A poem today to summon the spirit of Halloween. This is by Thomas Hardy:
Tree-leaves labour up and down,
And through them the fainting light
Succumbs to the crawl of night.
Outside in the road the telegraph wire
To the town from the darkening land
Intones to travellers like a spectral lyre
Swept by a spectral hand.
A car comes up, with lamps full-glare,
That flash upon a tree:
It has nothing to do with me,
And whangs along in a world of its own,
Leaving a blacker air;
And mute by the gate I stand again alone,And nobody pulls up there.
"Nobody Comes" was written in October 1924, and it makes me wonder if Hardy ever visited Binscombe...
I always say that Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is not a horror story in the way that Dracula is, for instance. But I also love James Whale's movies and, even more so, the Hammer series with Peter Cushing as an ennobled and deliriously driven Victor Frankenstein -- and Hieronymus J. Doom shares my geeky obsessions, as you'll see from this characteristically discerning, witty and well-argued review of my interactive take on Frankenstein:
As if that's not enough of a Samhain fix, Frankenstein was recently featured on the blog here.
Other sources of delectable chills for the time of year are:
- The Collected Short Stories of Saki by H H Munro
- Fancies & Goodnights by John Collier
- Japanese Ghost Stories by Yakumo Koizumi (aka Lafcadio Hearn)
- "A Wrong Turning" by Martin McKenna and Dave Morris
- "Waiting for a Bus" by John Whitbourn (from The Binscombe Tales)
- Headcases: A Bestiary of Flying Nightmares from World Folklore
I still haven't read your Frankenstein on account of the i-pad only issue, Dave. Is the print version you mentioned a while back imminent? Also the extra A J Alan stories?
ReplyDeleteI'm sure readers are in for a treat with the new Mr W story you're publishing next week. I clocked he's also recently released a book called 'Lucy In the Lammas Lands' that I started reading last night. I took a punt that it's up to his usual standards, so that's what my son (aged 10) and all his mates are getting as Christmas presents. Whether they read it or not is another matter entirely. Don't know if you did the cover but I love it, very vibrant.
To join in with the seasonal recommendations, the 2017 film 'Ghost Stories' on BBC iplayer is worth a look if you haven't seen it.
Oh, Andy, you're making me feel guilty. I meant to get the print version of Frankenstein out for Halloween, but trying to figure out how to use Affinity Publisher (the DTP package I'm using for Jewelspider) has grown like a black hole to swallow every available minute. Next year, I promise! And the A J Alan stories. I have less of an excuse with those, as previously I had to painstakingly go through the garbled text from OCR and edit out all the mistakes -- but now AI can clean up the OCR text in seconds. It's not helping me with book layout, though...
DeleteI did indeed do the cover for Lucy of the Lammas Lands. (Well, to be honest, AI did the heavy lifting, but that still means a few hours of tweaking to get the finished art.)
I have seen Ghost Stories -- co-written by one of the League of Gentlemen, no less -- and very good it was too. Proper spooky.
Thanks for the update, Dave. No rush with those. Will give me something to look forward to for next Halloween.
DeleteI really ought to go and see the Inside No. 9 Live Show. Reece Shearsmith is a contestant in the current series of Taskmaster which is hilarious.
The three certainties in life are death, taxes and me inexplicably getting the name of John Whitbourn book titles wrong. I'd like to say I started reading it so quickly because of my love of his work, but it was because I had to switch off the new series of The Witcher, which is somehow managing to be even worse than the last.
An easy mistake to make, Andy. I kept writing it as "Lucy and the Lammas Lands", but having to position the title on the cover finally set me straight. I'm looking forward to reading it. So far I've only seen the first couple of pages, and immediately I could picture the movie.
DeleteI love The Witcher games, but maybe for that reason I've never seen the TV series. Henry Cavill seems like a good casting choice, but I can only hear Geralt's voice as Doug Cockle.
Here's the link to Lucy of the Lammas Lands for those who are wondering what we're talking about. It's a Middle Grade fantasy adventure novel that should appeal to fans of Roald Dahl, C.S. Lewis, Katherine Rundell, J.K.Rowling, Alan Garner, and Susan Cooper.
Delete'And There's Place-Name Studies' is one of Mr W's finest short stories, Dave. I hope he updates Altered Englands at some point for us completists.
DeleteJust as a peripheral observation, I couldn't read the story on my Android mobile as the text doesn't show up on the white background, Where on my laptop I found the white text against a black background quite straining to the 'Eyes' (that being Mr W's best short short in my opinion). Aside from that, I really hope you put more nuggets like that on 'Wrong'.
'Lucy of the Lammas Lands' is fantastic by the way. You and Arthur Inteligente have excelled yourselves with the cover given you haven't read it.
I wonder if I ought to reconfigure Wrong, Andy. That white text on a black background sends my eyes into jitters after a while too.
