Where would we be without the shipping container, so much of the world's freight is now carried in these things by boat, train and truck. The ships and ports sections are probably the most interesting, though of course much of the information contained in here is a bit out of date.
But the humble shipping container still rules the roost, being transported around the world daily in the thousands. Quite a few end up repurposed for use as storage, or just abandoned to rust away.
The book includes the full range of lifeboats from sailing boats to modern motor boats and even hovercraft! Every boat has a small profile and photograph. This really is an excellent book packed full of information and very lavishly illustrated.
Highly recommended.
The Asterix saga was at a major turning point therefore. The creators were either too old to continue or had already passed away, the only way the franchise could continue was with new blood at the helm. You can imagine that the team of Ferri and Conrad, who created this story, felt a huge amount of pressure when they were putting Asterix and the Picts together...
NuAsterix (a term i invented, feel free to borrow) could well have lived or died on how good this story was. If it had been bad then there might not be much chance to keep the characters going for much longer. Luckily, Asterix and the Picts is actually pretty good!
I wouldn't say its the best Asterix book ever but it is definitely the best for some time, and certainly better than most of the ones Uderzo wrote and drew on his own after the passing of Goscinny. Not that i am as down on Uderzo's version of Asterix as some people are, the books are still pretty fine or at least OK but they lack the subtlety and warmth of the older books.
Asterix and the Picts takes a bit of a middle ground, it still has some of the more slap stick graphically heavy humour of Uderzo's Asterix but also some more of the word play and puns of the original version. The story gets off to a bit of a clumsy start but then starts to find its feet and includes a few genuine laugh out loud jokes.
In truth, the book was a bit safe and maybe lacks a clear identity but you can understand that because of what was riding on it. I suspect NuAsterix is now safe for the foreseeable future and a number of other volumes have followed. By Belanos what a relief!
This week's railway trip was closer to home and a bit less bleak than the trip to Thurgarton. I went to Hagley in Worcestershire. I have been once before but i wanted to update my station photography for my fourth book which will be on the railway stations of the county (and Herefordshire). I also wanted to visit the church too which i didn't do last time. The church was open too so i was able to have a nice look inside.
You can see my photos of Hagley here.
When i was a toddler we lived up in Liverpool for a short time, i don't remember anything of this unfortunately though i do have a souvenir from that time. This is a Dinky Mini police car which my Nan bought at a shop in Waterloo for me., However, this car is now in a very battered state without tyres, one of the doors and the paint is in a bad condition. In my memory it has always looked like this so i must have destroyed this toy and reduced it to this condition when i was a toddler. Amazing!
Just before Christmas i bought the same toy off of eBay in a much better (though still somewhat worn) condition. One of my model projects for this year will be to try and restore this Dinky car to something approaching a good condition! The original though will probably never look any better but i like it as a reminder of my apparently violent very young years.
Later on, his blindness is cured and he falls in love with a mysterious woman. However, he knows that she was involved in the murder but is not sure exactly how...
Although the book was a success when released in the late 19th century, and was adapted into a stage play, i found this a troublesome and frequently annoying read though the premise is pretty interesting.
The story moves on at a decent pace, though i found it rather melodramatic and the plot a bit too fanciful, though this was a common fault/feature (delete depending on your point of view) of the time.
Olrik gets involved with their plot, devised by the shadowy Grand Druid (the identify of whom is pretty obvious early on in the story), who seeks the sword Excalibur and the treasure hoard of King Arthur. Both are thought to be buried underground somewhere in Cornwall, they need Professor Mortimer's latest invention which can tunnel through solid rock like it isn't there, nothing at all like the Mole from Thunderbirds oh no...
So, this is a fine Blake & Mortimer adventure, as usual mixing mad science, a past reimagined and a dose of the mystic. However, it is by no means the best volume in the series. Blake & Mortimer is somewhat notorious for heavy use of word panels to explain the story. Whilst this can be a wordy story too there were times where it was a little unclear what was going on, maybe a little more explanation was needed in this instance! Still, great fun to read.
