On Watching YouTube!

 I do enjoy watching YouTube. There is such a variety of channels. I download Andre Rieu concerts for my mother. There are quite a few films and TV shows I would be happy to buy, but which are not available for download, at least not in Australia - films such as The Last Starfighter, Love at First Bite, some Shakespeare films not available for purchase elsewhere(maybe on American streaming  services?). I’ve gone to Premium, which allows me to download and is ad free. It costs, but is worth it.

I also have favourite channels.

Scottish comedian Eleanor Morton does skits in which she plays all the roles. My favourites are the hilarious conversations between J.R.R Tolkien and C.S Lewis. As Tolkien, she puffs on an invisible pipe. The skits always end with Tolkien saying that author Mervyn Peake is coming in later. She also does skits about someone famous reading their hate mail, from Marie Antoinette to Edgar Allan Poe. Arthur Conan Doyle reads a long list of hate mail from people annoyed about his killing Sherlock Holmes. One of the letters is signed, “Love, Mum.”

Someone else who plays all the roles in his skits is Ryan George, whose channel Pitch Meeting mainly focuses on pitch meetings for various films. There are two characters, the writer and “Producer Guy.” If the film is an old one, eg the original Star Wars, there is a typewriter in the background, otherwise a computer, depending when the film was made. The writer then tells the story, including whatever about the film didn’t make sense, pointed out by Producer Guy. His response is “I don’t know” why or “I need you to get all the way off my back about this.” The best known line, after the producer says “That must be very hard” is “No, super easy, barely an inconvenience.”

There is a rather nice channel called Cinema Therapy, in which a film loving therapist and a friend talk about characters from films and analyse them. It really gives you something to think about.

I also have some book and history themed channels. My favourite book channel is owned by Dominic Noble, who begins every review with “Hello, my beautiful watchers!” Most of them are comparing books with their film adaptations, though he did spend some time just talking about books during the Hollywood writers’ strike. He has done several reviews of the Narnia books, several more of the Hercule Poirot novels and film adaptations. He is very lively and often puts on costumes and acts out scenes from the stories. He has also reviewed some cringeworthy novels which are about women who start as feminists, but change their minds, often with Donald Trump as a character or mentioned positively. His descriptions of the stories are hilarious.

Claire Ridgway, a Tudor England expert, has a channel dedicated to her Anne Boleyn Files and Tudor Society. She does also have a web site of the same name, but pretty much everything there ends up on her YouTube channel anyway. It’s chatty and interesting. It’s not just about Anne Boleyn, also about well known people in Henry VIII’s England, but Henry VIII also plays a major part. Sometimes she answers fan questions. Sometimes it’s “What if this or that was different?” such as “What if Arthur Tudor had lived?” But she never says, “I’m right!” She usually says, “This is what I think, and here’s why, I’m not necessarily right, what do you think?” She has written some books, which are available in ebook.

Another chatty Tudor era historian is “Dr Kat.” She is very similar to Claire Ridgway on her channel Reading The Past. 

There are quite a few comedy channels. Aussie Mark Gallagher slips himself into scenes from Harry Potter as an Australian student who abuses characters like Malfoy. He is hilarious. Foil Arms and Hog are an Irish comedy group, also very funny. The most recent is someone trying to get workmates to swap work on Christmas Day.

A very recent channel for me, and a new favourite is Tasting History with Max Miller. He researches historical foods, talks about them and makes them. I have tried one of them, First Class breakfast on the Titanic. Apart from the sad story, it really was fun to have a go. I made buckwheat pancakes and a baked apple, added smoked salmon and marmalade. I couldn’t get Oxford marmalade, but the one I bought was acceptable. I used it on the pancakes. I did think baked apple was a bit over the top for breakfast, but did it anyway, just to see what people ate in First Class on that ship. It worked beautifully. He has written a cookbook called Tasting History. I might get it some time, but for now the YouTube channel will do. I’m currently watching his video on making real historical sugar plums. 

So, any YouTube fans out there?

What I’m Reading Now!

 As usual, I’m reading or rereading several books at a time. Some are books I read years ago and have indulged in buying ebook versions. 

