Raven

I have no books on my Christmas list, because I've had too many books over the years with creases in the spines, or they are the wrong editions so they don't look right on the shelf next to the others in the series, etc. OCD? Me?! Nah . . .

They are very good books. Leaving aside all the fantasy trappings, they are very well written and observed novels (the dragons just give them some added flair!)

Once again, a big thank you for the warm welcome! (and please accept my apologies for my tardiness in replying!). Oh, if only you knew the pain and misery of the IT competent . . . There is a very good Dilbert cartoon where a colleague is pestering him to come round and fix his computer. Dilbert says something like, "Sure, and whilst I do that you can re-grout my bathroom." The colleague asks why – that pretty much sums things up for those With The Knowledge, really! Have you turned it off and on yet?! You see that green thing in the corner of your screen with "Start" written on it . . . That’s not my obsession, that’s Lucy’s . . . Good to hear it! Does he know there is a new expansion out for Warcraft?! I did like it, yes! I read it after reading a particularly hard-going Phillip K. Dick novel (Ubik) and it was a very refreshing change of pace! It is a pity the rest of the series is out of print . . . Gasp! Go. Buy. Now! (you won’t regret it!). I think so too, unless I’ve just been subjected to World War Three or The Voyage of the Damned – neither his finest hour (but he has redeemed himself this year with the brilliantly tense Midnight). I’ve only read one of the novels – I’m not much into the lore of the game because it’s been made up as they went along and it’s pretty ropey in places! If it get’s him reading though, all the better! (I started with Star Trek novels, many moons ago . . .). No, and I’ve just suffered the ignominy of having to buy The Clone Wars for my nephew for Christmas! Haha! Get ready for a life of pain! I have a friend who has five (or is it six?) level 70 characters, and one level 80, now the expansion is out . . . Only two level 70 characters is strictly small-time! Cheers!

Welcome!

I think you get to go straight to college!

Well done! I think I spent far too long on the question I screwed up on. I got one sum wrong, was convinced it was right, and then spent the next fifteen minutes not being able to see any link between the two examples to work out the third correctly . . .

Personally, I think The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic are Pratchett's weakest Discworld books, so if you like them you should love the rest because they only get better after that! Oh, and if you like DEATH, you'll love Mort.

Could you pass the 11-plus? Blow me! I got 10/15 in the first ten minutes, and went up to 14/15 in the next ten, but one question - due to some silly faulty maths on my part - stumped me. How will you do?!

'lo! (from someone else in West Sussex!).

Be fair, he probably hasn't read Harry Potter!

And nobody is ever that

I found the forum using a divining rod and some pixie dust. (Come on, that's a helluva lot more interesting than saying "I used Google" isn't it?!).

I always feel that way when I've read one of Banks' science fiction novels.

I think Kaspersky is supposed to be one of the best pieces of AV software around at the moment, it is the software that a lot of other companies build their own products on.

Yoiks! So many posts to reply to! (and I shall do shortly!). But in the meantime, thanks for the warm welcome folks!

Surely that should be subtitled "A Christian's Response to The God Delusion" - unless, of course, Wilson is claiming to speak for all Christians?

Rather than being yet another poster who joined, said hello and then made three posts before disappearing never to be seen again, I thought I would wait awhile to get to know the forum a little before I introduced myself properly. My name is Paul, and I live in the UK in the charming county of West Sussex. Once - long ago - I went to University to study electronic engineering and now, for my sins, my working life is a fair approximation of the IT Crowd and I get to spend most of my day telling people how to find the Start button in Windows. Outside of work I have a number of interests, apart from reading, but the main one is helping to run a web site for the acclaimed comedy series Spaced. (I also seem to spend quite a bit of time on various forum boards posting vitriolic tirades on why George Lucas should be flayed alive for having foisted the Star Wars prequels upon an unsuspecting public, and trying to work out if Russell T. Davis is the best or worst thing that has happened to Doctor Who, but I'll try to reign in my inner geek on here!). I have also been playing World of Warcraft since May 2005, and have a level 70 Mage (that may impress some, puzzle others, but will probably bore or confuse most!). Reading wise I'd like to think I have a fairly varied palate (although that's probably not the case!). I started out as a teenager reading Star Trek novels and Terry Pratchett, but I have widened my reading since then and over the last decade have read books as varied as Catch-22, Cold Comfort Farm, High Fidelity, Flashman, Vernon God Little, all of Mike Gayle's novels (I still can't work out if they are male confessionals, or chick-lit) and more recently I've discovered Douglas Coupland and Haruki Murakami. I'm not the fastest reader in the world, but I've been quite pleased this year because I have managed to average a book every two weeks (go me!). So that's me, in part – hullo!

The BBC have announced that they are working on a new version of John Wyndham's science fiction classic, The Day of the Triffids. The new version will be shown in two feature length instalments next year, and it will be set in London and the South East in the year 2011. You can read more about this here: Triffids returning to television. I'm in two minds about this, part of me is really excited, but another part is worried by the "fast-paced, futuristic and electrifying take" line in the above article. Triffids just isn't an action story, and the plants themselves aren't really the focus, they are there as a plot device to help facilitate the breakdown of society story. Also, it's going to have to be good to beat the 1981 adaptation!

Well last night's episode was better than I was expecting it to be, but it's still not firing on all cylinders by a long way. There are a few of things I found puzzling last night: 1) If they have a group of armed thugs on their doorstep, why not just move? 2) Why are none of them planning for the future - why aren't they looking for a suitable farm or similar? 3) Why did Joseph's character just accept that the chap with the broken leg had died? (and why didn't he initially offer to take him back to the group as well?!). And there is another pretty women - what a brilliantly selective virus!

ZOMBIE!! Grrr-Argh!

I hope not, she burned the corpse! Yeah, it was a bit confusing the way they treated the main character's illness and recovery, it left you wondering who else was going to suddenly revive (which was no one, so it seems . . .). As a friend of mine pointed out, it's nice that the virus only left the pretty people alive!

The reader comments on Amazon back that up as well, but I like it (especially the wonderfully laid-back character of Takahashi). Personally, I've found his books inetersting precisely because things aren't explained, and that it is left to the reader to make of the story what they will.

I do that as well, but not having written a book, that's just paranoia on my part!