Wednesday 5 August 2015

Unknown London [by Walter George Bell]

Herein you will find much concerning those things which everybody knows about, but nobody knows — the things you have known about since childhood, and have been content to leave them at that, knowing little of what they are and still less where they are to be found. I have dealt mostly with the big things that London has in its keeping, such as the Domesday Book (can you tell me off-hand where it is to be seen ?); with the Confessor's Shrine (of the crowds who enter Westminster Abbey there is a big leaven who do not even know that it is there); with the massive fragments of London's Roman Wall that still survive; with that spot in Smithfield where martyrs burnt and English history was made; with the Duke of Suffolk's head and its dramatic story; with our Roman baths; with London Stone and odd others. … The City of London — the innermost "square mile" — is the richest ground for historical associations in all our world Empire, and the greater pity, therefore, that it should be unknown. (Summary from the author’s Preface, 1919.)


link to the free audiobook

Saturday 1 August 2015

The Thing in the Attic (version 2) [by James B. Blish]

"Honath and his fellow arch-doubters did not believe in the Giants, and for this they were cast into Hell. And when survival depended upon unwavering faith in their beliefs, they saw that there were Giants, after all...." The Thing in the Attic is a Science Fiction story by James Blish with a well developed story line and great characters that you find yourself pulling for as they struggle to understand and survive in 'hell'. Do they have tails? yes they do. Do they live in the treetops? you bet they do. Are they 'people'? Well, I will let you decide that. The strange beings and environment that you expect from Blish are all here and they challenge you to adapt your thinking to keep up with the action. And of course there is an ending that is definitely not expected. Listen and enjoy this story of a strange world far in the future of the human race.

Read by Phil Chenevert

link to the free audiobook
The Thing in the Attic (version 2) [by James B. Blish]