To my astonishment, I discovered that a book I read in my teens, Those About To Die, by Daniel P Mannix, a history of the Roman games, is still around as The Way Of The Gladiator. Interestingly, the intro is written by someone who read it at fourteen, about the same age as I was when I first discovered it. It’s quite charming, for a book about gruesome happenings. The author describes them through the eyes of real people who were there, or at least, chooses those real people, in order to describe the games. So it’s not just “this and this happened” but the possible story of top gladiator Flamma or bestiarius Carpophorus. We know their names, but nothing else. Who knows? I’m halfway through a reread and enjoying it again

I’m reading children’s book Septopus, about a seven tentacled octopus, by Aussie author Rebecca Fung. It will be reviewed here soon, plus I am hoping to interview the author, who has started a publishing company. 

I found the ebook of Drinking Gourd by Barbara Hambly, one of her Benjamin January series about African American musician, teacher, surgeon - and sleuth, sometimes even paid for it - Benjamin January, set in the 1830s and 1840s. I read it years ago, but remembered so little that it was worth a reread. This one involves a murder, as usual, and the Underground Railroad.

The Incompleat Enchanter, by L.Sprague De Camp and Fletcher Pratt, is a book I read years ago when I was first discovering speculative fiction. Someone mentioned it, oddly enough, while commenting on some fan fiction on web site Archive Of Our Own. It made me decide to check it out on Apple Books as I have no idea where my print copy is. I ended up buying all three books in the series. It’s strange to remind myself that this was written in the 1940s. The premise is that a couple of psychologists working at an institute figure out the mathematics of magic. You use a formula and are taken to an alternative universe where a literary world is real. The hero, Harold Shea, first decides to visit the world of Irish myth, but ends up in the world of Norse mythology instead - right before Ragnarok. He does eventually get the hang of it, and the next world is based on Spenser’s Faerie Queen, where he falls in love with warrior girl Belphebe, and takes her home. Other worlds are Orlando Furioso, Coleridge’s Kubla Khan, which, being unfinished, is a repeating world, The Kalevala and, finally, Irish myth. A lot of fun! 

I have finally bought The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman. It’s the first of a series set in a rather lavish retirement village. Four residents, Joyce, Elizabeth, Ron and Ibrahim, have weekly meetings to discuss - and hopefully solve - cold cases. This time someone actually has been murdered and they work on the case, with the reluctant help of police officers Chris and Donna. A nice cosy, though a number of characters die in the course of the novel. Still, nice to see a story centred around older sleuths. I’ve bought the second book.

There are more - I’ve recently bought the audiobook of Joanne Harris’s Gospel Of Loki, for example - but these will do for now. Are you a person who reads several books at a time, like me? Tell us about your current reading! 

Eric Idle At Hamer Hall

 Tonight I went to see Eric Idle, one of the members of the Monty Python group. I only found out it was on last night because he is on Twitter and mentioned he was having fun in Canberra and was doing a show in Melbourne tonight. The tickets were sold out except some in the choir seats, on the sides. I knew it would be fine, having seen Henry Winkler earlier this year, also from last minute choir seats, so I booked on line. It was not cheap, even in those seats, but well worth it. 

Mr Idle was very funny, but the show was mainly about how the Pythons got together (university) and how they made their shows and their films, even some of the TV shows on which they appeared, with clips. There was a Virtual Band playing every now and then, sometimes with Eric on the video.

He wrote the songs, including, of course, “Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life” from Life Of Brian. In fact, his show ended with him leading the audience in a sing-along of it, and quite a few people whistled during the chorus(good on them, I can’t whistle these days). I did sing along. 

He said he wrote it when they were trying to think of an ending for the film - in his hotel room! 

He had a story to tell about the help they got from the Beatle George Harrison in making Life Of Brian. They were in the middle of building sets in Tunisia when Lew Grade cancelled  their budget, after reading the script. With no money they had to go to the US to see if they could somehow raise the money, but no one was interested. Then Eric got a call from George, saying he had the money. To get it, he had to mortgage his home and his business. When Eric asked him why he did it, George said, “I wanted to see the film.”

Fortunately it became a classic, so he got his money back, but I remember the fuss made by Christians who hadn’t even seen it. A friend of mine who was religious said she had heard bad things, but I assured her it wasn’t making fun of Jesus - far from it! - so she went to see it and loved it. 

I had heard that George Harrison had helped, but not that he risked losing his home to do it.

He told stories about his other friends, including Robin Williams, who was disappointed that no one recognised him in France when they went out to a club - after saying he didn’t want to go out because people in the US always made a fuss. 

