Bill Bodden's Blog - Posts Tagged "reviews"
Books I Love: Drachenfels
I'd like to spend this week talking about one of my favorite books: Drachenfels by Jack Yeovil AKA Kim Newman. It was originally published by Games Workshop in 1993 to promote their Warhammer Fantasy Battles line of minature wargaming products.
The story begins with the legendary battle of a band of lesser-known heroes against the mighty enchanter, Constant Drachenfels. Drachenfels is evil incarnate, and has been a plague on the world for hundreds of years. He has been quiet lately, which led to rumors of his potential demise, but more sensible folk doubt such rumors. The band invades his castle to do battle with this monster, only to fall, one by one, to the Enchanter's wicked traps and vile servants. Only three reach the end of the quest: the throne room of Drachenfels!
Drachenfels (Warhammer) by Jack Yeovil
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
View all my reviews
Cut to twenty-five years later, when Prince Oswald von Konigswald, the young noble who led the expedition to vanquish Drachenfels, and reportedly the one who struck the killing blow, is gathering his old comrades together to celebrate their glorious victory. The celebration will consist of a re-enactment via play, written by one of the leading lights of the stage, playwright Detlef Sierck.
Sierck is currently rotting in debtor's prison after a former patron abandoned him, refusing to pay the bills for the playwright's previous, lavish production. Prince Oswald rescues him with the understanding that Sierck will write the play commemorating his heroic deeds of yore. Sierck sets to work crafting the production that will seal the glorious legend of Prince Oswald and his band of adventurers. No expense is to be spared - Prince Oswald has even had the evil Enchanter's old castle cleared to re-enact the play under the most accurate conditions possible.
As the story proceeds, complications arise. Ghosts - rumored to be the victims of Drachenfels - begin to haunt the company. Prince Oswald's father, one of the current Electors of the Empire and Grand Prince of Ostland, dies, leaving Oswald to take up these new responsibilities, and for some strange reason, there is sometimes a mysterious extra wagon in the train of props, players and scenery traveling to the castle for final rehearsals.
Drachenfels uses the classic "play-within-a-story" theme used to great effect by Shakespeare, among many others. This is a complicated story - which is not at all a criticism. In fact, I've found that over the course of nearly two decades I've re-read this book almost once a year and am always discovering something I missed.
It also benefits from the richly-detailed world of Warhammer, now thirty years in the making and with a lush background and history. Yeovil/Newman's storytelling talents really shine here as well, as we are drawn into the world of Detlef Sierck, unlikely hero.
To say that the story has a twist to it is like saying the Pacific Ocean is a little wet. It twists and turns like an earthworm, but the rewards are well worth following the complex trail. The characters - and by extension the reader - don't truly know until the very end what is really happening. People begin dying off in truly horrible ways once the company reaches the deserted castle, and it takes a heroic effort to avoid total calamity from befalling not only the assembled company, but the entire Empire itself.
Well worth you time to read, Drachenfels is, for me, one of the experiences that made me want to be a writer. I highly recommend it for any fan of high fantasy and/or mystery.
The story begins with the legendary battle of a band of lesser-known heroes against the mighty enchanter, Constant Drachenfels. Drachenfels is evil incarnate, and has been a plague on the world for hundreds of years. He has been quiet lately, which led to rumors of his potential demise, but more sensible folk doubt such rumors. The band invades his castle to do battle with this monster, only to fall, one by one, to the Enchanter's wicked traps and vile servants. Only three reach the end of the quest: the throne room of Drachenfels!
Drachenfels (Warhammer) by Jack YeovilMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
View all my reviews
Cut to twenty-five years later, when Prince Oswald von Konigswald, the young noble who led the expedition to vanquish Drachenfels, and reportedly the one who struck the killing blow, is gathering his old comrades together to celebrate their glorious victory. The celebration will consist of a re-enactment via play, written by one of the leading lights of the stage, playwright Detlef Sierck.
