SFPRP: The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells

SFFaudio Online Audio

Luke Burrage, in the first of two shows with me as a guest on Science Fiction Book Review Podcast, is reviewing and talking about The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells. Its a fun exercise, we run down the whole book and talk about other invisibility stories too. Have a listen…

The Science Fiction Book Review Podcast SFBRP #078 – H.G. Wells – The Invisible Man
1 |MP3| – Approx. 58 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: SFBRP.com
Podcast: Monday, January 18, 2010

Here’s what we talked about:
The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells, the public domain status of the writings of H.G. Wells, Luke and Jesse in conversation, The War Of The Worlds, The Island Of Dr. Moreau, The First Men In The Moon, Luke’s review of The Time Machine, Sussex, invasion literature, mad scientist, horror, thriller, the village of Iping, invisibility, scientific invisibility, What Was It?, haunted house, the 2000 film Hollow Man, Smoke by Donald E. Westlake, the development of the invisibility meme, creating tension in a scene with exposition, Luke’s review of Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, the Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Lawrence Kasdan Raiders Of The Lost Ark story conference |PDF|, a Nazi monkey, Griffin (the titular Invisible Man) as an anti-hero, The Ring Of Gyges (found within Plato’s The Republic), invisibility as a cipher for moral character, invisibility is good for nothing other than spying, if you’re an invisible person you’ll need a confederate, The Hobbit and The Lord Of The Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, Miss Pim’s Camouflage by Lady Stanley, WWI, Invisible Agent, WWII, isolation, moral isolation, anonymity, Eric Rabkin’s point about, refractive index, albinism, the sleight of hand that H.G. Wells uses in The Invisible Man and The Time Machine, The Crystal Egg by H.G. Wells, Mars, long distance communication, what is the serious problem with invisibility? [the answer is a DEFEATER for any truly HARD SF story], the background for The Time Machine is Charles Darwin, evolution and the class system, the background for The War Of The Worlds is invasion literature, war and colonialism, Eddie Izzard‘s colonialism through flags, the background for The Invisible Man is personal responsibility, isolation and moral character, Thomas Marvel (the tramp with an invisible friend), the parallels between The Invisible Man and Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson and Fawlty Towers, psychopathy, sociopathy, the one ring’s invisibility, invisibility for burglary is only half as useful as you’d expect, imagine the Sauron’s ring in the hands of Denethor, Boromir, or Gandalf!, the filmspotting podcast, visit Luke’s website!

http://www.sfbrp.com/?feed=podcast

iTunes 1-Click |SUBSCRIBE|

Posted by Jesse Willis

LibriVox: Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

SFFaudio Online Audio

LibriVoxStrange Maps is a fun blog (and now a book) by Frank Jacobs. Here is a smidgen of the proprietor’s post on Treasure Island:

“…was there a real-life model for the generically named Treasure Island – and if so, where was it? It seems to have been a chance invention by Lloyd Osbourne, RLS’s stepson, while holidaying with the family in a Scottish Highland cottage. As Osbourne later recalled:

‘… busy with a box of paints I happened to be tinting a map of an island I had drawn. Stevenson came in as I was finishing it, and with his affectionate interest in everything I was doing, leaned over my shoulder, and was soon elaborating the map and naming it. I shall never forget the thrill of Skeleton Island, Spyglass Hill, nor the heart-stirring climax of the three red crosses! And the greater climax still when he wrote down the words Treasure Island at the top right-hand corner! And he seemed to know so much about it too – the pirates, the buried treasure, the man who had been marooned on the island … . ‘Oh, for a story about it’, I exclaimed, in a heaven of enchantment …’

And that is how Stevenson got started writing Treasure Island – as a back story to the map originally drawn by his stepson.”

Cool hey?

There’s more to the story, and I encourage you to have a read of the original post |HERE|. After that you should be sufficiently primed to download the public domain audiobook version from LibriVox.org…

LibriVox - Treasure Island by Robert Louis StevensonTreasure Island
By Robert Louis Stevenson; Read by Adrian Praetzellis
17 Zipped MP3 Files or Podcast – Approx. 7 Hours 33 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: December 14, 2007
A mysterious map, pirates, and pieces of eight! When young Jim Hawkins finds a map to pirates’ gold he starts on an adventure that takes him from his English village to a desert island with the murderous Black Dog, half-mad Ben Gunn, and (of course) Long John Silver. Arr Jim lad! R.L. Stevenson (1850-1894) was born in Scotland and travelled extensively in California and the south Pacific.

Podcast feed: http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/treasure-island-by-robert-louis-stevenson-2.xml

iTunes 1-Click |SUBSCRIBE|

A map of Treasure Island:

Treasure Island Map

And the 1934 film version:

Posted by Jesse Willis

LibriVox: The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson

SFFaudio Online Audio

Listening For The League's Gentlemen At LibriVoxAlan Moore’s comic The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen is chock- full of public domain literary references (and characters). This is the third in a series of posts in which I root out the freely available audiobooks (at LibriVox.org) that either feature the characters in “the league” or which are at least alluded to in passing in the story. What’s especially interesting in this case is that Moore’s wasn’t the first comic book to take inspiration from Henry Jekyll’s chemically induced bipolarity. Marvel comics had its own take on Jekyll and Hyde with Bruce Banner’s transformation into The Incredible Hulk. Indeed it seems rather strange that I never saw this until I saw Moore’s own re-purposing.

