T'Leng raised an eyebrow.*

Oh, dear. I haven't done so well on the reading front this month. I put the blame squarely on book number fifteen...

15. Son of a Witch, by Gregory Maguire

And the reason for the aforementioned blame is that this book was a chore to read. A chore! I think it's because the story seemed somewhat aimless and Liir, the titular son of a witch, was too sullen, antisocial and whiny.
After the death of his mother, Liir sets out to find his half-sister, Nor, first by travelling to the Emerald City with Dorothy following her "accidental" (yeah, right!) killing of the witch, Elphaba. Once Dorothy buggers off back to Kansas (and good riddance), Liir sets out on his quest but get distracted by, in no particular order: old nuns, being-taken-advantage-of and having-a-baby-with a slutty girl-nun, underground city prisons, Elphaba's broom, talking birds, dragons, having a stab-in-the-dark with a hot, blond, dragon-trainer (although almost all of said stabbing is left up to one's own imagination), Glinda and an elephant in human form. Sounds pretty exciting, doesn't it? It's not, though. I'd go as for as to say: Don't bother with this one.


16. Unspoken Truth, by Margaret Wander Bonanno

After the boredom of Oz it was nice to get back to the sanctity of the Star Trek Universe with this somewhat indulgent tale of Spock's protege, Saavik.
Set just after the Whale Probe Crisis of Star Trek IV, the GNDN story of a tumultuous year in Saavik's life includes double & triplecrossing espionage, a first contact with a race of giant worms, an intimate encounter and insight into Vulcan's most prominent family.
It was a nice book to get lost in, but ultimately, brings nothing new to Star Trek. However, it was nicely written and paced, with plenty of familiar touches and showed more of the Vulcan way of life, which I always find fascinating.

* No. Not you Timothy Elizabeth Leng. Unless you've been using your Media Whoring powers to insinuate yourself into this book. Albeit as a wizened old Vulcan High Priestess! Anyway, the title of this post comes from page 309.


17. The Little Book of Essential Foreign Swear Words, by Emma Burgess

Not exactly a great work of literature, but it is mildly amusing if one likes this kind of thing. Which I don't, particularly, but I received it as a novelty birthday gift so I felt obligated to read it.
As well as translations from English to French, German, Spanish & Italian of most of the well known swear words, there's also a section on phrases and another on random rudeness from around the world.
I'll leave you with a couple of my favourite phrases:

"Est-ce que c'est un bronzage ou avez-vous de la merde sur vos doigts?"

"Dein Schwanz ist so klein, dass es 'ne Maus nicht merkt, wenn du sie fickst."

You can do the translations yourselves, or just guess if you don't have a clue.

Out of ashes...

Now that I'm no longer saddled with Apocalypse Oven, look what I've been able to accomplish:

Cream Tea Butterfly Cakes and Marzipan & Cerise Cakes

Here they are again in their natural habitat in Castle DeVice, just before being devoured by four gaping maws

Things I am looking forward to:

Splice

Caught in the act

Drat! Now I'll have to remove the evidence...

P.S. Yes, I know. I need a shave.

Evil Tim and the Jelly Babies of Doom!

The Duplicate Evil Tims stoically defend their Original from the massing hoards of zombie Jelly Babies on the Granite Planet, which, in certain lights, can look a lot like a kitchen worktop...



Despite being devoured from the feet up, the Tims remain steadfast, gritting their teeth and looking hot as the Jelly Babies slowly eat their tasty cardboard flesh.

Will Original Evil Tim escape?!?


Tune in next time!

Cusp Trek II deleted scenes

or: my OFFICIAL SPARKY TIM CUT OUT 'N KEEP ACTIONLESS FIGURE competition entry


Oh, no. Not again, Evil Tim thought as the witch fainted into his arms. Another casualty of my awesome yoga-honed bod and stunningly handsome face.

