Lord Samper's Library

  Page Count: 278 Pages I had to take a slight detour, from the intended route, but I’ve made it to Halloween having read a decent chunk of horror and supernatural fiction, go me :o) The plan was to round October off with a little Edgar Allan Poe but ‘Killer On The Road’ has been sat on the table for too long, all lonely and unread, so I resolved to do something about that yesterday (and the font size was just right for my eyes, can’t wait to pick my glasses up later today) . And that’s exactly what I did, even though I had a few things that I should have been doing instead. Time well spent? Let me tell you about it. Sixteen-year-old Harper has had another blow-out argument with her mother and decides to hit the road, again. However, her two best friends, little sister, and ex-boyfriend all stop her from hitch-hiking her way up Route 80 in Wyoming by joining her on an intervention disguised as a road trip. What they don’t realize is that Harper has been marked by a very unique seri...

  Page Count: 19 Pages Damn I’m getting old now. Here’s a sentence I never saw myself having to write… I’m waiting for my glasses to come back from the optician, with a new set of lenses, and this has rather limited what I’ve been able to read this week; that and the ongoing stuff that has seen me signed off work. I need to be reading though so I’ve been dipping in and out of a few short story collections this week. I’ve never read anything by Kingsley Amis so when I saw his short story ‘Something Strange’, I had the opportunity to do something about that and read another horror short story at the same time. ‘Something Strange’ was originally published in 1960. I found ‘Something Strange’ in ‘The 2nd Fontana Book of Great Horror Stories’ but if you’re after reading it yourself, you can also find it in Amis’ ‘Collected Short Stories’. Bruno, Clovis, Lia and Myri are the only occupants of a small outpost in space, carrying out their duties whilst waiting for the message from Base tha...

  Page Count: 58 Pages Regular visitors to the blog will know that every now and then, I decide that I really need to read something of Arthur Machen's, buy a book and then promptly pop it on a bookshelf to be forgotten about/possibly given away. Well… I can confirm that I have finally read an Arthur Machen story and it’s the one that everyone knows about. I had to start somewhere and the cover for ‘Tales of Horror and the Supernatural’ pretty much demanded that I start there. As a child of the eighties (mostly), I’ve got a soft spot for cover art like this; take a look and tell me that you disagree. Some things really were better in the ‘old days’ ;o) Anyway… ‘The Great God Pan’ was originally published, as a novella, in 1894 and my copy can be found in the 1975 Panther edition of ‘Tales of Horror and the Supernatural (Volume 1)’. Honestly though, if you’re looking to read ‘The Great God Pan’ yourself, you’ll have absolutely no trouble finding it in print or as an eBook. It’s not ...

My ability to focus on written words continues to drift in and out of... erm… focus, so I’ve been watching a lot more movies just recently. And here is where we catch up on a few of those movies, funnily enough while I try and figure out what book I’m reading next ;o) As always, ‘movies of varying quality’ is the order of the day so, lets have a little chat about what I’ve been watching. ‘The Long Walk’ (2025) In a near future America, fifty young men must compete for a huge cash prize (and one wish granted) by walking, across the country, until one person is left standing. But once you start walking, there is only one way you can drop out, and it’s permanent. I’ve got nothing against older Stephen King adaptations (ok, maybe ‘The Tommyknockers’) but I’m currently living in a golden age of Stephen King adaptations that are consistently great (ok, not the TV show of ‘The Mist’…); and I think that ‘The Long Walk’ might well be the best of them. I absolutely couldn’t take my eyes off this...

  Page Count: 10 Pages Just a quick post today as I had a late night/early morning with my new ‘friend’ insomnia. I say ‘friend’, probably more accurately described as that one guest who won’t take the hint and just leave… Oh well, fingers crossed for a better night tonight ;o) In the meantime, I did get a little reading under my belt today; mostly while I was in the waiting room for a hospital appointment (which went ok, thanks). I am still plodding my way through ‘The End and the Death Part 2’ and decided to take a little time out for some horror, what with it being Halloween Week and all. I found Kit Reed’s ‘Chicken Soup’ nestled in the Ramsey Campbell edited ‘New Terrors 1’ collection; just where I remember it being all those years ago when I picked it up in the school library. If you can’t find a copy of ‘New Terrors 1’, your best shot at reading ‘Chicken Soup’ will be to track down a copy of Reeds collections, ‘Revenge of the Senior Citizens’ or ‘Weird Women, Wired Women’. Th...