Sierck is currently rotting in debtor's prison after a former patron abandoned him, refusing to pay the bills for the playwright's previous, lavish production. Prince Oswald rescues him with the understanding that Sierck will write the play commemorating his heroic deeds of yore. Sierck sets to work crafting the production that will seal the glorious legend of Prince Oswald and his band of adventurers. No expense is to be spared - Prince Oswald has even had the evil Enchanter's old castle cleared to re-enact the play under the most accurate conditions possible.
As the story proceeds, complications arise. Ghosts - rumored to be the victims of Drachenfels - begin to haunt the company. Prince Oswald's father, one of the current Electors of the Empire and Grand Prince of Ostland, dies, leaving Oswald to take up these new responsibilities, and for some strange reason, there is sometimes a mysterious extra wagon in the train of props, players and scenery traveling to the castle for final rehearsals.
Drachenfels uses the classic "play-within-a-story" theme used to great effect by Shakespeare, among many others. This is a complicated story - which is not at all a criticism. In fact, I've found that over the course of nearly two decades I've re-read this book almost once a year and am always discovering something I missed.
It also benefits from the richly-detailed world of Warhammer, now thirty years in the making and with a lush background and history. Yeovil/Newman's storytelling talents really shine here as well, as we are drawn into the world of Detlef Sierck, unlikely hero.
To say that the story has a twist to it is like saying the Pacific Ocean is a little wet. It twists and turns like an earthworm, but the rewards are well worth following the complex trail. The characters - and by extension the reader - don't truly know until the very end what is really happening. People begin dying off in truly horrible ways once the company reaches the deserted castle, and it takes a heroic effort to avoid total calamity from befalling not only the assembled company, but the entire Empire itself.
Well worth you time to read, Drachenfels is, for me, one of the experiences that made me want to be a writer. I highly recommend it for any fan of high fantasy and/or mystery.
It's Friday! and a Book Recommendation
It’s always Friday somewhere.
After missing a week on my blog, I’m now back on track — if a little later than my usual Tuesday post. Things have been happening in the last two weeks: I attended Teslacon 4, and thanks to the largesse of my wife’s new job, I attended my first ever college football game! More about those next week; for now, here’s this week’s regular blog post:
Books I Love: Carnacki: Ghost Finder by William H. Hodgson
Carnacki is cut from much the same cloth as the main character (known only as “Time Traveller”) from H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine. He invites a group of friends over for dinner, and then proceeds to regale them with the tale of his latest adventure, creating a narrative device to link the stories together easily. Carnacki blends mysticism and late Victorian-era psuedo-science to defeat malignant spirits, either banishing them or sending them on to their final rest.
What I like most about the stories is that there are some that are explained through good detective work – once Carnacki has investigated the matter. There are some phenomena that cannot be explained, and there are even a couple of stories where you think things have been cleared up, only to have something happen that adds a new supernatural twist to the proceedings. It’s a well-balanced mix.
More recently, Scottish-born author William Meikle has added some new Carnacki stories to the fold in his anthology Carnacki: Heaven and Hell, and I must say he’s done a cracking good job keeping the tone and feel of the original. My only complaint (and it’s a very small one) with his work is that the mix I enjoyed so much from the original stories is absent; all the Meikle mysteries have a supernatural source. Regardless, Meikle delivers good, original stories, and all of them are chilling tales you may want to read with the lights left on! Carnacki: Heaven and Hell is well worth the time and effort to track down a copy.
The original Carnacki: Ghost Finder is sometimes tough to locate. It’s seen print more frequently in the author’s home country, so obtaining a UK edition is possible, though may be a bit pricey. It is also reprinted regularly in small-ish runs of US editions, so that might be another option. If you like good ghost stories with a garnish of some solid detective work, I highly recommend making the effort to find the original Carnacki.
Potentially less difficult to find is William Meikle’s Carnacki: Heaven and Hell stories. Published within the last two years by Dark Regions Press, they are available in trade paperback only (as far as I can tell) from the publisher’s website: http://www.darkregions.com/books/carn...
Happy reading, and take care!
