2013
Ocean Strike by Damien Lewis (a review)
A British agent in Port Louis, Mauritius gets information of a threat to the UK. The information is sent to London - a container ship is heading towards Sellafield with enough Sarin to cause a bigger disaster than the 9/11 attacks in New York..............................and it's only 3 days to Christmas!!!!!!!!!!
This short story rattles along at a good old pace. The action is pretty much relentless (as you would expect under the circumstances!) but not over the top in terminology. The author obviously knows his stuff and this shows, making a very readable book.
Would I read more by this author.........................Hell Yeah!!!!!!
This short story rattles along at a good old pace. The action is pretty much relentless (as you would expect under the circumstances!) but not over the top in terminology. The author obviously knows his stuff and this shows, making a very readable book.
Would I read more by this author.........................Hell Yeah!!!!!!
Sunday, 10 March 2013
Oz The Great And Powerful (a review of kinds)
First off, let me just say that
a) This is the first time I've reviewed a film in any way shape or form
b) THIS MAY CONTAIN MINOR SPOILERS
I saw this film in its IMAX version this afternoon, and friends, it was GOOD! Ok, some of the effects were better than others (and there were some ropey ones) but the good ones really worked well.
The story is that of Oscar "Oz" Diggs (played by James Franco) a fraud magician with a travelling fairground in 1905 Kansas. He is a smoothy with the ladies but is rumbled by an ex conquests, the shows' strongman he legs it and escapes in a hot air balloon.
As with The Wizard of Oz, the Kansas scenes are filmed in monotone, and, also as in Wizard a twister takes our "hero" to another land - the glorious technicolour land of OZ.
And this is where the IMAX comes into its own. The land looks beautiful, the colours are bright and there are many little things happening in the background to make you feel involved with the scenery.
There are quite a few nods to the old film and also a few hints at back story ( ie what made the cowardly lion the way he is),
Franco is excellently cast as Oz, a con man out of his depth, trying not to get too involved when everybody is depending on him to save the day. There are good performances too from Michelle Williams, Mila Kunis and Rachael Weiss as the witches of the South, East and West (especially Kunis, possibly one of the best performances of her career in my opinion).
The Tin Man, Scarecrow and Lion are replaced in this film by Finlay, a flying monkey and a little china doll that will just melt your heart.
A good story with a blockbuster ending, I would give this film 4 out of 5.
a) This is the first time I've reviewed a film in any way shape or form
b) THIS MAY CONTAIN MINOR SPOILERS
I saw this film in its IMAX version this afternoon, and friends, it was GOOD! Ok, some of the effects were better than others (and there were some ropey ones) but the good ones really worked well.
The story is that of Oscar "Oz" Diggs (played by James Franco) a fraud magician with a travelling fairground in 1905 Kansas. He is a smoothy with the ladies but is rumbled by an ex conquests, the shows' strongman he legs it and escapes in a hot air balloon.
As with The Wizard of Oz, the Kansas scenes are filmed in monotone, and, also as in Wizard a twister takes our "hero" to another land - the glorious technicolour land of OZ.
And this is where the IMAX comes into its own. The land looks beautiful, the colours are bright and there are many little things happening in the background to make you feel involved with the scenery.
There are quite a few nods to the old film and also a few hints at back story ( ie what made the cowardly lion the way he is),
Franco is excellently cast as Oz, a con man out of his depth, trying not to get too involved when everybody is depending on him to save the day. There are good performances too from Michelle Williams, Mila Kunis and Rachael Weiss as the witches of the South, East and West (especially Kunis, possibly one of the best performances of her career in my opinion).
The Tin Man, Scarecrow and Lion are replaced in this film by Finlay, a flying monkey and a little china doll that will just melt your heart.
A good story with a blockbuster ending, I would give this film 4 out of 5.
Saturday, 16 February 2013
The Dominus Runes by Peter Lukes
Wow!!!!!!!!!
What a brilliant
and enjoyable book this is.
Do you like future earth sci-fi? How about if we chuck in a touch of fantasy? Now, to that we'll add horror (and images that could have come from the imagination of Clive Barker)!
Still with me? Right, now to all that add a bunch of characters that would be at home in a noir detective/ gangster type novel.
And there you have it - a mix of genres that don't always work together but in this case really do, with scenes that'll have you picking your jaw off the floor just in time for it to drop again.
With Peter Lukes the future of Sci-fi is in safe hands. This guy deserves to be up there with the big names - surely it is only a matter of time.