DeleteYou're giving Mr Whitbourn the easy way out. Instead of suggesting a new edition of Altered Englands with one extra story, I thought he ought to write a dozen new stories and give us an Altered Englands Vol 2!
Good luck getting Mr W to write another dozen short stories, Dave! My mind blip with 'Alternate Englands' could be put to good use though, having a nice symmetry about it as a title.
DeleteI see I got the name of the short story wrong. Cross my heart that wasn't on purpose. I even checked it several times. Although this time it can be put down to too much wine rather than anything supernatural.
I've just taken a punt and bought Martin Noutch's Steam Highwayman 1 given you keep banging on about it, Dave!
DeleteI don't think you'll be disappointed, Andy. For some reason it makes me think of haring around the country lanes of Buckinghamshire (where I lived until I was three) only on a steam bike instead of the little pedal tricycle that was my pride and joy back then.
DeleteI'll look forward to it, Dave. Weirdly, one of my earliest memories is bombing up and down a path to a church on a similar vehicle when I was about four. I can date it on account of being close to where Brian Clough lived and a conversation in our garden about him signing the footballer Asa Harford!
DeleteI can trump that, Andy (though I should admit I've never heard of Asa Harford) as I was pedalling for all my little legs are worth less than a mile from where Bond and Goldfinger played golf.
DeleteStill the best Bond, Dave! Or From Russia With Love.
DeleteAs Mr W seems to be writing for a younger audience incrementally, perhaps his next work should be called 'The Tricycle Trio' aimed at 4-7 year olds. A group of young lads (we'll call them Matt, Asa and Dan, if we're allowed to have that acronym) pedal so fast on their trikes they get pulled into another dimension, so begins their quest to correct book title spelling errors and rid the world of Jane Austin books (this is John's work after all). Each entry having a particular moral, a series to rival the Mr Men.
On the subject of which, I see 'Mr Poirot' has been released. Even the completist in me can't bring myself to buy that. And I see they've changed Mr Uppity to Mr Snooty. Is nothing sacred?!
It's the kids' bad spelling that makes the world of literature safe for aficionados, Andy -- I like that! As for the Agatha Christie meets the Mr Men mash-up... I kept thinking, "But wait, it's not April the First yet!"
DeleteI've just started a massive viewing project: all the Bond films in order of release, kicking off with Dr No -- and I found I hardly remembered anything except the spider. From Russia With Love next. I might skip Never Say Never Again, though, despite Connery being in it.
Possibly inspired by Alan Partridge, I did the Bond films a few years back, Dave. Yes, I think you'll get away with not doing Never Say Never Again. It's strange how some of the later releases have dated a lot more than the early ones, especially latter era Moore, and I was never a fan of Brosnan. I'm in the minority who thought Timothy Dalton was a decent Bond. He grew up in Belper not far from where my Dad worked most of his life.
DeleteOh, and when I went onto Amazon to leave a review for Lucy of the Lammas Lands, I saw Mr W has also released a new play, so that'll be arriving on my doorstep soon as well.
I'm hoping the play (He Was A Bugger But I Loved Him for the benefit of our other readers) will get a London première, Andy, though I realize that wouldn't be quite as convenient a trip for you.
DeleteTimothy Dalton is my favourite Bond because he was the nearest to the character in the books -- and perhaps the Derbyshire connection gives him extra points, that being my other ancestral stamping ground (besides Dublin and Hertfordshire). To be exact, my favourite Bond might have been the One That Got Away -- Michael Fassbender. He's too old now. Daniel Craig was OK as far as casting goes but I didn't care for the movies, and never even bothered with the last one, though obviously I'll have to watch it as part of the full canon.
I agree about Daniel Craig, Dave. I thought the films were ok, just not as good as the hype. That they were all over half an hour too long was my biggest gripe. We'll let you off watching the original Casino Royale as well.
DeleteOne of the only things that would tempt me to ever set foot in London again is a John Whitbourn play. Admittedly I would have preferred Downs Lord Dawn to Monica and Phillip!
Never say never, Andy. (Just don't say never say never again.) I still think the BBC should do the Binscombe Tales as a radio series (that's if they're not bankrupted by Trump first) in which case an audience would get to show up for the recording.
DeleteI'd even tolerate the Underground one more time to be able to see that Binscombe recording, Dave. On which related note, my 'Lucy...' review has finally landed,
DeleteGreat review title, Andy, as always -- and I was chuffed to see Vampire's Lair mentioned. I really need to read the Terry Nation one. And Lucy too, come to that. I'm pretty sure it'll rate 5 stars from me too.
DeleteThanks, Dave. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day! Yes, do try and read Rebecca's World. I won't wax lyrical otherwise I'll set your expectations too high, but it's good for what it is.
DeleteI do hope John's play gets picked up, it's excellent. With caveats around my expertise on the subject matter and genre, I've left an Amazon review. They've told me its live but hasn't appeared yet.
It's live now, Andy. I'm looking forward to reading the play -- but even more to seeing it on stage. Fingers crossed...
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