Bill
After missing a week on my blog, I’m now back on track — if a little later than my usual Tuesday post. Things have been happening in the last two weeks: I attended Teslacon 4, and thanks to the largesse of my wife’s new job, I attended my first ever college football game! More about those next week; for now, here’s this week’s regular blog post:
Books I Love: Carnacki: Ghost Finder by William H. Hodgson
Carnacki is cut from much the same cloth as the main character (known only as “Time Traveller”) from H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine. He invites a group of friends over for dinner, and then proceeds to regale them with the tale of his latest adventure, creating a narrative device to link the stories together easily. Carnacki blends mysticism and late Victorian-era psuedo-science to defeat malignant spirits, either banishing them or sending them on to their final rest.
What I like most about the stories is that there are some that are explained through good detective work – once Carnacki has investigated the matter. There are some phenomena that cannot be explained, and there are even a couple of stories where you think things have been cleared up, only to have something happen that adds a new supernatural twist to the proceedings. It’s a well-balanced mix.
More recently, Scottish-born author William Meikle has added some new Carnacki stories to the fold in his anthology Carnacki: Heaven and Hell, and I must say he’s done a cracking good job keeping the tone and feel of the original. My only complaint (and it’s a very small one) with his work is that the mix I enjoyed so much from the original stories is absent; all the Meikle mysteries have a supernatural source. Regardless, Meikle delivers good, original stories, and all of them are chilling tales you may want to read with the lights left on! Carnacki: Heaven and Hell is well worth the time and effort to track down a copy.
The original Carnacki: Ghost Finder is sometimes tough to locate. It’s seen print more frequently in the author’s home country, so obtaining a UK edition is possible, though may be a bit pricey. It is also reprinted regularly in small-ish runs of US editions, so that might be another option. If you like good ghost stories with a garnish of some solid detective work, I highly recommend making the effort to find the original Carnacki.
Potentially less difficult to find is William Meikle’s Carnacki: Heaven and Hell stories. Published within the last two years by Dark Regions Press, they are available in trade paperback only (as far as I can tell) from the publisher’s website: http://www.darkregions.com/books/carn...
Happy reading, and take care!
Bill
My Take On The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
So my lovely wife T and I took in the latest installment of Peter Jackson’s Tolkein franchise last night. I have to admit, after seeing the first part last year, I went into this with lowered expectations. I was STILL disappointed. I will do my best to leave out spoilers for those of you who still intend to see the film.
To be fair, the dragon, Smaug, was awe-inspiring. The composite effect of all those thousands of terrabytes of computer-generated images was truly impressive. Also, we get to see more of the inside of the dwarf kingdom of Erebor – the Lonely Mountain – which I found fascinating. In the Mirkwood scenes, the spiders were quite scary, but by the way the Mirkwood sequences _ a major part of the book – were treated, it seems to have been included almost as an afterthought.
Taking all that into account, I have to admit this is the first time I was actively unhappy about a film from this franchise. Too much was added – and, in my opinion, to no good effect – to claim it had much to do with the original book. T made a fabulous point: the film lacked the charm of the books; scenes like Bilbo throwing acorns at the spiders to lure them away from the captured dwarves were omitted altogether. Sacrificing the very soul and innocence of the story for more action scenes — and more screen time for the elves who were barely involved with the story of The Hobbit — seems the order of the day in modern filmmaking. Sometimes that works; here, it did not. In the end, the film was unsatisfying, and is a classic example of folks in Hollywood thinking they know better how to tell a compelling story than the person who wrote the original, wildly-popular book on which the film is based.
Much can be said about any number of logistical decisions made regarding these films: splitting this book into three entire films leaps to mind as entirely egregious, and frankly I think now we see why that was a poor, though clearly solely an economic, choice. Too much filler had to be created from whole cloth to turn a 300-page children’s book into three entire, feature-length (perhaps even lengthier than that!) films.
I greatly admire the work of Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens to turn the Lord of the Rings trilogy into three spectacular feature films. However, they run a very real risk of undoing all that good work by not only pushing the metaphorical envelope with The Hobbit, but by ripping it to pieces and jumping up and down on the bits.