What a brilliant
and enjoyable book this is.
Do you like future earth sci-fi? How about if we chuck in a touch of fantasy? Now, to that we'll add horror (and images that could have come from the imagination of Clive Barker)!
Still with me? Right, now to all that add a bunch of characters that would be at home in a noir detective/ gangster type novel.
And there you have it - a mix of genres that don't always work together but in this case really do, with scenes that'll have you picking your jaw off the floor just in time for it to drop again.
With Peter Lukes the future of Sci-fi is in safe hands. This guy deserves to be up there with the big names - surely it is only a matter of time.
Sunday, 3 February 2013
The Wheel of Time - general thoughts and ramblings
So, this week I finally turned the last page of A Memory of Light - the fourteenth and final volume of the Wheel of Time series.
I started reading the series way, way back in 1990 and that got me thinking - I've been reading and following this series for half of my lifetime.
I remember being in WH Smith one Friday afternoon back in '90 and seeing the first book in the series, The Eye of the World - It was HUGE!!! The first thing that got me was the cover art - I was a big fan of Daryl Sweets covers and this was one of his best. I guess I was already sold on the book before I read the cover blurb but the blurb only turned a "want" into a "must have".
Needless to say I got the book home and devoured it. Thankfully book 2 and book 3 followed fairly quickly (and possibly books 4 and 5) but after a while there came a bigger gap between books and also, some of the books seemed to be a lot of reading for very little happening - but I had to keep on with them, for when things did finally happen they were usually well worth the wait.
Then, in 2007, the author, Robert Jordan, died leaving the series unfinished. Thankfully he had prepared for this eventuality and left enough notes for the book to be finished after his passing. The job of completing the final book was given to Brandon Sanderson - the ending was in sight.
The final book turned out to be 3 books but, in my opinion, that was for the better as there was a hell of a lot of story to be told.
The whole WoT story deserves to be recognised as a masterpiece in my opinion. I've been with these characters since they left the village of Emond's Field in the Two Rivers all those years ago. I've watched them grow into the roles they were given. I sat at 2am one morning, back when book 5 had just been published, stunned because Moiraine, one of the main characters had seemingly been killed off (it was expected but I guess I always thought there would be a way out). I remember feeling both sad and cheated at the death of Mr, Jordan and dubious about the ability of Mr. Sanderson to finish the job (and boy was I wrong there - he turned out to be THE BEST CHOICE!!).
I've had the good fortune to have met both Mr. Jordan and Mr. Sanderson at book signings and two nicer guys you couldn't hope to meet.
These books have been a big part of my reading life and will continue to be so as I now plan to start a complete re-read.
I started reading the series way, way back in 1990 and that got me thinking - I've been reading and following this series for half of my lifetime.
I remember being in WH Smith one Friday afternoon back in '90 and seeing the first book in the series, The Eye of the World - It was HUGE!!! The first thing that got me was the cover art - I was a big fan of Daryl Sweets covers and this was one of his best. I guess I was already sold on the book before I read the cover blurb but the blurb only turned a "want" into a "must have".
Needless to say I got the book home and devoured it. Thankfully book 2 and book 3 followed fairly quickly (and possibly books 4 and 5) but after a while there came a bigger gap between books and also, some of the books seemed to be a lot of reading for very little happening - but I had to keep on with them, for when things did finally happen they were usually well worth the wait.
Then, in 2007, the author, Robert Jordan, died leaving the series unfinished. Thankfully he had prepared for this eventuality and left enough notes for the book to be finished after his passing. The job of completing the final book was given to Brandon Sanderson - the ending was in sight.
The final book turned out to be 3 books but, in my opinion, that was for the better as there was a hell of a lot of story to be told.
The whole WoT story deserves to be recognised as a masterpiece in my opinion. I've been with these characters since they left the village of Emond's Field in the Two Rivers all those years ago. I've watched them grow into the roles they were given. I sat at 2am one morning, back when book 5 had just been published, stunned because Moiraine, one of the main characters had seemingly been killed off (it was expected but I guess I always thought there would be a way out). I remember feeling both sad and cheated at the death of Mr, Jordan and dubious about the ability of Mr. Sanderson to finish the job (and boy was I wrong there - he turned out to be THE BEST CHOICE!!).
I've had the good fortune to have met both Mr. Jordan and Mr. Sanderson at book signings and two nicer guys you couldn't hope to meet.
These books have been a big part of my reading life and will continue to be so as I now plan to start a complete re-read.
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