At the weekend i travelled to the East Midlands, to Thurgarton which is a village between Nottingham and Newark. This is a pretty rural part of the world near to the Trent, and pretty flat too. At this time of the year and with this weather (drizzly and overcast) it was all a little bleak. But this is just what i needed and i had a good time. You can see my photos here.
The professor is pretty reluctant to do this, having tired of being an amateur detective, but soon finds himself embroiled in a rather complicated situation with various suspicious characters, and also another murder!
This isn't the best Basnett book, he is maybe a little too jaded and reluctant to give the story much energy, and it needed some due to the number of characters introduced. The unveiling of the culprits is also rather low-key, taking place in the background. However, as with all of Ferrer's books it was still an enjoyable read.
One thing I did find up there was a children's book my Mum bought me to read when i was a child many years ago. I'm glad I did not throw this away.
"Hi Fella" by Era Zistel is the story of a puppy who gets lost when the box he is being transported in falls over the side of a truck. He has to learn how to survive, at first with a raccoon and then a cat, until he can find his way home. Wherever or whatever that is.
It is a delightful story and I am glad it was dumped up in the loft along with everything else instead of being thrown away. Sometimes hoarding is good.
I didn't have a railway adventure last weekend due to the heavy snow, but it has mostly melted away by now, its even almost warm so on Friday i headed up to Derby for the first time this year. It was nice to finally see one of the Network Rail 153s which are used to monitor railway infrastructure. You can see my photos here.
One of the many things i do is collect retro office technology from the 1970s and 1980s, including pocket calculators and i am starting to build quite a good collection. The latest calculator to add to that list arrived today. It is a nice late 1970s machine from Japan and my first by Toshiba. I'll have a proper look at it sometime this weekend, including seeing if it still works!
When i was a kid i used to love this stuff, though of course much of it was nonsense and i later found out that von Däniken was rather shameless in falsely presenting doctored evidence to support his claims.
However, it was a popular thing in the 1960s and 1970s and a fun aspect of the craze in the 1970s was the publication of a series of comic books about a group of aliens led by Ais and Zen who have come to Earth in the distant past to change the biology of primitive ape-men to create homo sapiens. This is a great science fiction adventure romp. In this first volume the aliens arrive on Earth and begin their plans...
Not really to be taken that seriously like many of the Ancient Astronaut works really should be, though unfortunately many have.
Many of the railways were cable hauled due to the steep inclines, including at High Peak Junction where a wharf for transfer between canal and railway and the railway's workshops can be visited as part of the many visitor attractions in this beautiful part of the world.
Thus, this is pretty different from the usual Middleton Press volume, as there arn't any stations which you can take trains to today and you can compare the past pictures against. Instead, it is a fascinating look at industrial railways and how they coped with often very difficult terrain and circumstances.
Well yes to both really. The novel is fairly true to the film. There are a few differences in structure, for example the flashbacks near the start of the film are presented in the book in linear fashion at the start but that's fine as this probably works better in print. The overall plot and feel of the film is adhered to with some differences in detail (but this may have been changed from the screenplay the author worked to anyway).
Does the novel add anything new? Well amazingly yes, it helped clarify some parts of the plot which perhaps were not that clearly laid out on screen. So overall a hit. The cover artwork is basic but effective, a classic still of Bruce in his epic fight with Han. No bullshit.
My best Christmas present was arguably this whiteboard! For some time i have wanted one to help me organise my railway trips and my future book projects too. Although i can, and do, use electronic methods to plan both, often i find being able to write and view things on a physical format more helpful. I am sure i will find this board highly useful.
This is an opulent book, beautiful rich artwork telling a wonderfully retro and exciting adventure involving sinister criminals and the mysterious powers of the occult. Blake & Mortimer stories so often have the air of a 1930s adventure serial and transport you to that wonderful noir world of detectives and cult dabblings, probably none more so than this volume which is the first part of a 2 part story set in Egypt (natch).
