It’s time to kick-off another week of fabulous story-telling in voice, brought to Second Life and InWorldz by the staff and volunteers at the Seanchai Library.
As always, all times SLT, and unless otherwise stated, events will be held on the Seanchai Library’s home on Imagination Island.
Sunday, April 19th
13:30: Tea Time at Baker Street
Caledonia, Kaydon and Corwyn accept a further invitation from Holmes and Watson to join them in the parlour at 221B Baker Street for a retelling of The Adventure of the Engineer’s Thumb, which first saw print in March, 1892 in The Strand Magazine, and was later included in the volume of tales The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.
Early on a morning in 1889, Dr Watson attends an injury sustained by a Mr. Victor Hatherley. The injury turns out to be the stump of a severed thumb, and Hatherley, a consultant hydraulics engineer, has a very disturbing tale to tell about how he came to be sans one pollex. Having treated the young man, Watson insists Hatherley relate his tale to Holmes, making this one of two cases Watson himself referred to the Great Detective.
Once before Holmes, the young engineer relates how he was hired by a Colonel Lysander to examine the hydraulic press Lysander has in his possession, apparently for making bricks from fuller’s earth. However, Lysander not only offers Hatherley the outrageous fee of fifty guineas (about £4,000 or almost $6,000 today) for doing so, but insists on a curious amount of secrecy, including transporting the engineer to the press the previous night in such a way that he would be uncertain as to its actual location. Things get stranger still when a woman at the house warns him to run away – and Hatherley eventually does find himself fleeing for his life from Lysander before the night is through, losing his thumb in the process.
So, what is the secret of the hydraulic press? What use could it be put to that would cause one man to contempt the murder of another? Sherlock Holmes has the answer!
18:00: Magicland Park SL: The Real Winnie: A One-of-a-Kind Bear
We all know AA Milne’s classic character, Winnie the Pooh. But did we all know he was inspired in part by a real bear called Winnie?
“Winnipeg” (shortened to “Winnie”) was the name veterinarian Harry Colebourn gave to a black bear cub he purchased while en route to an Army training centre near Quebec in 1914.
A Lieutenant in the Canadian Army Veterinary Corps (CAVC), Colebourn found his bear unofficially adopted by the CAVC’s mascot, travelling with them to London, where he remained in the care of London Zoo while Colebourn and his regiment went to France.
It was at London Zoo, where Winnie remained, that she became adored by one young Christopher Robin Milne, thus helping inspire the tales of Winnie the Pooh and the 100 Acre Wood.
Join Caledonia Skytower as she reads from
Monday April 20th, 19:00: The Wizard of Karres
Gyro Muggins returns to the universe created by James H. Schmitz and given form through his 1949 novel, The Witches of Karres, as he opens the pages of the 2004 sequel, The Wizard of Karres, penned by by Mercedes Lackey, Eric Flint, and Dave Freer, which reunites the reader with some familiar characters.
For Captain Pausert, it would seem that the old saying that no good deed ever goes unpunished should perhaps become the family motto. As a “reward” for thwarting the plans of the space pirates and eliminating the threat of the Worm World, Pausert is given the secret mission of stopping the nanite plague, a self-aware disease that lay waste to entire planets worlds.
Only someone has once convinced the Imperial Navy, unaware of his true mission, that Pausert is actually a wanted man. so it is that the Navy set out to hunt him down – and almost succeed, managing to cripple his ship. When Pausert discovers his funding has also been cut-off, leaving him without the means to get his ship repaired, he and his companions, Goth and the Leewit, the Witches of Karres, are forced to go undercover – and join a travelling circus.
After all, the show – and the mission – must go on, and thus the adventures continue.
Tuesday April 21st
18:00 SLT – VCARA Conference 2015
Caledonia Skytower from Seanchai Library is one of the two keynote speakers at the 2015 VCARA (Virtual Centre for Archives & Records Administration) Conference organised ans hosted by the San José State University School of Information in Second Life.
Find out more about the conference here.
19:10: Caitlin and Elizabth
With Shandon Loring.
Wednesday April 22nd
06:00: WASP, Where is Thy Sting?
Freda Frostbite and Trolly Trollop return to the thoughts and writings of Florence King.
WASP, Where is Thy Sting? was first published as a series of magazine essays in the 1970s prior to becoming a book in its own right, is a study by Ms. King focusing on the subject of White Anglo-Saxon Protestants (the WASPs) of the title.
While biased towards her own background as a member of an Anglo-Southron Washington DC family, and perhaps slightly dated today, the book explores the various varieties of Protestantism in the United States, which have often been based on social background and ethnicity far more than specific doctrinal differences, and can still resonate with readers today, as one reviewer notes:
After the various ethnic studies which began showing up through the ’60s and ’70s, Miss King decided that WASPs, as an ethnic group, needed to be delineated and explained to everyone else. Overall, she does a decent job. Yes, this is a humorous book, but there are too many parallels to people I’ve known and grown up with to doubt her accuracy. And there are plenty of Miss King’s delicious aphorisms (referring to many WASP womens’ idea of fashion as “Calamity Jane Eyre Chic” is a good example). There are many such quotable bits throughout the book.
19:00: Christie’s Detectives
Join Caledonia Skytower as she presents short stories featuring Agatha Christe’s beloved detectives: Parker Pyne, Jane Marple and Hercule Poirot.
Thursday April 23rd, 19:00: The Lost Race
With Shandon Loring.
Saturday April 25th, 12:00 Noon: Seanchai Inworldz: Inkheart
Shandon Loring opens the covers of Cornelia Funke’s young adult novel, Inkheart, the first novel in what would become the Inkheart trilogy.
The books chronicle the adventures of 12-year-old Meggie, whose life changes dramatically in Inkheart when she realizes that she and her father, a bookbinder named Mo, have the unusual ability to bring characters from books into the real world when reading aloud, as they have the “Silvertongue”.
Mo reveals that he once accidentally brought four characters to life from a story, once of whom is Dustfinger, and the villain Capricorn. while Meggie’s mother, vanished into the “Inkworld” after she and Mo had a bitter exchange.
Now Dustfinger has returned with a warning: Capricorn and his followers have also returned, and are seeking Mo and his daughter, and Mo’s copy of of Inkheart, with the intent of having Mo bring forth a monster known as “The Shadow” out of the book. With Dustfinger in their company, Mo and Meggie flee to Northern Italy and the home of Meggie’s Aunt Elinor, with Capricorn and his minions in pursuit.
Seanchai library, InWorldz are located in the ground the Community Library in InWorldz (https://inworldz/region/Sendalonde/217/144/28).
—–
Please check with the Seanchai Library SL’s blog for updates and for additions or changes to the week’s schedule. The featured charity for April / May is Habitat for Humanity, with a vision of a world where everyone has a decent place to live – a safe and clean place to call home.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 