vivdunstan: Test card (tv)
Excavating deep into our DVD collection - it feels like a combination of vertical and horizontal archaeological stratigraphy! - clearing out 30-ish year old VHS tapes (yes really!) and in the process rediscovering some DVD things I forgot we had. Like American Gothic, the short-lived 1995 gothic/horror/fantasy series, that aired in the UK on Channel 4. Well that will be fun to rewatch!

vivdunstan: Part of own photo taken in local university botanic gardens. Tree trunks rise atmospherically, throwing shadows from the sun on the ground. (Default)
My next short story collection read is The Haunted Trail: Classic Tales of the Rambling Weird. Another in the British Library "Tales of the Weird" series. This one is edited by Weird Walk.

An eerie yellow on black background drawing of a path winding through spooky looking plants and trees into the distance. The atmosphere is very foreboding.
vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
Still struggling not to type 2024 at the top of these posts!

    earlier books )
  1. Captive Queen: The Decrypted History of Mary, Queen of Scots by Jade Scott
  2. A Middle-earth Album: Paintings by Joan Wyatt Inspired by Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings by Joan Wyatt
  3. Could You Survive Midsomer? – A Winter's Murder: An Official Midsomer Murders Interactive Novel by Simon Brew
  4. Eerie East Anglia: Fearful Tales of Field and Fen by Edward Parnell
  5. Introducing Shakespeare: A Graphic Guide by Nick Groom
  6. Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
  7. The Principle of Moments by Esmie Jikiemi-Pearson


I've written reviews of Captive Queen, the Midsomer Murders gamebook and Eerie East Anglia.

Of the others, the Tolkien paintings book was nice, though there were some curious choices, especially re the hobbits. The Shakespeare book was great in parts, but had an almost total blind spot on detailed coverage of the many plays, which felt like a huge omission. Our Mutual Friend was a delight for me, as always. And The Principle of Moments, the first in a planned trilogy, was a heady mix of fantasy, space opera and time travelling shenanigans. Probably more ambitious in its goals than it ultimately achieved. But still a riveting read, and I will read the other books.
vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
Just finished this today, another in the British Library's "Tales of the Weird" series of short story collections, gathering together generally older tales, as well as sometimes more recent ones. This collection was edited by Edward Parnell, and focuses on East Anglia, such a rich setting for spooky and weird fiction.

There are 17 short stories in this collection, including a couple by MR James (such as "Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come To You, My Lad"). But also stories by many others, including E.F. Benson, Marjorie Bowen, and even Robert Aickman.

Stories range from medieval through to the present day, though many are in the Victorian or early twentieth century era. Many are written in the MR Jamesian style, of old manuscripts and strange places. Others take a different approach.

Overall most of the stories are strong, but three were absolute standouts for me. Firstly "The Dust-Cloud" by E.F. Benson, the atmospheric tale of a ghostly car crash. This left me unnerved for some time after, as did "The Seventeenth Hole at Duncaster" by H.R. Wakefield, the story of a haunted golf hole. Which started almost PG Wodehouse like, but soon became something darker. The third story that wowed me was John Gordon's "If She Bends, She Breaks", a tale of winter in the fens, that I very much regretted reading just as I was about to go to sleep, because it spooked me so extremely much! But in a good way.

A couple of the stories felt workmanlike. There was only one story that I disliked, indeed viscerally so: "Possum" by Matthew Holness. This was one of a few more modern stories in the book, and felt tonally completely out of place, and phenomenally unpleasant to read. But otherwise it was a strong collection.

Recommended. 4/5 stars.

vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
Crikey I so wanted to type 2024 there haha!

I've got off to a flying start this year, partly with 2 books that were hang overs from before, but also a quick read for my book club. But then I also quickly read 3 other books that had been hanging around for too long, and I wanted to pass on to charity shops. I'd previously started reading a couple of them.
  1. An Academy for Liars by Alexis Henderson
  2. Don't Touch My Hair by Emma Dabiri
  3. Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa
  4. Egyptian Myths: Meet the Gods, Goddesses, and Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt by Jean Menzies
  5. Tutankhamun: The Treasures of the Tomb by Zahi Hawass
  6. ABBA: The Treasures by Ingmarie Halling and Carl Magnus Palm
An Academy for Liars is a dark academia book, with rather a lot of violence and gore added to the mix. It was ok, but I had to push to keep reading it to the end. 3/5 stars.