He looked around to take in his surroundings. The platform he appeared on was at the rear of a large, futuristic-looking room, filled with various unmanned stations and other technological trickery. Spying some clothes draped over the back of a chair, Evil Tim carefully propped the stunned witch up in it and removed his red athletic leggings before pulling on the black and gold uniform. Not bad, he thought as he admired the way the skin-tight uniform stretched over his muscles.
As he stylishly mussed up his hair in the mirror-like shielding surrounding the platform, he noticed a large empty cardboard box laying on it's side in the reflection. He turned and approached the box, noticing that it had the word DuPLicatoR scrawled on it.
He grinned evilly, as was his wont and wondered What have we here? before climbing inside the box.

* BOINK *

"Scientific progress goes "boink"?" he said to himself as he crawled out. Ah, well...

* BOINK *

Two figures, identical to Evil Tim, crawled out of the box after him. Wow! The fun we could have.
"Welcome" he greeted them, fingers splayed in the traditional Vulcan salute. "I'm Captain James Timothy Kirk."
"Us, too" grinned the duplicates, copying his hand gesture.
"Hmmm... We can't all be the captain" Evil Tim began, "so, as I'm the original, you can be my understudies." He regarded himselves through slightly narrowed eyes. "And to save confusion, you'd better take off your uniforms."
The two Tims glanced at each other, shrugged, then flexed their muscles, bursting out of their straining uniforms. Rawr! Tim thought. I really am HOT in my Easy-Peel underwear! He did a double take at the colour of the duplicate on the right. Must've stayed in the Duplicator too long.



It was at this point that a certain witch stirred from his swoon, saw the practically naked Tims and overloaded with lust once more.

The possible thwarting of "long-held, slightly rapey desires*"

Why do I leave things to the last minute? WHY?!

My godsdamned printer (and associated software) is playing silly buggers and thwarting the printing of my OFFICIAL SPARKY TIM CUT OUT 'N KEEP ACTIONLESS FIGURE!
If Tim hadn't given such a ridiculously long deadline on his competition, I wouldn't have left this until now to sort out. Bah! My dreams of a willing army of Mini-Tim cardboard clones in various states of attire may come to naught. NAUGHT!

It may not be too late for you, though, as you have until May 15th to enter the competition. Just click here to find yourselves at Tim's competition post and create an OFFICIAL SPARKY TIM CUT OUT 'N KEEP ACTIONLESS FIGURE of your own. And yes, it has to be said in shouty capitals. And no, I didn't make it up.

And don't steal my idea of Easy-Peel pants (that I stupidly gave away in his comments) - It's mine! MINE I TELL YOU!! See:




* Quote taken from Tim. I'm sure I don't know what he means by it?

Guilty pleasure

Getting a bit overdosed listening to Goldfrapp and Calvin Harris whilst driving to work, I turned to the slightly cheesy, Steps spin-offs, H & Claire. As well as DJ, I keep listening to the beautiful ABBA-esque Another You, Another Me, written by Benny & Bjorn originally for Gemini, as you can see here:



I'm going to have to have something new next week, though, as H is really starting to annoy me (just as he did when he was in Steps). May be I'll pop Royksopp in?

The Perils Of Petra Pitstop

Now. Where did I put that Peril? I'm sure it was here yesterday?

Whatever are you looking for Peril for? Why do you need it?

Remember this?

Oh, gods...

Just apologise, for hells sakes!

Never!

Well, you can't find that Peril, so what choice do you have?

You've hidden it, haven't you?!

* guilty silence *

I knew it!



'Petra, I'd just like to point out, that the post in question was not at all slanderous (with the possible exception of the 'gay period' bit). It was the Comments that may have had a slanderous edge, and I can't be held responsible for what other people may write. But, just in case there is some legal precedent, I apologise on behalf of the said commenters for whatever psychological trauma you may have incurred.

Now, let's all have a nice cup of tea Gin & Tonic and forget this whole sordid affair.

Pass the Fondant Fancies, would you? There's a dear.

Vermin's the Pot Noodle of vampire snacks*

Well, here we are at the end of the month again. Not the end of April again. Well, not for me, anyway. Some of you may have been living the month of April again and again and again, maybe because you've chosen to, or maybe because you're stuck, but for most of us (I imagine) this is first and only time through.

