Monthly Archive: May 2011

The therapist by

Martin Kobel specialises in helping people. That’s his job, as a therapist, people in need come to him and he helps them. And when he bumps into Annabelle Young at a cafe he sees in her someone he can help. But she hasn’t asked him for help, he passes her his card, hoping that will prompt her to ask for assistance. That doesn’t work. And she is a teacher, her trouble could easily damage a whole class of young impressionable children. He has to do something.

Hanna dir. by

Hanna is sixteen years old. She lives with her father in the woods in isolated Finland. And when we first meet her she is stalking a deer through the snow, shooting it with a bow and arrow before finishing the injured animal off with her knife. To say she hasn’t had the most normal of upbringings is not an exaggeration. Her father has trained her to survive, to adapt, fight, and to kill. Now that she is growing up she wants more. She wants to experience the rest of the world. But to do so she must first help kill her father’s old enemy.

Blood by

The unnamed central character of this short story finds himself suddenly craving blood. He can’t understand it, he is a normal person, a normal man, why on earth is this happening to him. He tries to rationalise it, maybe he has an iron deficiency? Or maybe it is a totally misdirected sex-drive? And yet, he continues to find himself being drawn towards blood. Bloody raw steaks, the next-door neighbour’s chickens…

The heroes by

the heroesThe forces of the Union are about to meet those of the North in battle. Over the next three days war will be waged, and men will die. Or become heroes. Or something in between. This is the story of those bloody days, the story of the men, and occasional women, on both sides who fight.

A monster calls by

a monster callsEvery night Conor O’Malley has the nightmare. Every night. But tonight something is different. Tonight there is a new monster. A new nightmare. And Conor isn’t sure if this is a dream or not. But either way, this is the monster he was fearing. This monster, the yew tree, tells him that it will tell him three stories. And then Conor will tell the monster a story. A true story. And if he doesn’t, then the monster will eat him alive.

2011 #6

I’m not even going to mention the fact that this is only number 6 of the year and yet we are almost midway through May, so you shouldn’t either

Author talk by

As you may remember, last year I came across a series of books by Patrick Ness, The Chaos Walking trilogy. Which I loved. They even made me cry they were so good. And when I spotted that he was going to write a book based on an idea by Siobhan Dowd I thought, oh, that sounds fascinating. And then I saw the cover, and thought “ooooohhh that looks veeeery interesting”.

Ghosts of Vesuvius by

It is hard to blurb this book. On the one hand it is about Vesuvius and volcanic explosions and disasters both natural and man-made. But it is also a book about the origins of the earth, of the universe, and about how precarious our existence is. How so much of what we are today is dependent on natural events a thousand years ago, or a millennia ago, or so long ago that it is almost pointless to count the time because it is so difficult to grasp those sort of numbers.

Hobo with a shotgun dir. by

This once existed only as a trailer to Grindhouse but one day some one decided to go on ahead and make the film. I mean, it has a catchy title, in a Snakes on a plane sort of way. And the idea of a sort of comedy action film with Rutger Hauer as a hobo with a shotgun sounded like it might be vaguely entertaining.

The plot is this: hobo shows up in an ultra violent town. Ultra violent things occur. Blood. Gore. Death.

Beginning shortly

So, that was unexpected news about Bin Laden, don’t you think. I was out doing the garden this morning and so was later than the rest of all the world in reading about it. And as an anti-death penalty person I have to say that I’m quite happy hearing he isn’t with us any more. Not so sure about the pictures of the jubilant scenes outside the White House, but I guess a lot of those people were affected a lot more by the September 11 attacks

Danger Will Robinson

We-elll The upgrade went okay. Although the automatic yoke didn’t work so I had to do a manual. Still, seems okay. But look a new theme! Where did that come from...