RogerBW's Blog

Darktraders, Eluki bes Shahar 30 September 2021

1992 SF, middle volume of a trilogy. Saint Butterflies-are-free Peace Sincere, a smuggler pilot without a ship, has nearly got her inconvenient protégé back to safety… but it's never that simple.

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Zero Hour! 29 September 2021

1957 aviation disaster, dir. Hall Bartlett, Dana Andrews, Linda Darnell: IMDb / allmovie. Looks like you picked the wrong week to quit smoking.

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The Body in the Library 28 September 2021

1999 audio adaptation of Christie's 1942 mystery, in one 90-minute episode. The blonde dressed for a party turns up, stone dead, on the floor of the library at Gossington Hall…

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End of an Era 27 September 2021 - 3 comments

The longest, and I think the best, RPG campaign I've ever run has reached its end.

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The High and the Mighty 26 September 2021

1954 disaster film, dir. William A. Wellman, John Wayne, Claire Trevor: IMDb / allmovie. A 2,000-mile overwater flight is no place for an engine to explode.

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Masked Ball at Broxley Manor, Rhys Bowen 25 September 2021

2012 thriller novelette, prequel to the series Her Royal Spyness. "Georgie", cousin to the king but really of no importance, is coming to the end of her Season with no offers. She doesn't particularly fancy Prince Otto of Prussia, but going to a Halloween Ball (an American innovation) should be harmless enough…

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Raging Bull 24 September 2021

1980 drama, dir. Martin Scorsese, Robert de Niro, Joe Pesci; IMDb / allmovie. The boxer is on the way up, then he's on the way down.

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Perl Weekly Challenge 131: Splitting and Splitting More 23 September 2021

I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved splitting arrays and strings. (Note that this is open until 26 September 2021.)

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Hadrian the Seventh, Frederick Rolfe 22 September 2021 - 4 comments

1904 revenge-fiction. They laughed at George Arthur Rose at the seminary, but now he'll show them – he'll show them all!

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Sixth 1 Player Guild UK Meet 21 September 2021

The 1 Player Guild is a group of solo game players, communicating through BoardGameGeek. This was the sixth "proper" get-together for the UK contingent (some virtual meetings helped span the gap), and we were back in the upstairs room of the pub in Silverstone, a year and a half after the last one.

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Oath Bound, Melissa Scott and Jo Graham 20 September 2021

2015 historical fantasy, fifth in the Order of the Air series. Late in 1935, Alma, Lewis and Mitch are showing off the new Catalina at an air show in Palermo, while Jerry is across the Med in Alexandria following magical hints to the lost tomb of Alexander the Great.

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Dawn of the Dead 19 September 2021

1978 horror, dir. George Romero, David Emge, Ken Foree: IMDb / allmovie. The dead are still rising, and they're still hungry.

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A Beastly Kind of Earl, Mia Vincy 18 September 2021

2019 American Regency-ish romance, part of a loosely linked series. Thea Knight disguises herself as her sister Helen, so that Helen can elope with her beau. Lord Luxborough, set to watch Helen, realises what's going on, and works out that if he marries the woman under a false name he can get access to the family money he needs without the inconvenience of a wife he doesn't want…

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Perl Weekly Challenge 130: An Odd Tree 17 September 2021

I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved more binary trees and linked lists. (Note that this is open until 19 September 2021.)

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Marlow Tabletop and Board Games 6 September 2021 16 September 2021

This Meetup-based boardgames group remains on-line for the moment, though we may try the pub next time depending on numbers. For now we got together on Jitsi and then played some games on BGA, as usual.

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Night of the Living Dead 15 September 2021

1968 horror, dir. George Romero, Duane Jones, Judith O'Dea: IMDb / allmovie. The dead are rising, and they're hungry.

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Mutiny at Vesta, R. E. Stearns 14 September 2021

2018 SF, second of its series. Adda the hacker and Iridian the engineer travel with the infamous pirate Captain Sloane to his base on Vesta… which has been grabbed out from under him while he was away.

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Boardgames in Isolation: August (part 2) 13 September 2021

More boardgames played from home. (There was a plan for barbecue, beer and boardgames for some of the local gamers, but it turned out to be the first two and not the last one.)

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Apocalypse Now (1979) 12 September 2021 - 4 comments

1979 war, dir. Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Sheen, Robert Duvall: IMDb / allmovie. Captain Willard is sent upriver to assassinate Colonel Kurtz, who's fighting the war just a bit too well.

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Obsidio, Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff 11 September 2021 - 2 comments

2018 YA science fiction, last of its trilogy. When Kerenza IV was invaded, some of the inhabitants escaped; a few survived on the surface. Now the escapees' only option is to come back, but the invaders are still there…

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Perl Weekly Challenge 129: Eats Roots and Lists 10 September 2021

I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved more binary trees and linked lists. (Note that this is open until 12 September 2021.)

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The Day The Earth Stood Still (2008) 09 September 2021 - 2 comments

2008 science fiction, dir. Scott Derrickson, Keanu Reeves, Jennifer Connelly: IMDb / allmovie. The aliens land with a message for humanity, and the humans immediately shoot one of them.

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The Galaxy, and the Ground Within, Becky Chambers 08 September 2021

2021 science fiction. Three travellers get stranded at an inn by bad weather, and for once don't pass the time by telling each other stories.

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No Essen, Again 07 September 2021 - 3 comments

Essen SPIEL are doing a better job than UK Games Expo did, but I've very reluctantly decided that I'm not going anyway.

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Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad 06 September 2021

1899 novella. Charles Marlow takes a steamboat up the Congo to the aid of the ivory-agent, Mr Kurtz…

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Lord Edgware Dies 05 September 2021

1992 audio adaptation of Christie's 1933 mystery, in five 30-minute episodes. Lord Edgware has been denying his actress wife a divorce; she's been talking about killing him; and then he's murdered, and his staff say they saw her enter the house. But she has a perfect alibi…

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Plan 9 From Outer Space 04 September 2021 - 2 comments

1959 science fiction, dir. Ed Wood, Gregory Walcott, Bela Lugosi: IMDb / allmovie. The aliens land with a message for humanity, but that message is apparently "Your stupid brains!" Original vt: Grave Robbers From Outer Space.

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Perl Weekly Challenge 128: Maxima and Minima 03 September 2021

I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved finding submatrices and counting trains. (Note that this is open until 5 September 2021.)

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Absence of Light and Other Stories, Zoë Sharp 02 September 2021

2013 thriller, eleventh in the series about Charlie (Charlotte) Fox, former soldier and currently private bodyguard. Charlie's in Colombia, helping a disaster relief crew after an earthquake. Not really her thing? No, but her employer is also concerned about the rumours of large-scale thefts that seem to be following this team around the world, and the previous security guy has just mysteriously died…

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August 2021 Trailers 01 September 2021 - 2 comments

Some trailers I've seen recently, and my thoughts on them. (Links are to youtube. Opinions are thoroughly personal. I still hate everything.)

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