We went over to a friend’s place for a cheese and wine
party. Most of the cheese made it from table to mouth but some of the wine
ended up on the carpet (white wine and salt used to counter the red stain).
There was a big football match on the TV that some of the guys were interested
in but I was happy sitting with the girls and trying not to trip over Lynda’s
dogs.
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Olympic Flame…
The Olympic Flame has arrived in the UK and is touring the country before the opening ceremony. It has its own entourage of security with the police wearing strange looking ‘sporty’ uniforms and bustling out anyone who strays into the security envelope. So different from when it last came through the country in 1948 - I heard a tale of how when it came through our village then a local woman stepped up to the torch carrier and lit her cigarette on the flame.
Thursday, May 17, 2012
The spy who made me laugh…
This is the animated adult TV series about a man-child
super spy Sterling Archer who works for his mother at the ISIS (International
Secret Intelligence Service). Somewhere between James Bond, and Maxwell Smart
(Get Smart for you youngsters out there), Sterling Archer is a complex man with
serious issues who likes to self medicate on whiskey and resolve his problems
at the point of a gun or in the bedroom. He is a self centred and emotionally immature
yet highly skilled and feared secret agent. Set deliberately ambiguously in a
timeline that mixes 1960’s, 70’s and 80’s visual references it harks back to a
period where the spy genre was most popular while ensuring that there are
enough contemporary tweaks and sensibilities to add to the unique feel of the
show.
More of wot I have read…
I have got the feeling that I have read this before,
it all seems quite familiar. It is a somewhat formulaic story with a few
interesting and original ideas in it. The action is well paced that keeps the narrative
ticking over. There are the occasional background details that show that the
author has spent a lot of time developing his wider world setting to give more
depth to this and future stories in the same environment. Might be interesting
enough to want to see how the character develops in the later stories.
‘Not only
humans who know the meaning of hate.
A technician comes through the runcible on Samarkand at a
fraction below light speed. His arrival has killed thousands and wrecked a
terraforming project. The immortal Horace Blegg sends agent Cormac to investigate,
but Cormac must resolve things without the support of the AI grid, for his
thirty years of being gridlinked has left him without humanity. He does have
Shuriken, a throwing star with a mind of its own, the ambivalent dracomen, and
Golem combat androids at his side. But Pelter, with his mercenaries and
something out of nightmare, is on his trail.
Samarkand has descended into frigid cold and sabotage is
uncovered. The prime suspect is unfortunately an alien called ‘Dragon’, which
had apparently destroyed itself twenty-seven years before the event. An alien artifact
is uncovered and its monstrous guardian is a killer. How did both of these get
where they were? Why was the runcible destroyed? Cormac must resolve all questions
and decide who is lying. He must do this while hunted by Pelter and avoiding
the ungentle attentions of the killing machine, Mr. Crane. And in the end
someone must be punished.’
Friday, May 11, 2012
More of wot I have read…
The Call of the Weird: Travels in American Subcultures
by Louis Theroux
I remember seeing some of the TV series a few years
back and found them interesting if not a little disturbing (though I am sure
that was what was expected due to the interviewing style of Louis). This book revisits
some of the stories and catches up with them a few years later to see what has
happened to them. It is a good read and shows a reasonable journalistic balance
without sensationalising events or people much at all, though this in turn does
mean the book somewhat lacks the tension or drama that makes you want to read
on avidly.
‘For over ten years Louis Theroux has been making programmes about
offbeat characters on the fringes of US society. Now he returns to America and
attempts to track down some of the people who have most fascinated him over the
years, trying to discover what motivates them, why they believe the things they
believe, and what has happened to the assorted dreamers, outlaws, and
eccentrics since he last saw them.
On a journey that takes him to the porn sets of Los Angeles, among the
UFO contactees of Arizona, and up to far Northern Idaho for a festival
get-together of leading neo-Nazis, he asks what ‘weird people’ have to tell us
about our own secret natures. Has he learned anything about himself by being
among them? Do we choose our beliefs or do our beliefs choose us?
Louis Theroux’s first book is a hilarious, thought-provoking and at
times surreal voyage into the heart of weirdness.’
Thursday, May 03, 2012
More of wot I have read…
The Leviathan Series by Scott Westerfeld
This is an entertaining series of books aimed at the young adult reader. It is in a steampunk style and takes place in an alternative universe at the time of the outbreak of the First World War. In this world two factions have developed, those that have embraced genetic manipulation to create wondrous and formidable ‘beasties’ who take their name from the great naturalist of the time, Darwin, and the second faction are the ‘Clankers’ who have shunned what they refer to as the ungodly manipulation of animals for a technical solution that allows them to create great metal vehicles and weapons of war.