That reminded me of a friend of mine who hosted Leonard Nimoy when he was here(she knew all the Trek folk). He said he didn’t want a fuss made of him, then was disappointed that nobody recognised him when he went out for a walk. Well, it was the suburbs. You don’t expect to meet Mr Spock in Mordialloc, do you? 

He also talked about the sadness of losing friends as the years go by. He was asked to speak at Robin Williams’ funeral - and George Harrison’s. Both times he wrote a song, which he sang for us.

He spoke about the death of Python Graham Chapman, then showed a clip of a show they were on. They brought on an urn, supposedly with Chapman’s ashes in it, and a picture of him hanging on the side… then the urn was knocked over when John Cleese was in the middle of a sentence. They all got up and frantically started brushing up the ashes. I suspect Graham would have enjoyed the joke. 

I really enjoyed the show and am glad I was able to catch it. It was fascinating to look at the jam packed auditorium and think, everyone in the audience is a Monty Python fan. 

Good night! 

The October Man by Ben Aaronovitch. London: Gollancz, 2019

 I have been reading and loving the Rivers Of London series by this author. They are about a London policeman, Peter Grant, who is recruited to work for an unusual part of the police department, dealing with magic. In this universe, magic is a thing. Anyone can learn it, but it’s dangerous, as it can destroy your brain, which is why you’re safest to create a staff, fill it with magic and use it as a battery. I thought that a clever suggestion for why wizards use staffs. Oh, and rivers have gods and goddesses. 

In this novel, set in the same universe, there is also a tiny - magic - part of the police department in Germany. While there are plenty of  “special people” such as ones with horns, there are not many “practitioners” like Peter - or, in this case, Tobias Winter, a police detective called for in supernatural cases. In this case, he is called to the city of Trier, where there has been a strange, probably supernatural, murder. There are also human-form rivers, two of whom appear in this book, goddess of the river Kyll, Kelly, and a child goddess, Morgane. Kelly is helpful, but there are things she doesn’t want to talk about. There are strange things involving someone who tried to rape Frau Stracker, a local vintner whose family has been in the district for centuries, when she was twelve, and someone in Kelly’s past.

Can Tobias and his non-magical work partner, Vanessa, work it out? Of course they can, what kind of a mystery novel would end without the crime being solved? Well, there are a few, I just find them irritating. But this one is still thoroughly entertaining. 

Peter Grant, of course, isn’t in this book, but he and his department, known as the Folly, are mentioned a number of times. Tobias is actually an admirer of Peter. 

You could probably read this standalone, but I’d advise starting with the first novel, The Rivers Of London, which introduces this delightful universe. Be warned, though, once you start, you will probably want to binge on the lot.

We Couldn’t Leave Dinah by Mary Treadgold - Just Arrived!

 Look what just arrived from England! 

I ordered it through ABEBooks, a web site where secondhand booksellers post their stock. It’s out of print and not available in ebook, so on an impulse I went to ABEBooks, which had plenty of copies. This one was printed in 1964,  but the first edition was published in 1941, during the war, and set during the war.

I read it as a child, because I was madly into pony books, like many other little girls, and was reading, among other things, the novels by the British Pullein-Thompson sisters. I even managed to find an Australian one, Good Luck To The Rider, by Joan Phipson, who went on to write many other children’s books. 

But this one, though it has a horse in it, and the heroine adores it, isn’t a pony book. It’s set on a fictional French/British island, Clerinel. The Nazis arrive in a sneaky fashion rather than by plane, and the British residents have to evacuate - except thirteen year old Caroline and her brother Mick, who get left behind and have to hide. And Caroline is concerned for her horse, Dinah.

I remember the main bits, of course, from my childhood, but had forgotten that the children in the story are, as usual in many of the old English children’s books, middle class with servants and a nice home. Their father is a former journalist, which is interesting. But of course, you’d need money to be able to feed and look after a horse, let alone three(each child in the family has a pony).

I took the book with me to read at the pub last night, when I went there for dinner.

I’ll take it with me again on the tram to the city, where I am meeting a friend to see the dinosaur exhibition at the Melbourne Museum. 

Three cheers for ABEBooks! 

