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Movies… But No Comfy Chair To Watch Them From…

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A slightly extended weekend break from the blog, sorry about that :o) To cut a long, and not very exciting, story short… The comfy chair has gone to wherever comfy chairs go when they are no longer that comfy (the ‘tip’ in Lewisham) and I was left with a selection of chairs that are functional but not the kind of chair you can curl up in and read for a few hours. The search for a new comfy chair starts… Here :o) Anyway… Not a lot of reading happened over the weekend (hardly any actually) but I did manage to watch a few movies. Let me tell you about them… ‘The Descent’ (2005)   A caving expedition goes horribly wrong when a cave-in leaves the party trapped in unfamiliar tunnels with no idea how to escape. And while they can’t see what is stalking them through the tunnels, it can hear them… I’m reading the novelization, of ‘The Descent’, at the moment so when I saw the film was free to watch on Prime, well… I’d never seen it before so I had to give it a go :o) And… Well. It wasn’t a ...
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‘Come Sing For The Harrowing: Stories by Dan Coxon’ (Clash Books)

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  Page Count: 218 Pages I know that ‘Folk Horror’ books are a thing and that they are very likely to be my thing (I enjoyed ‘The Wicker Man’ the good one that is, you know what I mean..) For some reason though, I’d never got round to actually checking any books out until the other day. Don’t ask me why… I guess that when you read books ‘on a whim’ like me, that can happen :o) Anyway… I saw ‘Come Sing For The Harrowing’, in Waterstones, the other day and picked it up, you guessed it… on a whim. Not just a whim to be fair, I also figured that I had a better chance of actually finishing some shorter Folk Horror fiction; so many books, so little time etc. So that’s just what I did, and… From British and World Fantasy award-winning writer and editor Dan Coxon, Come Sing for the Harrowing is an uncanny folk horror collection for fans of John Langan and Robert Aickman. A young man working at a tourist attraction is singled out for unholy transformation, a gang of burglars are ambushed w...
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‘The First Wall’ – Gav Thorpe (Black Library)

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  Page Count: 385 Pages My readthrough of the ‘Siege of Terra’ books has been perhaps the most haphazard, and out of order, read through that I’ve ever done. Okay, there’s no ‘perhaps’ about it… Sometimes, you’ve just got no choice but to just read the books as they come to you ;o) Luckily, I already knew the rough outline of the Siege, and the Lexicanum helped too, so it hasn’t been the worst thing in the world but yeah, definitely not the recommended reading order. Anyway, here we are :o) I’ll be honest, I’ve been avoiding ‘The First Wall’ for a while, we’ll get into the ‘whys’ later on. The other day though, something finally clicked and it was time. I’m not quite sure what happened but again, sometimes you just have to go with the flow. So, that’s what I did. And… The war for the fate of mankind blazes on. Though the outer defences have fallen, the walls of the Palace itself remain inviolate as Rogal Dorn, the Praetorian of Terra himself, uses every known stratagem and ploy to ...
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‘There Is No Antimemetics Division’ – qntm (Penguin)

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  Page Count: 275 Pages If you frequent these parts you’ll know my reading tastes, it’s hard not to by now ;o) As a rule, it’s a rare thing to see me pick up any sci-fi that steps past the likes of Doctor Who, and Warhammer 40K, and into the realms of ‘high concept’ and ‘hard sci-fi’. Nothing against the stuff, it’s just that more and more, I read to relax (and escape) and I don’t find ‘high concept/hard sci-fi’ particularly relaxing. It’s that simple ;o) Every so often though… I’d heard a number of very complimentary words spoken about ‘There Is No Antimemetics Division’, more than enough to pique my interest, and the vague promise of a little cosmic horror was enough to swing it. I picked it up for a read and… An antimeme is an entity with self-censoring properties. Some are benign; others, less so… But how do you contain something you can’t record or remember? How do you fight against an enemy when you can never even know that you’re at war? Welcome to the Antimemetics Division....
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‘Invincible – Volume 2’ – Kirkman, Ottley, Crabtree (Image)

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  Page Count: 152 Pages Was it really five months ago that I read ‘Invincible Vol.1’ and… wasn’t a hundred percent convinced? Well, I trust my blog a lot more than I do my memory, these days, so yes, yes it was ;o) To be fair, I did enjoy Volume 1, I was just left wondering how much mileage there could be in a story where Invincible had it all laid out for him, ready to have it all. The powers, the costume, the evil father… Hang on :o) The Guardians of the Globe are dead. Now, Mark Grayson must try to fill their role as Earth’s newest superhero – Invincible. But there’s one question on everyone’s minds: who killed them? Think, Mark. Think! Sometimes, being the last one to the party can actually be a good thing as I don’t have to worry too much about spoilers when I’m writing these posts ;o) I’m going to assume that if you haven’t read the books already then you’ve more than likely watched the show on Prime. Or maybe you just read the Wikipedia entries and never got round to either...
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‘Meat Bees’ – Dane Erbach (Clash Books)

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  Page Count: 270 Pages As a kid, I used to be scared of flies (especially the big fat bluebottles) but that was a long time ago now. It took a little longer with bees but I got stung a few times and that pretty much got it out of my system. Wasps though… I fear and hate them in equal measure; angry, vicious grudge-bearing little bastards that seem to exist purely to make your summer miserable. And it has been a long, hot summer… :o( In the (slightly altered) words of Kyle Reese, "They can't be bargained with. They can't be reasoned with. They don’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear! And they absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead!" So when I heard that there was a new horror novel that was all about wasps… Of course I had to read it ;o) Jaws with wasps. By the time Scarlett Sutton arrives at her dad’s cabin in the Smoky Mountains, two locals have already been eaten alive by wasps. Of course, she doesn’t know this yet. All Scarlett knows is her mom finally ...
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Trailer - 'Black Sheeps' (2026)

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I didn't have a lot to say about 'Black Sheep', when I watched it in October last year , mostly because I was on sick leave and struggling to say much about anything... Anyway. Despite my reticence, I always enjoy watching 'Black Sheep' so when I saw that a sequel was on the way? I said 'finally...' and came straight here to post the trailer :o) Check it out... I'll be honest... 'Black Sheeps' looks like it's really only going to be for those of us who found 'Back Sheep' funny back in 2006. I count myself fortunate enough to be one of those number though, so... :o)
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