The story pitches two young people of opposites together (one a young girl from a poor Dawinist culture, and the other a young royal Clanker, both of whom are hiding something).
They engage in a series of adventures that through the series takes them across the globe and brings them to the brink of disaster and to the beginnings of love.
Leviathan
Previously reviewed here
‘It is the cusp of World War I. The Austro-Hungarians and Germans have their Clankers, steam-driven iron machines loaded with guns and ammunition. The British Darwinists employ genetically fabricated animals as their weaponry. Their Leviathan is a whale airship and the most masterful beast in the British fleet.
Aleksandar Ferdinand, a Clanker, and Deryn Sharp, a Darwinist, are on opposite sides of the war. But their paths cross in the most unexpected way, taking them both aboard the Leviathan on a fantastical, around-the-world adventure….One that will change both their lives forever.’
Behemoth
‘The behemoth is the fiercest creature in the British navy. It can swallow enemy battleships with one bite. The Darwinists will need it, now that they are at war with the Clanker Powers.
Deryn is a girl posing as a boy in the British Air Service and Alek is the heir to an empire posing as a commoner. Finally together aboard the airship Leviathan, they hope to bring the war to a halt. But when disaster strikes the Leviathan's peacekeeping mission, they find themselves alone and hunted in enemy territory.
Alek and Deryn will need great skill, new allies, and brave hearts to face what’s ahead.’
Goliath
‘Alek and Deryn are on the last leg of their round-the-world quest to end World War I, reclaim Alek’s throne as prince of Austria, and finally fall in love. The first two objectives are complicated by the fact that their ship, the Leviathan, continues to detour farther away from the heart of the war (and crown). And the love thing would be a lot easier if Alek knew Deryn was a girl. (She has to pose as a boy in order to serve in the British Air Service.) And if they weren’t technically enemies.
The tension thickens as the Leviathan steams toward New York City with a homicidal lunatic on board: secrets suddenly unravel, characters reappear, and nothing is at it seems in this thunderous conclusion to Scott Westerfeld’s brilliant trilogy.’
This is an entertaining series of books aimed at the young adult reader. It is in a steampunk style and takes place in an alternative universe at the time of the outbreak of the First World War. In this world two factions have developed, those that have embraced genetic manipulation to create wondrous and formidable ‘beasties’ who take their name from the great naturalist of the time, Darwin, and the second faction are the ‘Clankers’ who have shunned what they refer to as the ungodly manipulation of animals for a technical solution that allows them to create great metal vehicles and weapons of war.
The story pitches two young people of opposites together (one a young girl from a poor Dawinist culture, and the other a young royal Clanker, both of whom are hiding something).
They engage in a series of adventures that through the series takes them across the globe and brings them to the brink of disaster and to the beginnings of love.
Leviathan
Previously reviewed here
‘It is the cusp of World War I. The Austro-Hungarians and Germans have their Clankers, steam-driven iron machines loaded with guns and ammunition. The British Darwinists employ genetically fabricated animals as their weaponry. Their Leviathan is a whale airship and the most masterful beast in the British fleet.
Aleksandar Ferdinand, a Clanker, and Deryn Sharp, a Darwinist, are on opposite sides of the war. But their paths cross in the most unexpected way, taking them both aboard the Leviathan on a fantastical, around-the-world adventure….One that will change both their lives forever.’
Behemoth
‘The behemoth is the fiercest creature in the British navy. It can swallow enemy battleships with one bite. The Darwinists will need it, now that they are at war with the Clanker Powers.
Deryn is a girl posing as a boy in the British Air Service and Alek is the heir to an empire posing as a commoner. Finally together aboard the airship Leviathan, they hope to bring the war to a halt. But when disaster strikes the Leviathan's peacekeeping mission, they find themselves alone and hunted in enemy territory.
Alek and Deryn will need great skill, new allies, and brave hearts to face what’s ahead.’
Goliath
‘Alek and Deryn are on the last leg of their round-the-world quest to end World War I, reclaim Alek’s throne as prince of Austria, and finally fall in love. The first two objectives are complicated by the fact that their ship, the Leviathan, continues to detour farther away from the heart of the war (and crown). And the love thing would be a lot easier if Alek knew Deryn was a girl. (She has to pose as a boy in order to serve in the British Air Service.) And if they weren’t technically enemies.
The tension thickens as the Leviathan steams toward New York City with a homicidal lunatic on board: secrets suddenly unravel, characters reappear, and nothing is at it seems in this thunderous conclusion to Scott Westerfeld’s brilliant trilogy.’
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