Don't Touch My Hair by Emma Dabiri was an incredible insight into the experience and history of black hair. A strong 4/5 stars.

Days at the Morisaki Bookshop was another 3/5 star read for me. Ok, mostly, but a rather odd writing style, and an unexpected and lengthy shift away from the cosy bookshop setting mid way through. 3/5 stars.

Egyptian Myths by classical historian and YouTuber Jean Menzies was an entertaining and informative text, full of striking large format illustrations from Katie Ponder. I did find the order and structure a little confusing in places, but I learned a lot. 4/5 stars.

Tutankhamun: The Treasures of the Tomb is a large format coffee table book, filled with huge photographs and details of many hundreds of items from Tutankhamun's tomb. The items chosen are a selection carefully curated by Zahi Hawass, and it's not exhaustive. But for what you did get it was jaw dropping, including multi-page folding out large photographs. Both Martin and I were stunned by parts. 5/5 stars.

ABBA: The Treasures is a large format squidgy book telling much of the story of ABBA in photographs, reminiscences, and reproductions of paper ephemera connected with them, tucked into folders inside that you open up and work through the contents of. It's a nice book, but a rather narrow perspective on their life, focusing mainly on some of their 1970s international tours, which one of the authors accompanied them on. I did feel that I was missing out on the wider story. But the folders of paper ephemera were a delight. I was particularly amused by the customs list, for the Australian tour I think, including a "piano accordion". 4/5 stars.
vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
Just finished my first book of 2025. An Academy for Liars by Alexis Henderson. Dark academia. 3/5 stars. Now for my next novel started Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa, my book club read this month. Initial impressions: writing style a bit brisk for my taste but sticking with it.
vivdunstan: Test card (tv)
Just binge watched - at a bit of speed in places! - the last 3 episodes of Wednesday season 1. Martin is also now watching it, though a bit behind me. It's been odd for him seeing snippets that he'd already seen me watching, and learning where they fit into the story! Anyway yes, I'm all watched up. He should be soon. A second season has already been filmed.

It's very much a teen drama, but I liked an awful lot about it. Especially the gothic feel. Jenna Ortega did a great job. I was also surprised just how dark the last few episodes were in terms of content. But yes, very much enjoyed, and looking forward to the second season.
vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
Nearing the end of my annual October reread of "A Night in the Lonesome October" by Roger Zelazny. And enjoying it as much as always. It is a fantastically creative piece of gothic storytelling, richly imaginative, and so much fun. Perfect for the run up to Halloween each year.

vivdunstan: Part of own photo taken in local university botanic gardens. Tree trunks rise atmospherically, throwing shadows from the sun on the ground. (Default)
I've just finished my marathon viewing of a large bunch of videos on catchup from the Glasgow Worldcon this summer. Watching on catchup I missed out the chance to take part in the live Q&As. And I also found the user interface rather cumbersome, that I had to watch on my laptop, which limited how frequently I could do so. But I still managed to get through quite a large number of talks.

Here are the events I watched, each one about an hour long, typically with 45 main minutes of discussion, followed by 15 minutes of audience Q&A:
  • AI and Work - Do Androids Dream of Taking Your Job?
  • ENIAC and the Post-War Dawn of the Computer age
  • The Horror Out Of Space
  • *Scot-ish: The Influence of Scotland on Fantasy Worldbuilding
  • It's Life, Jim, but Not as We Know It
  • *Iain Banks: Between Genre and the Mainstream
  • All the Shakespeare: the Bard's Influence on SFF
  • The Untold History of Worldcons
  • Inadvisable Rocket Science
  • A Fireside Chat with Samantha Béart
  • Guest of Honour Interview: Ken MacLeod
  • *The Many Legs of SF: Creepy Crawlies in Space
  • 50 Years of TTRPGs
  • Comics Can Save Your Life
  • Faeries in Fantasy Literature
I've marked out above those with asterisks that I especially enjoyed. To pull those out specifically these were:
  • Scot-ish: The Influence of Scotland on Fantasy Worldbuilding
  • Iain Banks: Between Genre and the Mainstream
  • The Many Legs of SF: Creepy Crawlies in Space
The first two of these had obvious Scottish connections, which I unsurprisingly appreciated. But I also found them particularly rewarding in other respects. But I enjoyed something in everything I watched, not just these particular highlight talks.