Professor Mortimer is in Egypt studying ancient papyri but a shadowy group led by Mortimer's arch nemesis Olrik (who else?!) is also there and also eager to discover what secrets the papyri hold, as they are the key to understanding the secret of the Great Pyramid and the riches that are supposed to lie within...
A terrific plot, though as with most Blake & Mortimer books sometimes the plot does get a little too intricate and everything is accompanied by masses of text! You certainly get your money's worth with Blake & Mortimer words wise. I like the denseness of the story personally though if you are used to the more fluid plot of, say, Tintin then it can take some getting used to.
Highly recommended, this really is a high point of the original Edgar P. Jacobs Blake & Mortimer series but you will desperately want to read part 2 as soon as you finish this!
After re-visiting places for most of the second half of 2025, it was nice to return to visiting new places for the first trip of 2026. I headed to the Cotswolds and to Kingham railway station which is in Oxfordshire, though the nearby village of Bledington which i walked to is in Gloucestershire. The village has a nice church though i didn't venture too deeply into the village due to time constraints and the snowy weather which made walking a bit of a chore. A nice place to re-visit, when it is a bit warmer!
Oddly enough the worst story here is by arguably the most famous author. I found Anton Chekhov's story a bit impenetrable.
Highlights of the collection include Koga Saburo's fun but bizarre story about a rotating spider lab which is probably the best story in the collection.
Also involving spiders is a good story by Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay. Another highlight is Maria Elvira Bermudez's tale of murder and family secrets. A great and varied collection of stories.
The only houseplants i bother with are spider plants (or Chlorophytum comosum if you prefer). The flowers of spider plants are not especially fancy but many do become plantlets which can be cut off and potted separately. Thus, when you get one spider plant then you can keep them for years with successive generations. All of my spider plants come from a couple of plantlets i cut off my boss' office spider plant when i worked at a university over fifteen years ago. Unfortunately, i've lost track of what happened to the original ones i had.
Currently i have four potted, though two share the same pot, around the house. I have also another one which i am going to try and keep alive during the winter. Spider plants are resilient though don't like freezing temperatures. I have therefore bought a cloche to try and protect it. So far the plant is doing pretty well actually though we have only just had the first winter blast. Around March i do plan to get a small greenhouse, so if the spider plant can survive in the cloche it will be moved there.
Just before the end of the year i had to go down to London, i took the chance to visit London Transport Museum in Covent Garden. I haven't been to it for a number of years, actually i am a friend of the museum and so get free admission as well!
The museum was very busy (which is a good thing of course) but i was able to get the updated photographs that i wanted. You can see them here, and also visit the museum yourself when you can!
For the past year i have been keen to encourage the visits of our feathered friends to the garden by hanging up various bird feeders. More birds in the garden will encourage more insect eaters too which should help with the garden. Well that is the theory anyway.
The problem is, squirrels are keen to cash in on this free food supply too! I have bought a bird feeder stand to try and stop squirrels from taking the bird food, they can get their own nuts! Whether this bird feeder will succeed or not is the question of course. I have my doubts that anything can stop a determined squirrel!
A cathedral which is short of cash is looking to sell it's copy of the Magna Carta. As Treasure is involved with the decision making he heads down to the cathedral town. However, when he gets there he finds there has been a terrible accident. A fire in the library has killed the old verger and destroyed the Magna Carta...
Or is it an accident? Treasure begins to unravel a complicated plot involving forgeries, theft and even incest. The story doesn't really have anything to do with Christmas despite the title, though this is just as well considering the dark crimes that have been committed.
A good read with a plot full of threads. The only thing i didn't like is that not all of the threads were tied up at the end. Some of the characters maybe needed a bit more building up because at times they merged into one and it could get a bit confusing. But otherwise well written.