What was I saying?

Ah, yes. End of the month. So, here is the prerequisite book update post. Let's start from where we left off last time and go straight to the tenth book Ive read this year:


10. Bad Blood (a Being Human novel), by James Goss

George is a werewolf, Mitchell is a vampire, and Annie is a ghost, and they all live together in Annie's old house in Bristol. Annie has organised a bingo night to raise money to refurbish the community centre and the boys have turned up - just about on time - to support her. Sounds pretty run-of-the-mill, doesn't it? It's not, though. Not by a long shot. Especially when the vampire Human Resources manager at the local hospital turns up!
There's more to it than that, of course, but I don't want to spoil it for anyone who might be about to read it. However, I will say this: Bad Blood is a very well written story about the Being Human trio. I totally believed in it. I think it was because the author has really got a feel for the characters - How they 'sound', their mannerisms and the way they react to things. I heartily recommend this book!

* This post's title came from this book.


11. Single White Vampire, by Lynsay Sands

As I mentioned to 'Petra: "Don't bother purchasing (or reading) Single White Vampire (unless you already have) - What a crock! One dimensional characters bounce from one conveniently placed plot device (no relation) to another. And while there are the expected sex scenes, they are heterosexual. But luckily, they're not too explicit - Well, the lady-bits aren't!"
And what I omitted to mention was that the lead female character is annoying beyond reproach. Quite how the Single White Vampire in question fell for her and dumped his Singleton status I don't know?
Actually, she did put out a lot. The slut. And she sure as hells moans a lot during sex. Not whiny moaning, sex moaning. Yuk!

I brought this on myself, of course. Totally judged a book by it's cover. Well, I say 'judged', more like 'took one look at the cover model and fell in lust'!


12. Zombie, an anthology of the undead, edited by Christopher Golden

Ooh, loads of good takes on zombies in this book. Among my favourites are Lazarus, by John Connolly - The story of Lazarus' resurrection from his point of view (seems like that busy-body Jesus should have left him alone); What Maisie Knew, by David Liss - A zombies-as-commodities story; The Wind Cries Mary, by Brian Keene - A ghost/zombie love story of sorts, and; Twittering From The Circus Of The Dead, by Joe Hill - A girl Twitters for her life as her family are all zombified.


13. Star Trek: Nero, by Mike Johnson, Tim Jones & David Messina

This comic/graphic novel collects the four issues about the Romulan Nero which cover the 25 year gap in the film Star Trek. Did that sentence make sense? I keep reading it and reading it, but to no avail. Ah, well...
Anyway, this book gives more insight into the villain, Nero, and his personal vendetta against Spock and the United Federation of Planets. It's cinematic in scope, with a dark tone, which is good, really, as it's based on a film! As with other graphic novels, I lament at the portrait layout - For a truly cinematic feel (and easier read), a landscape layout would really do wonders.


14. Tall, Dark and Dead (well, nobody's perfect...), by Tate Hallaway

Oh dear. See what I thought of Single White Vampire up there to see what I think of this particular 'tome'. Except that the cover is Chick-Lit Shit.
A book I've owned for over two years and only just got around to reading (I wish I hadn't bothered) even though it has been mentioned in this blog before - click here and scroll down to the first award.
This book, the fourteenth I've read this year, means that I've already equalled the amount of books I read in all of last year. And it's still only April!

Ummm... Actually, I wrote this review based on the first couple of chapters of TD&D (which were pretty shit), but I've since read the rest and, I'm happy to tell you, it's MUCH better than Single White Vampire. The characters (mostly) have more than one dimension and the sex (what little there is, thanks gods) isn't all moany!


And there we have it for another month. Byeeee!

Wednesdays are orange?

No, this is not a promotion for Orange - I just like the ad.




P.S. For some very Sparky Malarkey, Tim is holding a competition that could very well make my dreams come true - Albeit in miniature cardboard form. I suggest you get yourselves over there to see what it's all about.

Now!

I've got a Rocket

We just love Goldfrapp's latest single here at Castle DeVice.



That's all.