As always, the plan is to keep working my way through all the unread books in my flat before buying any more. But... I end up doing things like spending the afternoon in London and diving into bookshops that I've never been in before (well, a couple that I hadn't and a couple that I definitely have...) It was kind of inevitable that I'd come home with a few books by the end of the day. I dropped my daughter off, at the train station, and once she had left, I swiftly realized that I wasn't ready to go home just yet. So... There's a bookshop called Skoob Books that I'd never been in but heard was worth a look, I decided to set out and see if I could find it. After a fair bit of walking (for me anyway), I finally found the shop and... Skoob Books looks amazing, literally a huge basement full of shelving that is all full of books; the kind of place where I could browse for hours, even on the shelves that I'm normally not that bothered about. The sci-fi/fantasy ...

  Page Count: 142 Pages When I found my copy of ‘The Twin Dilemma’, the other day, ‘The Green Death’ was sat right next to it so I thought I’d make that my next read. I love it when random chance determines what I read :o) I actually got some sleep, on Wednesday night, so was able to spend a little time with ‘The Green Death’ yesterday. I was pretty keen to get into the ‘Green Death’ as I’ve never watched the serial; I don’t think I’d read the book either, until yesterday. Let me tell you a little about it… The Green Death begins slowly. In a small Welsh mining village, a man emerges from the disused colliery covered in a green fungus. Minutes later, he is dead. UNIT, the Doctor and Jo Grant arrive on the scene to investigate, but strangely reluctant to assist their enquiries is Dr. Stevens, director of the local refinery Panorama Chemicals. Are they in time to destroy the mysterious power which threatens them all before the whole village, and possibly the world, is wiped out by a ...

Insomnia has been biting hard, these last few days, up to the point where on Tuesday night, I didn't get any sleep at all. Not quite sure what's behind it, could be a couple of thing, but reading didn't really happen yesterday (and I'm shattered today) so while I try and sort myself out, I'm 'recycling' an old review to tide things over for today ;o) I like the direction that my reading has taken me in this week (even if 'The Twin Dilemma' wasn't a great read...) so I thought I'd dig out an old 'Doctor Who' review and let it have a breath of fresh air. I posted about the 'Shada' serial, last year , so it seemed like the right time to (re)post some old thoughts on the book. If you want the whole post, click Here ; if not then keep on reading, all the important stuff is below. Normal service should resume tomorrow, fingers crossed... I absolutely had to copy and paste the blurb this time. The usual time constraints apply once mo...

  Page Count: 138 Pages This is turning into a bit of a ‘Doctor Who Old-School Target Novelizations Week’; I’m not quite sure how that happened but here we are so lets see where we end up… ;o) A large part of my book buying problems is that I am easily distracted these days. I’ll buy a book with every intention of reading it, only to spot another read, that suits my mood better, and the next thing I know, it can be anything up to years later and the original book has been left unread the whole time. It’s not the worst problem to have, I just need to stop buying books for a bit and try to catch up ;o) Anyway… I’ve been following Adam Whitehead’s coverage of the classic ‘Doctor Who’ serials and my eye was caught by his comments on Season 21, particularly ‘The Twin Dilemma’. Sure enough, there was a copy of the novelization, lurking in a box under my bed (and unread since I picked it up a few years ago ) I had to give it a read… The Doctor has regenerated, having sacrificed his fifth...

Insomnia paid me a visit on Sunday night so I wasn’t good for much yesterday, hopefully today will be a little more productive as far as my reading goes. Lets see… Yesterday wasn’t a total write-off though. I watched some half decent movies (more about those another time, I’m pretty sure you guys don’t want another ‘Movie Post’ right now…) and read a few of the comics that I picked up over the weekend. One good, one ‘not so good’, another that was OK and also prompted me to finally sort out an eye test :o) Let me tell you about them… ‘Conan the Barbarian #25’ – Zub, Horley (Titan Comics, Heroic Signatures) As King of Aquilonia, Conan welcomes a mysterious stranger to his court. This hooded wanderer has come to bestow a gift on Conan but it cannot be given, only earned. History itself waits with bated breath as Conan must face his greatest challenges all over again. This is #25 but could just as easily be #1, if you’re picking up the series for the first time, and I love how Jim Zub man...

