This week I’m recommending a Fantasy novel about pirates. Who doesn’t love pirates? Except real life ones, of course. `On Stranger Tides’ by Tim Powers came out in 1988 and has been reprinted many times since. You can get it in paperback or as an ebook. `Hang on,’ I hear you saying, `isn’t `On Stranger… Continue reading
Most of us have seen J.M. Barrie’s famous play `Peter Pan’, or one of the many films based on it, but did you know that Barrie developed the play into a novel called `Peter and Wendy’? I recently read this novel for the very first time and found it much more interesting than I was… Continue reading
When J.R.R.Tolkien wrote, `There are many heroes but very few good dragons’ he was referring to the dragon who appears in the Anglo-Saxon poem known as `Beowulf’, which is this week’s recommendation. We’re lucky to have this epic about one hero’s fights with three monsters, since it only survived into modern times in a single,… Continue reading
This week I’m recommending the ultimate in Urban Fantasy – Mark Helprin’s `Winter’s Tale’, which was first published in 1983. Out this year are paperback and ebook editions under the title of `A New York Winter’s Tale’, to coincide with the release of a film adaptation by Akiva Goldsman. This is a sweet, romantic, and… Continue reading
I’ve recently seen `The Selfish Giant’, a British film about excluded children by Clio Barnard. Set in a junkyard, this grim but moving film is very loosely based on a short story by the brilliant Anglo-Irish author, Oscar Wilde. He may now be most famous for the tragic end to his dazzling career but Oscar… Continue reading
Nearly everyone I know has seen and enjoyed the film version of `The Princess Bride’ , written by William Goldman and directed by Rob Reiner. Far fewer people seem to have read Goldman’s original novel, which came out around fifteen years before the film. So this week I am recommending the novel, which is available… Continue reading
This week, back to the classics. One of my all time favourite Fantasy films is `Jason and the Argonauts’ which came out in 1963. Ray Harryhausen’s famous stopmotion animation sequences – such as the fighting skeletons or the bronze giant – thrilled me as a child and they’re still pretty impressive. If you’ve never seen… Continue reading