Jump to content

Raven

Advanced Member
  • Posts

    5,546
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by Raven

  1. Managed a magnificent three uploads tonight* before it fell over. *And one of those doesn't seem to have uploaded the images correctly...
  2. As he climbs into the sidecar of Hagrid's motorbike and takes to the skies, leaving Privet Drive for the last time, Harry Potter knows that Lord Voldemort and the Death Eaters are not far behind. The protective charm that has kept Harry safe until now is now broken, but he cannot keep hiding. The Dark Lord is breathing fear into everything Harry loves, and to stop him Harry will have to find and destroy the remaining Horcruxes. The final battle must begin - Harry must stand and face his enemy. The seventh and final volume of the spellbinding Harry Potter series.
  3. Harry has yet again spent the summer holidays at the Dursleys'. He has had plenty to think about, though - from the death of his beloved godfather Sirius Black, to the terrifying chase through the Ministry of Magic by the Death Eaters, to the fierce duel he witnessed between Professor Dumbledore and Lord Voldemort. It is the middle of the summer, but there is an unseasonal mist pressing against the windowpanes. Harry is waiting nervously for a visit from Professor Dumbledore himself. He can't quite believe that Professor Dumbledore will actually appear at the Dursleys' of all places. Why is the Professor coming to visit him now? What is it that cannot wait until Harry returns to Hogwarts in a few weeks' time? Harry's sixth year at Hogwarts has already got off to an unusual start, as the worlds of Muggle and magic start to intertwine J.K. Rowling charts Harry Potter's adventures in his sixth year at Hogwarts with a mix of detail and humour that is unsurpassed, pace that is breathless and above all a flair that is magical.
  4. The summer holidays are dragging on and Harry Potter can't wait for the start of the school year. It is his fourth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and there are spells to be learnt and (unluckily) Potions and Divination lessons to be attended. But Harry can't know that the atmosphere is darkening around him, and his worst enemy is preparing a fate that it seems will be inescapable . . . With characteristic wit, fast-paced humour and marvellous emotional depth, J.K. Rowling has proved herself yet again to be a master story-teller.
  5. All your teeth have fallen out, haven't they? 😱 (< empty mouth emoji!)
  6. I'm not sure, as the error message is not clear, but this error seems to be related to problems loading the book covers, because of when it has happened (I don't know if that is downloading the image from Google or uploading to our site).
  7. I'll have a tidy up and keep the one with the most descriptive tags.
  8. I can't see it in Books, have you deleted it?
  9. My name is Peter Grant and until January I was just probationary constable in that mighty army for justice known to all right-thinking people as the Metropolitan Police Service (and as the Filth to everybody else). My only concerns in life were how to avoid a transfer to the Case Progression Unit - we do paperwork so real coppers don't have to - and finding a way to climb into the panties of the outrageously perky WPC Leslie May. Then one night, in pursuance of a murder inquiry, I tried to take a witness statement from someone who was dead but disturbingly voluable, and that brought me to the attention of Inspector Nightingale, the last wizard in England. Now I'm a Detective Constable and a trainee wizard, the first apprentice in fifty years, and my world has become somewhat more complicated: nests of vampires in Purley, negotiating a truce between the warring god and goddess of the Thames, and digging up graves in Covent Garden ... and there's something festering at the heart of the city I love, a malicious vengeful spirit that takes ordinary Londoners and twists them into grotesque mannequins to act out its drama of violence and despair. The spirit of riot and rebellion has awakened in the city, and it's falling to me to bring order out of chaos - or die trying.
  10. The first modern tale of alien invasion, H.G. Wells's The War of the Worlds remains one of the most influential science fiction novels ever published. The night after a shooting star is seen streaking through the sky from Mars, a cylinder is discovered on Horsell Common in London. At first, naïve locals approach the cylinder armed just with a white flag - only to be quickly killed by an all-destroying heat-ray, as terrifying tentacled invaders emerge. Soon the whole of human civilisation is under threat, as powerful Martians build gigantic killing machines, destroy all in their path with black gas and burning rays, and feast on the warm blood of trapped, still-living human prey. The forces of the Earth, however, may prove harder to beat than they at first appear. The War of the Worlds has been the subject of countless adaptations, including an Orson Welles radio drama which caused mass panic when it was broadcast, with listeners confusing it for a news broadcast heralding alien invasion; a musical version by Jeff Wayne; and, most recently, Steven Spielberg's 2005 film version, starring Tom Cruise. This Penguin Classics edition includes a full biographical essay on Wells, a further reading list and detailed notes. The introduction, by Brian Aldiss, considers the novel's view of religion and society.
  11. Been doing some more testing and I think there is a bug in the plugin. It seems that if you do two or three successful uploads, it then has problems - usually trying to connect to a server - and then after that, it doesn't seem to want to play for a while, even if you close and reopen your browser (this is when I have been seeing blank forms). I'll try a bit more later and get a screen shot of the error. Also, ISBN numbers from Amazon may work better than typing them in from the back of the book (although they should be the same!).
  12. Trier is famous for wine, Romans and for being Germany's oldest city. So when a man is found dead with, his body impossibly covered in a fungal rot, the local authorities know they are out of their depth. Fortunately this is Germany, where there are procedures for everything. Enter Investigator Tobias Winter, whose aim is to get in, deal with the problem, and get out with the minimum of fuss, personal danger and paperwork. With the help of frighteningly enthusiastic local cop, Vanessa Sommer, he's quick to link the first victim to a group of ordinary middle aged men - and to realise they may have accidentally reawakened a bloody conflict from a previous century. But the rot is still spreading, literally and with the suspect list extending to people born before Frederick the Great solving the case may mean unearthing the city's secret magical history. . . . so long as that history doesn't kill them first.
