The Secret Lair Episode 0005: Fatherland by Robert Harris
Follow me into the darkest depths of The Secret Lair, along passages watched by unseen, ever-vigilant eyes, past barred portals and shadowy niches and, finally, through the ancient wooden door that leads to row upon row of shelves piled high with tomes as old as the very mists of time. This is The Secret Library, and the texts contained within are wondrous and horrific, mundane and magickal, forgotten and forbidden.
Here is an aged volume, the words within first put to paper in the late twentieth century! Writ upon the faded spine of this mass market paperback is the title, Fatherland, and the name of the author who dared pen the tale, Robert Harris. Join the overlords and their special prisoner guest, Laura Johnson, as they unveil the sinister secrets of the very first selection from The Secret Library.
While discussing Fatherland, we mention:
- The Day After Tomorrow by Allan Folsom.
- Fatherland is a television mini-series based on the novel. It stars Rutger Hauer and Miranda Richardson, but seems to be available only on VHS.
- 1984 by George Orwell.
- The Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum.
- The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown is essentially the same novel as Angels & Demons (also by Brown).
- The gorgalthumper.
- Life is Beautiful starring Roberto Begnini.
- Schindler’s List starring Liam Neeson.
- Harry Turtledove is arguably the master of alternate history. How Few Remain tells the tale of how one seemingly minor alteration might have changed the outcome of The Civil War and rewritten a hundred years of history.
- Michael Moorcock’s Elric saga features an intriguing anti-hero who engages the reader and draws them into the story.
- Jim Butcher’s urban wizard, Harry Dresden, is an entertaining character and he makes The Dresden Files a fun series to read.
- House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski is an exercise in tricky typesetting.
- M. Night Shyamalan’s The Sixth Sense isn’t as enjoyable when you know the big secret ahead of time.
This is the first episode recorded with our brand new Samson Zoom H2 mobile recorder. As of this writing, we’ve almost covered the entire purchase price with donations! Many thanks to everyone who donated.
Coming soon to a podcatcher near you…
Our next book for The Secret Library is Market Forces by Richard K. Morgan.
From the back cover: “A coup in Cambodia. Guns to Guatemala. For the men and women of Shorn Associates, opportunity is calling. In the superheated global village of the near future, big money is made by finding the right little war and backing one side against the other—in exchange for a share of the spoils. To succeed, Shorn uses a new breed of corporate gladiator: sharp-suited, hard-driving gunslingers who operate armored vehicles and follow a Samurai code. And Chris Faulkner is just the man Shorn needs.”
From the Amazon.com editorial review: “Market Forces is at once an anti-globalization treatise and anime fantasy meets The Road Warrior…a disturbingly brutal picture of slash-and-burn capitalism run amok.”
We encourage interested minions to acquire a copy and join in the discussion at our official community or The Secret Library group at Goodreads.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 40:32 — 37.2MB)
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Tags: 1984, Allan Folsom, Angels & Demonds, Dan Brown, Elric, Fatherland, George Orwell, gorgalthumper, Harry Turtledove, House of Leaves, How Few Remain, Jim Butcher, Life is Beautiful, Mark Z. Danielewski, Market Forces, Michael Moorcock, natalie metzger, reviews, Richard K. Morgan, Robert Harris, Robert Ludlum, Schindler's List, The Bourne Identity, The Da Vinci Code, The Day After Tomorrow, The Dresden Files, The Sixth Sense
Episode 0048: The Great Old Pumpkin
Well spoken review of a book that could certainly have been better.
I’ll email more specifics.
Nice to hear from Laura! I do hope they didn’t leave any marks…
-pax-
Good episode. I have some comments that don’t really need to clutter your blog, but can’t find a contact address. I could be missing it, but I looked all over the main page. What be it?
That’s a fine question, Wesley. A fine, fine question. We should totally have a contact address. Yes, we should.
Yup.
Definitely would be good to have.
Hey, is that Elvis?
I have to agree with Chris’ assessment of the novel. I got bored with it about half way and stopped. The writing was good, but the story just didn’t grab me and the characters… well, I think they could have been done better.
Okay, I’ll just say it here then
The sound quality was great, but the volume was so low that I cranked my mp3 player up to 6dB over “0″ (which should put a ton of clipping) and it was STILL quiet.
I opened the file in Audacity and saw what I think is the problem. Near the end, there are several “clicks” in the track which set the ceiling for the volume somewhere around 8-10dB higher than it should be. If you just globally raised the volume 8-10dB (ignoring complaints that it will cause clipping) that would be enough, but you should also consider a teeny bit of compression (Audacity’s defaults of -12db, 2:1 is fine, but I’d make the attack 0.1 and if you have the newest Audacity, leave Decay at 0. Then, after that, amplify again because those clicks will probably still be there.
Compression may not be necessary, and can increase the volume of background noise, so if it doesn’t work ignore what I said
But seriously, crank that volume up. I’d hate to be listening, forget that I had to max my volume out, and blow my eardrums when another podcast came on after.
But Wesley…that was the PLAN.
No…you have a good point. That as the first recording we’d made with the thing, and the next time We’re going to use the 2-channel surround and place it closer to us.
I didn’t notice a volume problem; my podcatcher normalizes the volume on each file it picks up before it lands in my player.
I believe iTunes and several others can do this automatically.
I was impressed with the fact that I could tell where the people were relative to each other in the recording. Dunno what that’s called, but I’m not an audiophile by any stretch…
-pax-
Hey guys, I got five minutes in and haven’t decided if I want to continue listening to the review. Based on what I’ve heard so far, I don’t think I’m going to be a fan of the book at all. So… are there other goodies to hear in this episode besides the review? Thanks!
Every episode of The Secret Lair is a treasure trove of aural goodies, Shannon. To queue an episode up in your MP3 player of choice is to stand before a mighty dam and prepare to be caught up in the flood of our brilliance. What you will encounter as you tumble through the turbulent wash is anyone’s guess, but you can be sure that it will be varied and amazing.
Surprised there was no mention of PKD’s ‘The Man in the High Castle’ when mentioning alternate history books. It covers a similar theme of a world where the Nazi’s have won WW2.
I suspect we may have overlooked the book simply because we haven’t read it, Vanamonde. Of course, I can only speak for myself on the topic, and Mr. Miller won’t be able to speak (or type) for himself for at least another two hours. There was a slight mishap when we were attempting to restrain a cloned allosaurus early this afternoon and Chris received a rather significant dosage of tranquilizer. I’ve been assured that he will regain conscious by dinner time and long term effects should be minimal.