Showing results by narrator "Rayner Bourton" in All Categories

A Child's History of England is a book by Charles Dickens. It first appeared in serial form in Household Words, running from 25 January 1851 to 10 December 1853. Dickens also published the work in book form in three volumes: the first volume on 20 December 1851, the second on 25 December 1852 and the third on 24 December 1853. Although the volumes were published in December, each was postdated the following year. Dickens dedicated the book to "My own dear children, whom I hope it may help, bye and bye, to read with interest larger and better books on the same subject".

Rayner Bourton, original Rocky Horror and all 'round nice guy, has released this wonderful new book with his memories of the early days of The Rocky Horror Show. It gives a brilliant insight from the first auditions though the original Theatre Upstairs production to the Kings Road shows. For the true Rocky Horror fans, this book is a mine of information.

The Mystery of Edwin Drood is the final novel by Charles Dickens, originally published in 1870. Though the novel is named after the character Edwin Drood, it focuses more on Drood's uncle, John Jasper, a precentor, choirmaster and opium addict, who is in love with his pupil, Rosa Bud. Miss Bud, Edwin Drood's fiancée, has also caught the eye of the high-spirited and hot-tempered Neville Landless. Landless and Edwin Drood take an instant dislike to each other. Later Drood disappears under mysterious circumstances.

Robur the Conqueror (French: Robur-le-Conquérant) is a science fiction novel by Jules Verne, published in 1886. It is also known as The Clipper of the Clouds. It has a sequel, Master of the World, which was published in 1904. The story begins with strange lights and sounds, including blaring trumpet music, reported in the skies all over the world.

Toomai's father rides Kala Nag the elephant to catch wild elephants in the hills. Toomai comes to help and risks his life throwing a role up to one of the drivers. His father forbids him to enter the elephant enclosure again. One night he follows the elephant hunters, and is picked up by Kala Nag; he rides into the elephants' meeting place in the jungle, where they dance. On his return he is welcomed by both hunters and elephants.

The Cone is a short story by H. G. Wells, first published in 1895 in Unicorn. It was intended to be "the opening chapter of a sensational novel set in the Five Towns", later abandoned. The story is set at an ironworks in Stoke-on-Trent, in Staffordshire. An artist is there to depict the industrial landscape; the manager of the ironworks discovers his affair with his wife, and takes him on a tour of the factory, where there are dangerous features.

Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life is the first book by American writer Herman Melville, published first in London, then New York, in 1846. Considered a classic in travel and adventure literature, the narrative is partly based on the author's actual experiences on the island Nuku Hiva in the South Pacific Marquesas Islands in 1842, liberally supplemented with imaginative reconstruction and adaptation of material from other books. The title comes from the valley of Taipivai, once known as Taipi.

"The Empire of the Ants" is a disturbing tale about a new species of giant ants in South America which have evolved to use tools and weapons, wear clothes, communicate and organize themselves as a deadly fighting machine. And their chosen enemy is mankind...

G.K. Chesterton was one of the towering figures of British literature in the early twentieth century. A man of massive size, massive personality, and massive appetite, Chesterton famous personality, dress, and personality gave rise to an eponymous adjective: Chestertonian. Although he is renowned for the Father Brown detective series, Chesterton also wrote volumes of nonfiction. First published in 1917, A Short History of England is exactly that, serving Chesterton's goal of publishing "a popular book of history written from the standpoint of a member of the public."

An English family have just moved to a house in India. They find Rikki-Tikki-Tavi the mongoose flooded out of his burrow. A pair of large cobras, Nag and Nagaina, attempt unsuccessfully to kill him. He hears the cobras plotting to kill the father in the house, and attacks Nag in the bathroom. The sound of the fight attracts the father, who shoots Nag. Rikki-Tikki-Tavi destroys Nagaina's eggs and chases her into her "rat-hole" where he kills her too.

Martin Eden is a 1909 novel by American author Jack London about a young proletarian autodidact struggling to become a writer. It was first serialized in The Pacific Monthly magazine from September 1908 to September 1909 and then published in book form by Macmillan in September 1909. - Eden represents writers' frustration with publishers by speculating that when he mails off a manuscript, a "cunning arrangement of cogs" immediately puts it in a new envelope and returns it automatically with a rejection slip.

'The Moth' is the strange tale of two rivalling entomologists, each determined to demolish the other's life's work. When one of them dies, the other struggles to cope in the absence of his rival. And then he discovers an entirely new species of moth - a moth very reminiscent of his dead rival - and which pursues him wherever he goes.

DI Barbara Forster returns home to Cumbria for the first time since a personal tragedy shattered her small Lake District village. Tragedy strikes again when her teenage goddaughter Katya vanishes under circumstances that mirror the disappearance of Barbara’s teenage friend 10 years earlier, during a charity fun run on bonfire night - still an unsolved case. Convinced there is a link, Barbara is determined to find the missing girl and answers to the past.

"The Haunted House" is a story series published in 1859 for the weekly periodical All the Year Round. It was "Conducted by Charles Dickens", with Charles Dickens writing the opening and closing stories, framing stories by Dickens himself and five other authors. The story appeared in the Extra Christmas Number on 13 December 1859. Dickens began a tradition of Christmas publications with A Christmas Carol in 1843 and his Christmas stories soon became a national institution. The Haunted House was his 1859 offering.

Under The Knife is a short story by H. G. Wells. Herbert George "H. G." Wells (21 September 1866 - 13 August 1946) was an English writer, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing textbooks and rules for war games. Wells is sometimes called "The Father of Science Fiction," as are Jules Verne and Hugo Gernsback.

"Dagon" is a short story by American author H. P. Lovecraft, written in July 1917, one of the first stories he wrote as an adult. It was first published in the November 1919 edition of The Vagrant (issue #11). Dagon was later published in Weird Tales and is considered by many to be one of Lovecraft's most forward looking stories.

'The Treasure in the Forest' is the tale of two treasure hunters, Evans and Hooker, who have murdered a Chinese man to steal his map, which locates a buried stash of gold ingots. The Chinese man had boasted that he had ensured the safety of his secret hoard. But what can he have meant by this? When Evans and Hooker arrive at the location of the hoard, the first thing they find is a dead body of another Chinese man. But how did he die? And why did he fail to get away with the gold?

The young daughter of a local doctor is killed - shoved into an icy, fast-flowing river and cold-bloodedly left to die. Her parents stubbornly deny any involvement. The child’s father is so focused on his right to remain silent that DCI Neil Hunter, DI Barbara Forster, and DC Matt Walsh begin to wonder if he wants the truth uncovered - or ensure it remains buried. The mother, too, has her own reasons for keeping the truth dead and buried. Then, within days, a boy is also murdered, and all three officers find themselves caught up in one of the most harrowing cases of their careers.

The eight stories here show Wells in various moods and foreshadow his celebrity. These are uncanny tales, resonating strangely, despite arising from ordinary thoughts, interactions, and memories. Wells shows just how fantastic the everyday can be, if one only pauses to reflect on missed chances, suggestions of what might have been, bleak premonitions of blessed futures whose utopian promise is destroyed by new forms of war.

'The Country of the Blind' is the strange story of a mountain guide who accidently falls off a cliff ledge in the Andes. He survives the fall unhurt, and finds himself in a remote valley where a tribe lives completely cut off from the rest of the world. A hereditary illness has meant that for 15 generations all the members of the tribe have been born blind. As a result, they now have a highly evolved sense of hearing, scent and touch. 'In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king,' thinks the mountaineer.