Blind Horse Books

The Game is Afoot… CELEBRATING Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, HAPPY BIRTHDAY You probably know Sir Arthur Conan Doyle as the creator of the world’s most famous detective, Sherlock Holmes. But as significant as Sherlock Holmes is, it’s only a small part of the author’s story. In addition to his mysteries, Arthur Conan Doyle was a prolific writer who wrote fantasy, science fiction, plays, romance, poetry, non-fiction, humor, and historical fiction. ……but did you know…… ……Conan Doyle was also an enthusiastic investigator. He amateurishly solved a couple of mysteries. A particular one which gained much popularity was when he successfully got the Oscar Slater released from prison. Oscar Slater was wrongly convicted of the murder of an 82-year-old woman. ……..Doyle killed his most famous creation Sherlock Holmes, the same year his alcoholic father died in an asylum – 1893. It is also said and believed that he killed Sherlock so that he could focus on writing about his passion – Spiritualism. ………The

  You probably read his most successful book in High School: The Scarlet Letter. Much of Hawthorne's writing centers on New England, many works featuring moral allegories with a Puritan inspiration. His fiction works are considered part of the Romantic movement and, more specifically: Dark Romanticism. His themes often center on the inherent evil and sin of humanity, and his works frequently have moral messages and deep psychological complexity. Hawthorne's published works include novels, short stories, and a biography of his friend Franklin Pierce. He was born in 1804 in Salem, Massachusetts, to Nathaniel Hathorne and the former Elizabeth Clarke Manning. His ancestors include John Hathorne, the only judge involved in the Salem witch trials who never repented of his actions. Nathaniel later added a "w" to make his name "Hawthorne" in order to hide this relation. He entered Bowdoin College in 1821, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa in 1824, and graduated in 1825.

 Today, images and phrases from The Wizard of Oz are so pervasive, so unparalleled in their ability to trigger personal memories and musings, that it’s hard to conceive of The Wizard of Oz as the product of one man’s imagination. Reflecting on all the things that Oz introduced, the Yellow Brick Road, winged monkeys, Munchkins, can be like facing a list of words that Shakespeare invented. It seems incredible that one man injected all these concepts into our cultural consciousness. Wouldn’t we all be forever lost without “there’s no place like home,” the mantra that turns everything right side up and returns life to normalcy? DID YOU KNOW: Baum’s original title for the book was “The Emerald City,” but publishers had a superstition that a jewel in a book title was bad luck and asked Baum to change it. Baum got the name for his fairy country off a drawer on a file cabinet that was marked “O-Z.” He named his plucky heroine Dorothy Gale after an infant niece named Dorothy Louise Gage who die

  He was born and educated in Scotland but moved to London, where he wrote a number of successful novels and plays. There he met the Llewelyn Davies boys, who inspired him to write about a baby boy who has magical adventures in Kensington Gardens (included in The Little White Bird), then to write Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, a "fairy play" about an ageless boy and an ordinary girl named Wendy who have adventures in the fantasy setting of Neverland. Barrie was made a baronet by George V in 1913, and a member of the Order of Merit in 1922. Before his death, he gave the rights to the Peter Pan works to Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children in London, which continues to benefit from them. It's a shame that his lesser-known short stories, such as The Inconsiderate Waiter, and the The Courting of T'Nowhead's Bell do no not get more recognition. They are far deeper, darker, more cynical views of adulthood and more humorous than his land of Neverlan

  Robert Browning (7 May 1812 –1889) was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of the dramatic monologue made him one of the foremost Victorian poets. His poems are known for their irony, characterization, dark humor, social commentary, historical settings, and challenging vocabulary and syntax. Although the early part of Robert Browning’s creative life was spent in comparative obscurity, he has come to be regarded as one of the most important English poets of the Victorian period. Browning’s father had amassed a personal library of some 6,000 volumes, many of them collections of arcane lore and historical anecdotes that the poet plundered for poetic material, including the source of “The Pied Piper.” The younger Browning recalled his father’s unorthodox methods of education in his late poem “Development,” published in Asolando: Fancies and Facts (1889). Browning remembers at the age of five asking what his father was reading. To explain the siege of Troy, the elder Browning cre

  Part of the Paris postwar literary movement in the 1950s and a companion to Beat writers in Greenwich Village, Southern was also at the center of Swinging London in the 1960s and helped to change the style and substance of American films in the 1970s noted for his distinctive satirical style. Several years ago, the family is talking at the dinner table and the subject of favorite movies arises.  And when asked what some of my favorite movies were, for some reason, I thought films that impacted me was the question. Eventually, I settled on Dr. Strangelove from my mis-spent youth. Little did I know that this after dinner rapport was a set-up quiz to locate a Christmas present from the children.  On Christmas morning I opened a DVD of Dr. Strangelove.  I suppose there was a curious look on my face as I did not then even remember the dinner exchange.  “You said it was your favorite movie!,” the kids exclaimed.  Quick recovery, “Oh, yes, thanks.” A few days later the family sat down for a