Martin and I had originally hoped to be at the Glasgow 2024 Worldcon in person. We had low cost attending memberships in place. But things didn't work out that way. However I was able to watch on catchup, and have very much enjoyed that. I was also active in the Discord during the convention, and treated myself to some purchases inspired by the Dealers' Hall.

vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
Just booked myself an online ticket for the British Library's "Tales of the Weird: An Autumnal Festival" on 2nd November. In person tickets have sold out, but online streaming tickets are still available. It's an all day (Saturday) event, and you can view live, or on catchup over the following 48 hours. I've used their catchup streaming for other recent events, and it works well. Looking forward to it! A celebration of weird fiction, in its many forms.
vivdunstan: Scene from The Greatest Enemy episode of Robin of Sherwood (robin of sherwood)
I am continuing to watch these on ITVX. Though generally in spread out spurts, rather than more steadily.

Tonight I was watching the latter half of "Lord of the Trees", all of "The Enchantment", and starting on the first half of "The Swords of Wayland". All episodes from season 2.

One thing that's striking me a lot is how sanitised it is, both in violence, but also in sexual relations. The fight scenes - heavily signposted by the start of the "fight music" each time - are pantomime like a lot. Older me fast forwards through many of them. They also often go on for a very long time. But they're also rarely too gory (*). Nor is there anything like as much sexual violence or menace as you would expect for the time, and would be shown in a more adult aiming programme. Even Lilith's seduction (of a sort) of Robin is remarkably asexual, especially from Robin. And as for Robin and Marion, well that's minimal too.

Against that mythology is heavily used throughout. And it's often very dark. As are the frequently threatening visuals. I've just got to the start of "The Swords of Wayland" two-parter. The images at the start of riders on horseback and menacing people is very visceral and scary. Not in a light Hammer way. Watching "Lord of the Trees" tonight I wondered what Mary Whitehouse would have made of it all! Checking on Wikipedia it seems that she did have views, and "objected to the [show's] relentless slaughter and blasphemous religious elements". No big surprises there!

Women frequently have very strong roles in the series, which is nice to see. Though not so much Marion, even if her agency improves in season 2 over season 1. But I'm thinking especially of villainesses, such as Lilith and Morgwyn. Though quite what that says, that it's generally the evil women who get the strong female roles, I'm not so sure. To be fair, this is set in medieval times, when things were even more limited than today.

It is a bit exasperating how certain storylines are left unfinished though. I'm thinking in particular of what happened to Gisburne at the end of season 1, the story of Baron de Belleme, and of course, and most sadly, the unfinished storylines after the series was cancelled after season 3.

The guest cast is often astonishing though. I've been marvelling at that throughout. I am looking forward to next season, and Richard O'Brien's repeated appearances. Though I'm less excited about an upcoming major cast change. On plus we will have other great guest stars to enjoy. I am especially looking forward to seeing William Russell.

Anyway yes, very happy rewatching these. A marvellous series, that first aired 40 years ago this year. And still well worth making time for.

* I know that ITVX has cut some of the violence. But I've seen enough of the series on DVD before to remember that even in the original uncut form it's not as violent as you might expect for the time. Very impressive, albeit a bit overlong for me now. But remarkably non "eek!" inducing.
vivdunstan: Part of own photo taken in local university botanic gardens. Tree trunks rise atmospherically, throwing shadows from the sun on the ground. (Default)
This is always one of my highlights of Worldcon, boggling at the range of SFF/cult/horror merchandise on offer. I can spend literally hours in there, browsing stuff. And often buy too much. Which would not have been so big a problem this time with a con in Scotland. But can be a big problem when coming home by plane!

The Glasgow Worldcon has an online list of dealers who were planning on coming, as of mid July. But it is absolutely no substitute for being there in person, and immersed in the sheer mass of awesome stuff to browse and buy.