I will still see the third film, and as the time grows near I will doubtless be filled with anticipation just as I was five times before. Life goes on, and the films will make buckets of money, but the excitement for me is gone. T. and I agreed that we feel no need to own copies of ANY of The Hobbit films. Contrast this with the previous trilogy, where we could hardly wait to obtain the DVDs and watch them, over and over. That is a powerful testament to the film-making skills involved that filled us with such a strong sense of wonder. Where those skills and that sense of wonder went this time is anybody’s guess.
To be fair, the dragon, Smaug, was awe-inspiring. The composite effect of all those thousands of terrabytes of computer-generated images was truly impressive. Also, we get to see more of the inside of the dwarf kingdom of Erebor – the Lonely Mountain – which I found fascinating. In the Mirkwood scenes, the spiders were quite scary, but by the way the Mirkwood sequences _ a major part of the book – were treated, it seems to have been included almost as an afterthought.
Taking all that into account, I have to admit this is the first time I was actively unhappy about a film from this franchise. Too much was added – and, in my opinion, to no good effect – to claim it had much to do with the original book. T made a fabulous point: the film lacked the charm of the books; scenes like Bilbo throwing acorns at the spiders to lure them away from the captured dwarves were omitted altogether. Sacrificing the very soul and innocence of the story for more action scenes — and more screen time for the elves who were barely involved with the story of The Hobbit — seems the order of the day in modern filmmaking. Sometimes that works; here, it did not. In the end, the film was unsatisfying, and is a classic example of folks in Hollywood thinking they know better how to tell a compelling story than the person who wrote the original, wildly-popular book on which the film is based.
Much can be said about any number of logistical decisions made regarding these films: splitting this book into three entire films leaps to mind as entirely egregious, and frankly I think now we see why that was a poor, though clearly solely an economic, choice. Too much filler had to be created from whole cloth to turn a 300-page children’s book into three entire, feature-length (perhaps even lengthier than that!) films.
I greatly admire the work of Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens to turn the Lord of the Rings trilogy into three spectacular feature films. However, they run a very real risk of undoing all that good work by not only pushing the metaphorical envelope with The Hobbit, but by ripping it to pieces and jumping up and down on the bits.
I will still see the third film, and as the time grows near I will doubtless be filled with anticipation just as I was five times before. Life goes on, and the films will make buckets of money, but the excitement for me is gone. T. and I agreed that we feel no need to own copies of ANY of The Hobbit films. Contrast this with the previous trilogy, where we could hardly wait to obtain the DVDs and watch them, over and over. That is a powerful testament to the film-making skills involved that filled us with such a strong sense of wonder. Where those skills and that sense of wonder went this time is anybody’s guess.
Walking To New Orleans (part two of two)
Our first stop of the next day -- Christmas Eve Day -- was
the Audubon Aquarium
. It was a delight. Featuring both fresh and salt-water fish, their displays and habitats featured good visibility for viewing. We had lunch in the Aquarium cafeteria, which was situated to provide diners a fantastic view of the Mississippi River with their meal. After we finished seeing what there was to see, we hustled across the street to...
To read the rest of this post, please visit http://billbodden.com/2018/03/06/walk...
To read the rest of this post, please visit http://billbodden.com/2018/03/06/walk...
Mr. Bodden Calls Tech Support
I had some trouble with my website last week - the kind of trouble that prevented me from accessing my dashboard. Luckily this happened AFTER I'd put up my blog post for the week, and the problem was on the admin end so it was mostly invisible to everyone but me, though many of you may have seen wacky error messages before being forwarded on to the correct page.
I am NOT very tech savvy. I know enough basic coding to be dangerous to myself, but when it comes to trouble shooting I'm...
To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2019/03/25/mr-b...
I am NOT very tech savvy. I know enough basic coding to be dangerous to myself, but when it comes to trouble shooting I'm...
To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2019/03/25/mr-b...