  13. It is the summer of 2013 and Abigail Kamara has been left to her own devices. This might, by those who know her, be considered a mistake. Teenagers around Hampstead Heath have been going missing but before the police can get fully engaged, the teens return home - unharmed but vague about where they've been. Aided only by her new friend Simon, her knowledge that magic is real, and a posse of talking foxes that think they're spies, Abigail must venture into the wilds of Hampstead to discover who is luring the teenagers and more importantly - why?
  14. Peter Grant is facing fatherhood, and an uncertain future, with equal amounts of panic and enthusiasm. Leaving his old police life behind, he takes a job with Silicon Valley tech genius Terrence Skinner's new London start up: the Serious Cybernetics Corporation. Drawn into the orbit of Old Street's famous 'silicon roundabout', Peter must learn how to blend in with people who are both civilians and geekier than he is. Compared to his last job, Peter thinks it should be a doddle. But magic is not finished with the Met's first trainee wizard in fifty years... Because a secret is hiding somewhere in the building. A technology that stretches back to Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage, and forward to the future of artificial intelligence. A secret that is just as magical as it technological - and twice as dangerous.
  15. Martin Chorley, aka the Faceless Man, wanted for multiple counts of murder, fraud and crimes against humanity, has been unmasked and is on the run. Peter Grant, Detective Constable and apprentice wizard, now plays a key role in an unprecedented joint operation to bring Chorley to justice. But even as the unwieldy might of the Metropolitan Police bears down on its foe, Peter uncovers clues that Chorley, far from being finished, is executing the final stages of a long term plan. A plan that has its roots in London's two thousand bloody years of history, and could literally bring the city to its knees. To save his beloved city Peter's going to need help from his former best friend and colleague - Lesley May - who brutally betrayed him and everything he thought she believed in. And, far worse, he might even have to come to terms with the malevolent supernatural killer and agent of chaos known as Mr Punch . . .
  16. I don't know if it is the add-on or the lack of information in Google Books. It certainly goes through the "loading" cycle each time, but - at best - it's probably only working for one in three of the books I've tried. I tried to enter all the Rivers of London hardbacks I have here this afternoon; three of the loaded no problem at all, the other three retuned blank forms - so it's not like it's one specific author or publisher (I had the same thing happen with the Iain M. Banks books I tried - only one of the three worked - and Terry Pratchett was 50/50).
  17. Humanity has colonised the solar system - Mars, the Moon, the Asteroid Belt and beyond - but the stars are still out of our reach. Jim Holden is an officer on an ice miner making runs from the rings of Saturn to the mining stations of the Belt. When he and his crew discover a derelict ship called the Scopuli, they suddenly find themselves in possession of a deadly secret. A secret that someone is willing to kill for, and on an unimaginable scale. War is coming to the system, unless Jim can find out who abandoned the ship and why. Detective Miller is looking for a girl. One girl in a system of billions, but her parents have money - and money talks. When the trail leads him to the Scopuli and Holden, they both realise this girl may hold the key to everything. Holden and Miller must thread the needle between the Earth government, the Outer Planet revolutionaries and secret corporations, and the odds are against them. But out in the Belt, the rules are different, and one small ship can change the fate of the universe.
  18. There's something going bump on the Metropolitan line and Sergeant Jaget Kumar knows exactly who to call. It's PC Peter Grant's speciality . . . Only it's more than going 'bump'. Traumatised travellers have been reporting strange encounters on their morning commute, with strangely dressed people trying to deliver an urgent message. Stranger still, despite calling the police themselves, within a few minutes the commuters have already forgotten the encounter - making the follow up interviews rather difficult. So with a little help from Abigail and Toby the ghost hunting dog, Peter and Jaget are heading out on a ghost hunting expedition. Because finding the ghost and deciphering their urgent message might just be a matter of life and death.
  19. Suspicious deaths are not usually the concern of PC Peter Grant or the Folly, even when they happen at an exclusive party in one of the most expensive apartment blocks in London. But Lady Ty's daughter was there, and Peter owes Lady Ty a favour. Plunged into the alien world of the super-rich, where the basements are bigger than the house and dangerous, arcane items are bought and sold on the open market, a sensible young copper would keep his head down and his nose clean. But this is Peter Grant we're talking about. He's been given an unparalleled opportunity to alienate old friends and create new enemies at the point where the world of magic and that of privilege intersect. Assuming he survives the week . . .
  20. In the fifth of his bestselling series Ben Aaronovitch takes Peter Grant out of whatever comfort zone he might have found and takes him out of London - to a small village in Herefordshire where the local police are reluctant to admit that there might be a supernatural element to the disappearance of some local children. But while you can take the London copper out of London you can't take the London out of the copper. Travelling west with Beverley Brook Peter soon finds himself caught up in a deep mystery and having to tackle local cops and local gods. And what's more all the shops are closed by 4pm... Sales for Broken Homes in trade leapt by 50% over Whispers Under Ground, confirming that Ben Aaronovitch is an author with an unrivalled eye for a bestselling story.
  21. Okay, just tried one that pulled through the German description of the book! Not sure how that happened!
  22. I don't think Bukowski is offensive (and you can certainly read his books without being American yourself!) I can see why some might not get one with it, but he wrote about life as he lived it, just under the guise of it being fiction. One of my favourite authors.
  23. I've had well over a dozen today - do you really want to get into it to that level? I've also just just realised that it has created some entries for some of the books I tried to add without the complete information it was claiming it required. I will try to tidy these up over the next day or so.
×
×
  • Create New...