I may have to indulge in some not-at-Worldcon retail therapy to make up for missing out ...
vivdunstan: Part of own photo taken in local university botanic gardens. Tree trunks rise atmospherically, throwing shadows from the sun on the ground. (Default)
Browsing the Glasgow Worldcon programme, which has finally been released. We are not going to be there in person as hoped, because of how ill I am now. But they are offering a lot of streamed and recorded for later talks. So I will get to see masses. I am now going through the programme to mark up those of interest. Thank goodness for the recordings, because I have multiple time clashes already!
vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
I just wrote up my experience watching masses of Cymera 2024 on streaming.
vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
I'll be blogging about this properly on my academic musings blog. But I've just finished watching my final catch up videos from the Cymera 2024 Edinburgh festival of fantasy, scifi and horror writing. Here is the list of things I got through - a rather impressive total of 18 events. Rather stunned with that, given how asleep I am constantly, and I have been mainly watching them just before bed at night. And not every night. And usually taking several nights to finish each one! These and other Cymera videos have been available for me to watch online from early June until tonight at midnight.
  • From Dr. Who to Star Trek: New Stories with Esmie Jikiemi-Pearson and Una McCormack
  • The Power of Books with Gareth Brown and Mark Lawrence
  • Eldritch Gods and Other Uninvited Guests with Mark Stay and Charles Stross
  • There’s Been A Murder with Amy Goldsmith, T.L. Huchu and Frances White
  • Arctic Horrors with C.J. Cooke, Tim Lebbon and Ally Wilkes
  • In Search of a New Eden with Oliver Langmead, Ken MacLeod and Adrian Tchaikovsky
  • Time Travels with Poppy Kuroki & Nigel Planer
  • Cassandra Clare in conversation with V.E. Schwab
  • The Pleasures of Reading
  • The Secret to a Successful Partnership with Megan Bannen and Gabby Hutchinson Crouch
  • Many Shades of Darkness with Elle Nash, Kaaron Warren and Johanna Van Veen
  • Creating Legends with Kate Heartfield and Sophie Keetch
  • Past, Present, Future with Esmie Jikiemi-Pearson, William Letford and EJ Swift
  • Dark Encounters with Em Reed and Lorraine Wilson
  • Writing the Future with Rachelle Atalla, Dan Coxon and Una McCormack
  • Thrilling Futures with Lauren Beukes, Nikhil Singh and Maud Woolf
  • Retellings with Joanne Harris, Lucy Holland and Shona Kinsella
  • Unleashing Chaos with Jane Flett and Kelly Link
vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
I have just DNF'd My Best Friend's Exorcism by Grady Hendrix. It should have appealed a lot, with lots of 80s pop culture references. But I didn't find the writing style worked for me, nor were the voices of the young girls convincing. I see it was made into a movie a couple of years ago. Happy to pass on both.

Alongside other non fiction books on the go I've now started a short story fiction collection, gathering together classic spooky stories about Cornwall. Cornish Horrors is another in the British Library Tales of the Weird series. And should fill a nice slot for me.

I am leaving my fiction reading slate free after that for the middle of July, when another in Deborah Harkness's A Discovery of Witches fantasy series is published. I particularly enjoyed the original trilogy, and am keen to read this upcoming 5th book, The Black Bird Oracle. I have it preordered on Kindle, and intend to read it right away on publication. And I also have a signed hardback copy on preorder.

CYMERA 2024

Jun. 2nd, 2024 12:03 am
vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
Starting with my CYMERA festival catchup. This festival of science fiction, fantasy and horror writing is happening in Edinburgh this weekend, but luckily though I can’t go I bought a digital ticket in advance. So I’m just now watching a talk from Saturday morning (Doctor Who and Star Trek content!). Very much up my street!

vivdunstan: Photo of some of my books (books)
I just read this for my book club, and really enjoyed it. Surprisingly I'd never read it before, though I know the 1940 Hitchcock film well, which won the Best Picture Oscar back in its day.

Rebecca is a gripping gothic thriller combined with psychological study. It has a rather leisurely pacing, which took me a while to adjust to. But then it felt more of a natural fit, and I was happy for it to have room to breathe. The story is that of a young woman, newly married and returning with her husband to his Cornish grand mansion home, only to uncover secrets from the past. I don't want to go into the plot too much, but I found it a real page turner. And even though I knew the core plot (there are very few differences between the 1938 novel and 1940 movie), it still kept me glued, through to the very end.

I have seen other movies based on Daphne du Maurier stories - Hitchcock's The Birds, and Nicolas Roeg's Don't Look Now. But I haven't read any more of her writings. And I need to fix that.

Rating 5/5 stars. Easily.

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