Review: Eyes "Scary, Tense, Funny, And Quirky"

Book review: The Eyes of the Killer Robot

The House That Silence Built

Whaddya know, someone wrote fan fiction. This one’s a doozy: John Bellairs and Dr. Who.

Something About the Game of Gloom

In the game of Gloom you assume control of the fate of an eccentric family of misfits and misanthropes. The goal of the game is sad, but simple: you want your characters to suffer the greatest tragedies possible before passing on to the well-deserved respite of death. Blogger Graham Linehan points out the delightful obvious similarities between the game (not kin to another game by id software) and the artwork of Edward Gorey: 

Something About Bellairsian Memorabilia

Over the years we’ve seen or heard about people who collect John Bellairs’s books, be it Bantam paperbacks or the original hard covers with Edward Gorey art. But is there any other Bellairs-related memorabilia?

Review: Treasure "Descriptive, Well-Paced, Some Extremely Unlikely Plot Contrivances"

Book review: The Treasure of Alpheus Winterborn

Bellairsian Vibes from Strange and Norrell

Daphne shared her thoughts on Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell and the Bellairsian vibe she received:

Time Capsule: Forty Years Of Existence

John Bellairs’s second book turns 40 years old this month. The Pedant and the Shuffly is the fable pitting cold, hard logic against boundless, explosive chaos.

Review: Lamp "Creepy Things. Spooky Sounds. Delicious Shivers, You Know?"

Book review: The Lamp from the Warlock's Tomb

The Art of Suspense

by Nathaniel (Jan. 15, 2008)

(Originally published at MadLord Innovations)

Something About the Lewis Chessmen Stalemate

We mentioned the conflict a few weeks ago but now some comments about the push to relocate the Lewis Chessmen from their home in the British Museum to Scotland, the country they were found:

• The Closet Grandmaster
  
• Jeffrey J. Cohen
  
• Derek.Fincham

In addition, someone is using the pallid little dwarves as inspiration for a writing project.

Assembled and Collected

by Jan Halvarson (Jan. 21, 2008)
(Originally published at poppytalk.com)
Note: Halvarson interviews three people about their collections, including Roger Allen and his collection of vintage John Bellairs books.

Like a Tapir in Some Monument

Fresca shared her thoughts about Edward Gorey's guest, it of Doubtful Guest fame. Most of us are probably familiar with the 50-year-old story of the creature that showed up at this house one day and to the best of our knowledge is still lounging around the estate causing problems. Fresca believes Gorey creature’s closest relative is the tapir, the strangely snouted beast seen in Asia and elsewhere:

Time Capsule: January 16, 1968

And tomorrow I will be thirty.

On the Road to Providence

Just as those quirky Bellairsians have their Bellairs Walk in Marshall, so too do they celebrate Lovecraft’s hometown of Providence, Rhode Island.  "A hand-sketched survey of key areas that were important to both H.P. Lovecraft and his stories” was announced recently.

How Sweet A Voynich...Plant?

Centuries after surfacing, the Voynich Manuscript still has its mysteries and people are still trying to make heads or tails out of what it is, what it means, and why someone bothered to create it in the first place. 

The arcane tome has a special place for Bellairsians: Prospero and Roger Bacon must battle a curious grimoire with similar (or identical?) properties in The Face in the Frost and Johnny Dixon also has a run in with a similar manuscript in The Wrath of the Grinning Ghost.