  Page Count: 125 Pages The Doctor and Jo Grant land on a cargo ship crossing the Indian Ocean in the year 1926, or so they think… Far away on the planet Inter Minor, a travelling showman is setting up his live peepshow, watched by an eager audience of spaceport officials… On board the ship, a giant hand suddenly appears, grabs the TARDIS and withdraws. Without warning, a prehistoric monster rises from the sea to attack… What is happening? Where are they? Only the Doctor realizes, with horror, that they might be trapped… ‘The Carnival of Monsters’ was a Target novelization that I was given way back in the day, probably as a birthday or Christmas present, and it stayed on my shelves for years (along with all my other Doctor Who books) until I hit a spot of financial bother and had to sell it. I needed the money but really came to regret selling a favourite book of mine, especially when I tried to buy a replacement (damn…) Well, I was headed home the other day and stopped in Marchpan...

Welcome to your regularly scheduled Monday ;o) Hopefully it treats you well... Some of the medication that I take plays merry hell with my memory so I am unashamedly using the blog to as a kind of placeholder for trailers that look like they could be fun; just so I don't forget to see the movie later on ;o) 'Send Help' doesn't come out until January but what looks like 'Misery on a desert island' ('Misery in Paradise'?) is definitely one that I don't want to miss out on.  If you haven't seen it already, here's that trailer...  

  Page Count: 64 Pages “We have been wounded sorely. Yet still we stand, with fire in our eyes and valour in our hearts. Let them think us beaten. We shall teach them otherwise.” – Pedro Kantor, Chapter Master of the Crimson Fists The galaxy of the 41st Millennium is beset by war. Within this grim, dark future, Humanity’s greatest defence are the Adeptus Astartes – brutal gene-forged warriors – whose actions turn the tide of war zones, and whose voices echo across the clamour of battle. Their words lay bare what it is to be an Angel of Death: courageous acts of valour, bonds of brotherhood, unrelenting hatred, and violent intent. Within these pages you will find all this and more manifest in the quotes of legendary Space Marines. Whether you think the Adeptus Astartes are the noble defenders of humanity or genocidal gene-forged monsters (I’m firmly sat on the fence here, I think it’s possible to be both in this instance), they really are the only thing standing between humanity...

Bit of an odd day yesterday… I had a day all to myself which was cool (natural loner and all that ) but also awkward, at the same time, as I can be pretty bad at spending time in my own company (because apparently, I’m that much of a loner...) I’ll get there but yesterday, all I was good for was sitting in front of the telly and watching horror movies. I’ve got a couple of books on the go, at the moment, but nothing close enough to finishing that I can post about. While I try and solve that, let me quickly tell you about those movies… ‘Brain Dead’ (2007) No, not that ‘Brain Dead’ or the ‘Brain Dead’ that sometimes goes by ‘Dead Alive’; this is the ‘Brain Dead’ where two students, a pastor and his assistant are held hostage by two escaped convicts in a cabin, while murderous zombies prowl outside. ‘Brain Dead’ very much sits in the ‘low budget movie’ end of the scale but is still a hell of a lot of fun, staying well clear of creating any suspense and going full on with the practical eff...

  Page Count: 241 Pages It has been a long old time since I last read ‘The Running Man’, years in fact, long enough that I can remember reading it but have no real idea when… Not the worst problem, in the world, to have but it is bugging me right now, I hate not being able to remember things. Anyway… I thought I’d take a little break from ‘The End and the Death: Volume 2’ and go for something a little faster paced. At only 241 pages, ‘The Running Man’ looked like it would fit the bill nicely and there was also the added incentive to pay it a visit before the film comes out next month. So, after I’d dropped my girls back with their Mum last night, I settled down for a read and… It's not just a game when you're running for your life. Every night they tune in to the nation's favourite prime-time TV game show. They all watch, from the sprawling slums to the security-obsessed enclaves of the rich. They all watch the ultimate live death game as the contestants try to beat not...

I’m quite happy to have my blood tested, more than happy in fact, it’s just unfortunate that I’m not so happy about having blood taken out of me to be tested… You can’t have one without the other though so I just have to look the other way while they stick the needle in my arm. That’s what I did yesterday afternoon and I sweetened the deal, for myself, by promising myself a trip to Forbidden Planet afterwards. Just for a couple of comics (which turned into a couple of comics and Book 1 of ‘Bug Wars’, I should have known really…) I’ll tell you about ‘Bug Wars’ another time, maybe tomorrow or the day after, for now, we’re all about the couple of comics that I picked up. The plan was to grab copies of ‘Event Horizon: Dark Descent #2’ and ‘Skinbreaker #2’; the title of the post shows a 50% success rate which isn’t too bad I guess, I really should pay more attention to release dates and such. Anyway, on with the comics… ‘Event Horizon: Dark Descent #2’ – Ward, Jones, Martin (ID Dark) The ‘E...

