Karsa Orlong

In preparation for Friday at the O2 . . .

I'll send you my copy

Unless you're Amazon, apparently. What they're doing isn't illegal, but still . . . http://www.guardian....s-pay-vat-ebook

Alibi are starting to show the series again, from the first episode, on Wednesday night this week

I couldn't agree more! Goodman thinks waaaay too much of himself, and he loves being contrary just to get the attention, imo. It's unfortunate that the judges seem to revel in their own celebrity status. He's also got a habit of shouting the other judges down. I'll say one thing for Craig - he always sits quietly whilst the others are having their say,

True Grit - the Coen Brothers version. 'Twas good, but I still prefer the original

You guys may like it Although, from what Tim says, it sounds like it isn't a one-off . . .

Book #69: Apartment 16 by Adam Nevill Blurb: Some doors are better left closed . . . In Barrington House, an upmarket block in London, there is an empty apartment. No one goes in, no one comes out. And it’s been that way for fifty years. Until the night watchman hears a disturbance after midnight and investigates. What he experiences is enough to change his life forever. A young American woman, Apryl, arrives at Barrington House. She's been left an apartment by her mysterious Great Aunt Lillian who died in strange circumstances. Rumours claim Lillian was mad. But her diary suggests she was implicated in a horrific and inexplicable event decades ago. Determined to learn something of this eccentric woman, Apryl begins to unravel the hidden story of Barrington House. Thoughts: Sometimes I can't wait to review a book, other times I almost can't be bothered. Apartment 16 definitely fits into the latter category. For a horror novel it is amazingly devoid of atmosphere, which should be a criminal offense for any book in the genre. For me, the structure did not work at all. The prologue introduces us to Seth, a night porter at Barrington House, and the strange noises emanating from the titular apartment number 16. Straight away we learn about how Seth is drawn to the apartment, which is fair enough, but, because of the way in which Seth's involvement is dealt with it robs the story of all mystery - or, at least, it did for me. It was pretty obvious from the very first chapters exactly what was going on, which made the rest of the book a bit of a slog. It might have worked better for me had Nevill taken his other main protagonist, Apryl, and told the story completely from her point of view, as she tries to uncover the mystery of what happened to her uncle and aunt in their apartment in the building. Hers is the more engaging tale, and she is the more engaging character. Atmosphere, atmosphere, atmosphere. It's completely missing. There is no build up of tension, the scares - such as they are - are reliant upon incredibly wordy and yet vague descriptions which are repetitive and end up being little more than padding - and there's a lot of padding in this book. Nevill also seems to think that having characters swear a lot amounts to adult content when, really, it just comes off as juvenile. When the story finally does reach its point (at least 100 pages too late) it does belatedly start to engage, but then it culminates in a horribly rushed and unimpressive conclusion, compounded by . . . Yawn. I've put off reading this book for a long time. I should've put it off even longer. 5/10

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aATt3Uv2xY8

I thought I must've mentioned these games before. A bang up to date version of XCOM has just been released. It's maybe a little dumbed down from the original(s) but it's still brilliant, the best game of its type that I've played since Terror from the Deep, which was the best part of 20 years ago. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKQrJYr0mvA

300 pages into Apartment 16 now. 150 to go . . .

ELO - Concerto for a Rainy Day Best played loud

512 pages isn't long anyway, imo.

I can't stand Aliona, so I find it quite amusing that she's out before she even got the chance to dance Agree with Kay about Pendles - 'hard work' might even be an understatement. Very pretty, though Yes, she'd obviously got the message. I think she only said 'yeah' once this week . . .

I haven't, no - nowhere near. There were 150+ episodes in all, I think. I always used to watch it when it was on, though

I'm about 150 pages into Apartment 16 by Adam Nevill.

Fingers crossed for the exam result, Kylie

[Yoda] The Dark Side this is [/Yoda]

Funny, I searched for ages for this episode yesterday (it's the one I wanted to link to originally) and couldn't find it - today I found it straight away Anyway, this is one of the most famous episodes, if not the most famous, starring The Shat in his pre-Star Trek wig days Nightmare at 20,000 Feet

There were also a couple of 'revivals' of The Twilight Zone, one back in the 80s and the other about ten years ago. Neither was as good as the original, imo. It's dated, of course, but it's still brilliant You can watch the full first episode here

I remember Split Enz 30 years ago this week I was listening to this album for the very first time . . . Where does the time go

Well I know we disagree on movies, cos I watched Avengers Assemble last night and loved it

The George R.R. Martin series is actually called 'A Song of Ice & Fire', but people keep calling it 'Game of Thrones' because that's what the tv series is called. It's the same thing, basically. A Storm of Swords is the third book in the series, the first two are called A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings. The first and third books are great, the second book is decent, the fourth book (A Feast for Crows) is poor, and the fifth book (A Dance with Dragons) is the biggest waste of time in the history of wastes of time

Book #68: The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld Blurb: When a wealthy young debutante is discovered bound, whipped and strangled in a luxurious apartment overlooking the city, and another society beauty narrowly escapes the same fate, the mayor of New York calls upon Freud to use his revolutionary new ideas to help the surviving victim recover her memory of the attack, and solve the crime. But nothing about the attacks - or about the surviving victim, Nora - is quite as it seems. Thoughts: Set in 1909, this novel is a mix of actual and fictional events. Taking the real-life visit of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung to the US it jumps off into a murder mystery using Freud's theories as a basis for uncovering the truth. It is his young American 'disciple', Stratham Younger, who is the main protagonist of the novel. Through his somewhat tenuous links to one of New York's upper class families, Younger's attendance at a high society ball results in him being pushed in front of the city's mayor and told of an attack on the teenage daughter of one of the mayor's good friends. Since the attack, the traumatised daughter has been unable to speak, and it is suggested that Younger's (and Freud's) methods might be able to help. Running parallel to this, a young detective, Jimmy Littlemore, is called upon by the city coroner to assist in the investigation of the murder of a debutante, the circumstances of which seem to link it directly to Younger's own case. I've read a fair bit of negativity towards this book and, for sure, it is quite clunky in places. It's unique selling point - the presence of Freud and Jung as characters involved in the story - is, to my mind, a nonsense. There is absolutely no need for them to be involved, or to even appear, in the story. Yes, one of Freud's theories is particularly relevant, but does he really need to be present for it to be so? No. That Freud's presence is pushed so hard is daft, because he doesn't actually appear that much. Even in the author's notes, Rubenfeld observes that most of his dialogue is taken from Freud's own papers. It's a bizarre choice which, to me, just indicates the author wanting to show off the research he'd done. Remove this sub-plot and it would have been a tighter, better novel, in my opinion. Additionally, many of Younger's scenes are told in the first person, whilst the rest of the book is in third person. I say 'many' because, at times, Rubenfeld decides to narrate scenes in which Younger is involved from another point of view in third person. It's kind of weird and occasionally jarring. I also found the presentation of Freud's theories, and of various theories on the interpretation of Shakespeare's Hamlet, a little over-cooked and repetitive. We get the idea, get on with the story already! Despite all this, I found it to be a suprisingly fast-paced and enjoyable read. The crime and its solution are suitably convoluted, there is a fair amount of humour (which works quite well but did make me wonder exactly what atmosphere Rubenfeld was trying to create), and Littlemore in particular is a very likeable character. Reading all the hyperbole quoted on the cover from various sources, I was possibly expecting something more from the book. It is neither 'spectacular' nor 'fiendishly clever' (blame The Guardian for those), but it is never less than an entertaining, if light, read. I'll probably seek out Rubenfeld's next book at some point. 7/10