Comments | lost_spook: One more thing

lost_spook

One more thing

Mar 13, 2014 17:21

I knew there was something else: and I bought (as a reward for doing hard stuff, including some money-saving/gaining things) the TV tie-in book of Enemy at the Door for 1p on Amazon. I was worried, because TV novelisations do tend to be a special kind of terrible. Anyway, it arrived today! And I will say more some other time (now, I have my ( Read more... )

alfred burke, 1970s, libraries, enemy at the door

Comments 20

persiflage_1 March 13 2014, 18:35:58 UTC

Glad you're enjoying the book.

lost_spook March 13 2014, 20:23:19 UTC

It's an old TV tie-in, so it's, er... special. But it does have the odd bit of extra information that seems reasonably reliable, which is helpful for me. And some things that are accidentally amusing and/or fairly eyebrow-raising, so I'm definitely getting my £2.80's worth. It doesn't require much proper reading, really, which also helps.

So, on balance, yes. And librarians, saints and aristocratic confidence tricksters... Ha. *adds it to the long list of Dumb THings People Say About Librarians*

:-)

persiflage_1 March 13 2014, 20:26:40 UTC

Heehee...

So long as you're amused!

clocketpatch March 14 2014, 06:06:52 UTC

The book sounds like one of those special, fannish pleasures which is equal halves embarrassment/mystification that such a thing exists and utter squee that it does and that it's in your hands. *is happy for you*

lost_spook March 14 2014, 12:14:21 UTC

Hmm, in this case, it gave me the extra info I hoped for, amused me with its highly random descriptions of people (not those it didn't bother with, too), but then, aargh, unexpected horrible sexist/probably actually misogynist cliched stuff that was NOT IN MY WWII SHOW WHO LET BEN STEED IN HERE. So, um, yes.

But I now have the extra knowledge what I paid for.

;-)

oonaseckar March 14 2014, 08:45:31 UTC

The third option sounds the most fun. Pretty minimal qualification, too: I might check the job boards, see if there are any vacancies...

Some novelisations are great, though. 'Desperately Seeking Susan', that one is unhinged and pretty hilarious, goes off on tangents the filmmakers never thought of. The 'Angels' (80's nursey thing?) ones are also good: bleak and grim in the extreme, but good. Also I was going to say 'Johnny Jarvis', but checked and it's a novel adaptation rather than the other way around.

Maybe he just has favourite characters? Then comes to others, goes, 'You, I hate you, your scene is getting cut right down. You're goin' daaahhn!'

lost_spook March 14 2014, 12:20:22 UTC

The third option sounds the most fun. Pretty minimal qualification, too: I might check the job boards, see if there are any vacancies...

But do you have that kind of face? Do people also mistake you for a saint or a librarian? :-D

This is not a great novelisation, sad to say. Four episodes of a well-written, balanced and thoughtful TV series compressed into a one dimensional novelisation with bonus missing sexism. Still, the author like describing Alfred Burke, and he did supply the extra info I hoped it might have, so I'm not complaining too hard.

Maybe he just has favourite characters? Then comes to others, goes, 'You, I hate you, your scene is getting cut right down. You're goin' daaahhn!'It doesn't even seem to be that logical. He describes several people in loving detail at the start, and nearly has a fit over how beautiful he thinks Clare and Peter are, and then the only people he describes using actors' little quirks are Alfred Burke's character, and John Malcolm's (and he doesn't seem to like Kluge, he also says he ( ... )

scifi_mel March 14 2014, 10:32:57 UTC

I remember I really enjoyed this one and was why I was so pleased that they found it as reading it it seemed like a really good adventure. Though I'd forgotten the line about librarians..

lost_spook March 14 2014, 12:23:39 UTC

:lol: Sorry, no, not that one - I didn't explain properly - this isn't the novelisation for Enemy of the World (which, yes, I remember being a good one, too, though it's been a long time since I read it), but a novelisation of the ITV 1978-80 series Enemy at the Door about the occupation of the Channel Islands.

(It's not a good novelisation at all. I don't know what the author was thinking, or why somebody let him write an episode after this. There's even a whole bout of unwarranted sexism towards some of the female characters that the show is pretty free of, thank goodness.)

scifi_mel March 14 2014, 12:30:32 UTC

Ah, I must have been reading too quickly before coffee ;) I've not seen enemy at the door. That's pretty awful about the sexism though! :(

liadtbunny March 14 2014, 15:41:29 UTC

A man so saintly he has to grow a beard to protect the world, lol.

I'm glad you're enjoying your 1970's TV tie-in. I suppose it helps it's not set in the 1970's and thus avoiding collecting all your favourite racist, sexist & homophobic stereotypes(!). Next stop PE bks for more facial descriptions.

I bought an XYY Man book (now a successful Granda TV series), from a charity shop, the other day - it may be going back!

lost_spook March 14 2014, 18:18:51 UTC

A man so saintly he has to grow a beard to protect the world, lol.

He can't seem to make up his mind whether it's also possibly sly, but he comes down on saintly twice. In the same paragraph as being sly and foxy. So, er... :lol:

I'm glad you're enjoying your 1970's TV tie-in. I suppose it helps it's not set in the 1970's and thus avoiding collecting all your favourite racist, sexist & homophobic stereotypes(!). No, no, it has completely unwanted and unwarranted surprise!sexism, especially in its version of Ep 1. It went so abruptly Ben-Steed like, I might need to make a further post sometime about the whole thing. So, I am amused at some stuff, and it did answer the questions I wanted answering, but I am not okay with the horrible sexist crap it went and threw in. urgh ( ... )

liadtbunny March 15 2014, 14:49:10 UTC

He's a foxy saint? *G*

Oh dear, keep flick reading. I might watch Ben Steed's Crown Court now or not.

TV novelisations suck you in by having a nice picture on the front so I'm afraid you will have to buy the book - Henry VII's monkey needs company(!). TV tie-ins can be quite interesting as the authors original work is described as avant-garde fic and TV ties aren't.

lost_spook March 15 2014, 20:55:02 UTC

He a foxy, saintly, sly librarian. Or possibly an aristocratic conman. Apparently.

No old TV tie-in has as nice a pic as Henry VII and the monkey! And that one was a nice little non-fiction book that made me happy. Mind, I was a little hard on this one about the sexism, because it did calm down a bit, but it was rather a shock, because I really wasn't expecting it in

:lol: No, don't watch the Ben Steed episode!! Save yourself now! Or, er, possibly, do, and then tell us whether it was as dreadful as his B7 eps, or he's better when he's not writing SF.

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