  Page Count: 55 Pages H.P. Lovecraft’s ‘The Dunwich Horror’ was originally published in the April 1929 edition of ‘Wierd Tales’ (thanks Wikipedia!) I read it as part of the Vintage Books edition of ‘The Call of Cthulhu & Other Weird Tales’; you can more than likely pick up any collection of Lovecraft tales and find this story inside. You can also have a quick Google and find ‘The Dunwich Horror’ free to read online, like Here for example. Having watched the movie the other day, and realising that I’d never read the original tale, I thought it was way past time that I gave ‘The Dunwich Horror’ a read. So that’s exactly what I did last night, let me tell you about it… In the half-forgotten Massachusetts village of Dunwich, Wilbur Whateley is shunned by the other villagers and marked for an earth shattering destiny… If he can get his hands on an original edition of the Necronomicon. Wilbur’s untimely death abruptly ends that destiny but his unfinished work leaves Dunwich in grea...

I totally missed 'The Long Walk' at the cinema (is it still showing at the cinema?); hopefully I'll have better luck with 'The Running Man', released on the 14th November.  It has been years since I last read the book so I've got no idea how much this film is sticking to the original plot. Still, it looks like a lot of fun though and I'm pretty sure the 1987 version did its own thing as well (and that turned out ok...)

Yesterday was a quiet day in the flat, playing Uno (and ‘Lego World’ on the PS4) with my youngest daughter while trying to provide some support for my eldest daughter, who was deep in homework. Lets just say that I lost every game of Uno and my eldest daughter wouldn’t let me near her maths homework (she’s a sensible kid…) Anyway… Life has kind of caught up with me a little just recently, hence the sick leave, so reading longer books takes a little more of a run-up and a lot more sustained effort to power through them. Short stories and novellas though? I’m still good with those ;o) I had a little time to myself, yesterday evening, and managed to get a few more short stories under my belt. Here are some quick thoughts on each of them… ‘The Crown of Thorns’ – Peter Fehervari (Black Library) Page Count: 11 Pages For many long years, the Angels Resplendent protected humanity in the Emperor’s name. But they are no longer resplendent, their purity and zeal turned inwards. Now the Angels Pen...

It has been a bit of a week, what with one thing and another, and one of those things was having to have my kids pet rabbit put down on Friday afternoon. I’m a ‘dog person’ normally but Cupcake was the closest you could get to a dog in rabbit form :o) She was always up for having a fuss made of her and when I looked after my ex partner’s house, Cupcake would come and sit by my feet all day while I was working. She wouldn’t take any nonsense from the cat either. Until the arthritis got too much that is. She wasn’t really my pet but I’ll miss her anyway. Anyway… Yesterday wasn’t really a day for reading; more a day for sitting in front of the telly and letting movies happen to me :o) Actually, so was Friday night, come to think of it. Let me tell you about some of the movies that I watched… ‘Empire of the Ants’ (1977) A shady land-developer takes prospective investors on a tour of her latest business opportunity, unaware that radioactive waste has leaked and caused the local ant populati...

We had to have our pet rabbit put down yesterday (she was old and arthritic and had pretty much given up, can't blame her) so I'm just sat here watching movies today. While I do that, have a trailer for the upcoming 'A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms'. I wasn't a hundred percent sold on Season 2 of 'House of the Dragon' (it was fine but did they need a whole season to build up to a war that everyone knows is coming?) but 'A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms' looks like a change in pace that might be what the franchise needs. We'll see... Keep an eye open for 'A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms' early in the New Year.

  Page Count: 124 Pages I’ve got enough of a ‘book buying problem’ as it is so as a rule, I try not to act on other people’s recommendations. Nothing to do with other bloggers recommendations, it’s more about trying to keep the number of books, in the house, under control. You know how it is ;o) Every now and then though, a recommendation will catch me unawares and before I know it, there’s another book on a TBR pile, making me feel all guilty… ‘Rest Stop’ wasn’t on the TBR pile for too long though. I’m a regular subscriber to Brian Keene’s newsletter and when he had nothing but good things to say about ‘Rest Stop’, that was all I needed to hear. And yesterday, I had some time on my hands so I thought I’d give ‘Rest Stop’ a go... A young musician finds himself locked inside a gas station bathroom in the middle of the night by an unseen assailant, caught between the horrors on the other side of the door and the horrors rapidly skittering down the walls inside. ‘Rest Stop’ is one of ...