Glasgow Worldcon, 2024, And Hugo Awards

 This year’s World Science Fiction Convention was held in Glasgow, Scotland. I wasn’t able to attend in person, alas, I’ve never been overseas for a Worldcon. The last time I was planning to do that was when it was being held in New Zealand, but that in-person convention had to be cancelled because of COVID. However, the organisers decided to have the con online, and there has been a virtual Worldcon ever since, which has meant I could attend, even if I had to stay up till 2.00 or 3.00 a.m! I usually lie in bed and watch on my iPad.

Last year’s Worldcon, in Chengdu, China, was the least well-organised. I did manage to get some of the shortlisted Hugo Award books, but not all, and I couldn’t watch a single panel.And I only got one reply to my inquiries. Not sure who was responsible, but it was a disappointment. At least the virtual membership was cheap. I gather there was a controversy over the Hugo shortlist. Here is a link to the Wikipedia article.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/81st_World_Science_Fiction_Convention

This year’s was a pleasant surprise. Downloading the books was easy and smooth. I didn’t have to stay up late to watch the panels, because the ones that were available to watch online were put up very soon after the panels were over. And while I’m still catching up, I have till the end of the year. I want to catch up with the opening ceremony and Hugo Awards presentation. There was a controversy over that too, by the way. Someone paid for a lot of memberships so that the new members would vote for that book. They spent about $30,000 for that! We don’t know who it was, or what the book was, and the author may not even know about it, but they didn’t win anyway. I’m wondering if it was a publisher. Why else would it be worth that much money? Honestly, even being on the shortlist is amazing.

The only thing that did disappoint me is that quite a few panels I was interested in were not recorded. Ah, well, can’t have everything!

I have already given you the full shortlist here:

https://suebursztynski.blogspot.com/2024/05/the-hugo-awards-2024.html

Below are the winners. I’ll be interested to see whether you agree with them. 

There were some wonderful items in the Dramatic Presentations, short and long, and I haven’t seen either of those that won. I’m still reading the books, so I voted for those that I had read - and liked - at the time. I can never get through everything, but I don’t bother with those that only give you a sample. I mean, fine, I get it, that’s a few thousand copies the publishers of shortlisted books have to give, but I prefer to focus on those who gave me a full copy.

BEST NOVEL

• Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh (Tordotcom, Orbit UK)

BEST NOVELLA

• Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher (Tor, Titan UK) 

BEST NOVELETTE  

• “The Year Without Sunshine” by Naomi Kritzer (Uncanny Magazine, November-December 2023) 

BEST SHORT STORY

• “Better Living Through Algorithms” by Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld May 2023) 

BEST SERIES  

• Imperial Radch by Ann Leckie (Orbit US, Orbit UK)

BEST GRAPHIC STORY OR COMIC  

• Saga, Vol. 11 written by Brian K. Vaughan, art by Fiona Staples (Image Comics)

BEST RELATED WORK  

• A City on Mars by Kelly Weinersmith and Zach Weinersmith (Penguin Press; Particular Books)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION, LONG FORM  

• Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, screenplay by John Francis Daley, Jonathan Goldstein and Michael Gilio, directed by John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein (Paramount Pictures)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION, SHORT FORM

• The Last of Us: “Long, Long Time”, written by Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann, directed by Peter Hoar (Naughty Dog / Sony Pictures)

BEST GAME OR INTERACTIVE WORK

• Baldur’s Gate 3, produced by Larian Studios

BEST EDITOR SHORT FORM

• Neil Clarke

BEST EDITOR LONG FORM

• Ruoxi Chen

BEST PROFESSIONAL ARTIST

• Rovina Cai

BEST SEMIPROZINE

• Strange Horizons, by the Strange Horizons Editorial Collective 

BEST FANZINE

• Nerds of a Feather, Flock Together, editors Roseanna Pendlebury, Arturo Serrano, Paul Weimer; senior editors Joe Sherry, Adri Joy, G. Brown, Vance Kotrla. 

BEST FANCAST  

• Octothorpe, by John Coxon, Alison Scott, and Liz Batty 

BEST FAN WRITER

• Paul Weimer

BEST FAN ARTIST

• Laya Rose

LODESTAR AWARD FOR BEST YA BOOK

• To Shape a Dragon’s Breath by Moniquill Blackgoose (Del Rey)

ASTOUNDING AWARD FOR BEST NEW WRITER (sponsored by Dell Magazines)

• Xiran Jay Zhao