It’s time to kick-off another week of fabulous story-telling in Voice, brought to Second Life by the staff and volunteers at the Seanchai Library SL and the folks at Storyfests SL
As always, all times SLT, and unless otherwise stated, events will be held on the Seanchai Library’s home on Imagination Island.
Sunday October 27th
From 10:00 at Bran: BOOFEST!
BOOFest is back for a third year – gathering around the autumnal fire as the flames blaze and the leaves turn, and the chill in our bones is something more than the chill winds: the veil between the living and the dead is at its thinnest, and we celebrate both as the wheel of the year comes ’round again!
Check out the stories and storytellers!
BOOFest benefits War Child North America, and is produced in partnership between Stories Unlimited! and Branwen Arts.
18:00: Magicland Storytime – Bonfires and Broomsticks
Author Mary Norton is perhaps best know for her long-running series of fantasy books The Borrowers (named for the first book of the series) published between 1952 and 1982.
However, her first published work, in 1943, was entitled The Magic Bed Knob; or, How to Become a Witch in Ten Easy Lessons, a fantasy piece about an elderly woman who practices magic for a hobby and has a magic bed knob, and three London children evacuated to the country during the bombing of London.
This was followed in 1945 by the sequel Bonfires and Broomsticks. Then, in 1957, the two books were republished as a single volume entitled Bed-Knob and Broomstick. And it was a play on this title by which the story became most widely known, when in 1971, Walt Disney released the film Bedknobs and Broomsticks starring Angela Lansbury and the late David Tomlinson.
Join Caledonia Skytower at Magicland Park as Caledonia reads from the second volume of this classic tale.
Monday October 28th 19:00: Classics of Science Fiction
With Gyro Muggins.
Tuesday October 29th, 19:00: Selections from The Graveyard Book
Caledonia Skytower brings the first of the week’s visits to the mind and imagination of Neil Gaiman as she reads selections from The Graveyard Book.
Nobody Owens, known to his friends as Bod, is a normal boy. He would be completely normal if he didn’t live in a sprawling graveyard, being raised and educated by ghosts, with a solitary guardian who belongs to neither the world of the living nor of the dead. There are dangers and adventures in the graveyard for a boy. But if Bod leaves the graveyard, then he will come under attack from the man Jack—who has already killed Bod’s family . . .
The Graveyard Book is a children’s fantasy novel simultaneously published in Britain and America during 2008.
Wednesday October 30st, 19:00: The Case of Four and Twenty Black Birds
“I sat in my office, nursing a glass of hooch and idly cleaning my automatic. Outside the rain fell steadily, like it seems to do most of the time in our fair city, whatever the tourist board says.
“So when the dame walked into my office I was sure my luck had changed for the better. ‘What are you selling, lady?’
‘What would you say to some of the green stuff?’ she asked, in a husky voice, getting straight to the point. She opened her purse and flipped out a photograph. Glossy eight by ten. ‘Do you recognise that man?’
In my business you know who people are. ‘Yeah.’
‘He’s dead.’
‘I know that too, sweetheart. It’s old news. It was an accident.’
Her gaze went so icy you could have chipped it into cubes and cooled a cocktail with it. ‘My brother’s death was no accident. I’m Jill Dumpty….’
And so Jack Horner, a noir-esque private eye (if a little short on stature) in Nurseryland, is launched into one of the most perplexing mysteries of his career – who killed Humpty Dumpty? Join Kayden Oconnell as he reads from Neil Gaiman’s brilliantly conceived and written 1984 short story.
Thursday October 31st, from 16:00: Happy Halloween!
A special gathering to celebrate haunting, horror and ghosts and ghouls, which also see the testing of two new storytelling times the folks at Seanchai will be trying-out (see below).
- 16:00: The Reaper Man. Join Dubhna Rhiadra & Caledonia Skytower as they read from Terry Pratchett’s classic Discworld tale featuring Death, his life and … well … his death, coupled with issues of a backlog of the life force of the recently departed …
- 19:00: Ambrose Bierce: The Ways of Ghosts. Shandon Loring brings us tales from the pen of editor, journalist, satirist, short story writer, civil war veteran and traveller, Ambrose Bierce, who himself mysteriously vanished in 1913.
- 21:00: Seanchai Late Night. More spooky tales!
New Story Times – Your Voice Matters
Starting this week, Seanchai Library will be testing some new session times in addition to the regular 19:00 Monday-through-Thursday programming. The first of these sessions will be Thursday, October 31st at 16:00, and a “Seanchai Late Night” will also launch that day at 21:00.
If these sessions draw enough of a consistent audience, they may become part of the regular Seanchai schedule, just as Tea Time was added in 2012.
The team are confident about the 16:00 session placement, although the time might be juggled with. However, they’re still deciding which day of the week might be most auspicious for a late night story audience. Are you on the West Coast of the Americas or in the Pacific? Would you be interested in such a session? What Night? Take the online survey found in the right-hand sidebar of the Seanchai Library’s home page and let them know. Poll Closes November 1st.
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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 September and October is Water for People. Have questions? IM or note card Caledonia Skytower.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 