LibriVox - The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis StevensonThe Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde
By Robert Louis Stevenson; Read by Kristin Hughes
10 Zipped MP3 Files or Podcast – Approx. 2 Hours 50 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: April 24, 2009
After hearing Mr. Enfield’s account of a distressing event involving Edward Hyde, the heir of his friend, Henry Jekyll, John Utterson is convinced that Jekyll’s relationship with Hyde is built on something sinister. Utterson’s concern for his friend is not unfounded but the reasons aren’t quite what he, at first, believes.
Podcast feed:

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/the-strange-case-of-dr-jekyll-and-mr-hyde-by-robert-louis-stevenson-2.xml

iTunes 1-Click |SUBSCRIBE|

Posted by Jesse Willis

CBC R1: Writers & Company talks to international crime writers

Aural Noir: Online Audio

CBC Radio One - Writers And CompanyThis week’s CBC Radio 1 Podcast of Writers & Company focuses on international crime writers. Host Eleanor Wachtel talks to Gianrico Carofiglio (Italy); Asa Larsson (Sweden); Louise Welsh (Scotland); Giles Blunt (Canada). They talk about mystery writing, their books and their inspirations (Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson, Greek mythology, the Old and New Testament villains King David, Judas, Cain, O.T.-God) . |MP3|

Podcast feed:

http://www.cbc.ca/podcasting/includes/writersandco.xml

P.S. CBC is still embargoing a J. Michael Straczynski radio drama series that Canadians have already paid for. That’s not polite CBC! Release it!

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBC Radio 4: Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde and The Rapture

SFFaudio Online Audio

BBC Radio 4It’s that time of the week for a quick scan of the forthcoming BBC Radio schedules in the Radio Times. There are two solid items to set your Radio Downloader program humming: The first runs just an hour, the second in 15 minute chunks for 10 weekdays in a row.

First up, a repeat of the play first broadcast in early 2007…

BBC Radio 4 - Dr. Jekyll And Mr. HydeThe Saturday Play: Dr Jekyll And Mr Hyde
Based on the book by Robert Louis Stevenson; Performed by a full cast
1 Broadcast – Approx. 60 Minutes [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4
Broadcast: Saturday July 25th 2009
When a London lawyer studies the last will of his old friend Dr Jekyll, his suspicions are aroused. Why has respectable Dr Jekyll left everything to sinister Edward Hyde? Directed by Claire Grove.
Cast:
Dr Jekyll …… Adam Godley
Utterson …… David Horovitch
Enfield …… Mark Straker
Mrs Utterson …… Christine Kavanagh
Lanyon …… Sam Dale
Poole …… Joseph Kloska
Sir Danvers …… Ian Masters
Girl/Maid …… Emma Noakes
Housekeeper …… Bethan Walker

Next, described as an “eco-thriller”…

BBC Radio 4 - The Rapture by Liz JensenBook At Bedtime: The Rapture
By Liz Jensen; Read by Denise Black
10 Parts – Approx. 2.5 Hours [UNABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4
Broadcast: Monday-Friday July 27th – 31st August 3 -7 @ 22:45-23:00
It is a June unlike any other before, with temperatures soaring to asphyxiating heights. All across the world, freak weather patterns—and the life-shattering catastrophes they entail—have become the norm. The twenty-first century has entered a new phase. But Gabrielle Fox’s main concern is a personal one: to rebuild her life after a devastating car accident that has left her disconnected from the world, a prisoner of her own guilt and grief. Determined to make a fresh start, and shake off memories of her wrecked past, she leaves London for a temporary posting as an art therapist at Oxsmith Adolescent Secure Psychiatric Hospital, home to one hundred of the most dangerous children in the country. Among them: the teenage killer Bethany Krall.

[Thanks Roy!]

Posted by Jesse Willis

Audio Realms an update

SFFaudio News

Audio RealmsThough fairly quiet of late, Audio Realms has been busy recording some classic SF, Fantasy and Horror that we’ll be telling you a lot more about very soon. The ringleader there, Fred Godsmark, says he’ll be following up the recently released Andre Norton novel “Voodoo Planet” (details of which have just been added to our ANDRE NORTON author’s page) with an unabridged release of Norton’s The Time Traders!

Audio Realms recently won accolades for their 2007 release called Little Fuzzy. That’s H. Beam Piper’s best loved novel! The acclaim came from none other than Publisher’s Weekly magazine! Little Fuzzy won “Best Fantasy AudioBook for 2007!”

Currently available from this Audio Realms are classics like:

The Land That Time Forgot by Edgar Rice Burroughs
The People That Time Forgot by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Out of Time’s Abyss by Edgar Rice Burroughs

Further, a new “urban horror” imprint of Audio Realms saw the release of two sure fire hits:

Hide And Seek by Jack Ketchum and
The Traveling Vampire Show by Richard Laymon

And their popular Dark Worlds of H.P. Lovecraft series is up to Volume 6 now too! But it doesn’t all end there. The near future portends even more goodies:

The Rising by Brian Keene
The Door Through Space by Marion Zimmer Bradley
Things That Are Not There by C.J. Henderson
The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
People Of The Dark by Robert E. Howard (this includes a Conan story, Queen Of The Black Coast)

And even a Weird Tales collection!

Fred’s going to be sending review copies of a lot of these. That will make some serious internecine fighting in the SFFaudio review clubhouse. Which reminds me, I need to add some more obsidian shards to the end of my club.

Posted by Jesse Willis