Boney Abroad

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  • War Lord by Bernard Cornwell

    After 15 years of adventures, Bernard Cornwell finally allows Uhtred of Bebbanburg to hang up Serpent-Breath. Of course, before Uhtred can finally do that, he is dragged into one final confrontation that will see Alfred’s dream realised on the bloody field of Bebbanburg.

  • Sword of Kings by Bernard Cornwell

    Uthred of Bebbanburg returns for his 12th adventure in Bernard Cornwell’s latest novel, Sword of Kings. Uthred is goaded into returning south to rescue a queen and make a King. Yet Uthred is not getting any younger and the return to London prompts our ageing hero to consider that his days in the shield wall…

  • Rian Johnson’s The Last Jedi

    Rian Johnson got the chance to make a Star Wars film. Then The Last Jedi came out and ever since there has been a huge fan debate about it. Not a debate had in good humour either. In my mind, The Last Jedi is the most original Star Wars film since The Empire Strikes Back,…

  • On Battle Scars

    Half a year late, but I finally get round to writing about Battle Scars. Which is odd as it is a podcast that pops to mind regularly. Thom Tran’s chats with veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are funny, moving and, more often than not, a little shocking. Battle Scars is a podcast…

  • NT Amadeus

    Michael Longhurst’s production of Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus returns to the National Theatre.  With Lucian Msamati as Salieri, Adam Gillen as Mozart and an incredible Flreu de Bray as Cavalieri, it is an ambitious, barnstorming and utterly, utterly wonderful production.  

  • Boney’s Review of 2017

    2017 is almost done, but it hasn’t been all bad, right?  In this post, I look back at the things I’ve loved and discovered in 2017.  I look at Books, Films and Podcasts as these are the things that have taken up most of my free time.  Hope you like it.

  • How to Build a Car by Adrian Newey

    In motor Racing, Adrain Newey’s name ranks among the greats.  He is not one for the cameras of a race weekend, but his autobiography is wonderfully engaging, funny and honest.  From building Lotus kit cars with his dad through to 10 World Championships with three teams, Newey’s tale is fascinating.  He takes us through the…

  • Proper Adaptation: Hap and Leonard

    Rarely does adaptation work well.  Most of the time you hope for the best and accept OK.  With Hap and Leonard though, Joe R Lansdale’s novels live and breathe on the small screen.  This is a look at how that transfer works so well, from the eyes of a fan on a couch in leafy Surrey,…

  • Thoughts on Bond 25

    With the welcome announcement of Bond 25, I default into worry at where we stand with our current Bond run.  Daniel Craig, should he return, deserves a great Bond send off.  But the corner EON has painted themselves into post SPECTRE means the wicket is rather sticky.

  • The Women Who Flew For Hitler by Clare Mulley

    Clare Mulley’s new biography looks at two incredible, yet very different women who were pinoneering Test Pilots for the Third Reich.  In The Women Who Flew For Hitler, Mulley looks at what drove these women in a male dominated flying world and the very different directions they chose under a Nazi flag.

  • The Serpent Sword by Matthew Harffy

    The Dark Ages in Britain are a fertile period to mine.  The sources, few as they are, talk of kings and warlords, battles and death, and then arrive the men from the North.  It is the period of Beowulf and Arthur, of a Britain living in the decay of the Roman withdrawal and the arrival…

  • A Love Letter to Hap and Leonard

    A love letter to the finest TV Show on air at the moment, Hap and Leonard.  No spoilers contained within, just an attempt to spread the joy of proper television and two towering performances from Michael Keneth Williams and James Purefoy.

  • Their Finest

    Their Finest does that difficult thing of being funny about a period and reverential about it at the same time.  And above it all is Gemma Arterton.  Her performance is subtle, humorous, strong and committed.  Their Finest is one of those increasingly rare occasions where a film happily sits across generations and manages to please all.

  • Airborne by Robert Radcliffe

    I have loved Robert Radcliffe’s previous five novels, to the point I even read one of them as an eBook.   Radcliffe’s new tale is his most ambitious yet.  Airborne is the first of trilogy of novels telling the tale of a boy caught between countries, in search of a father and who finds two; John Frost,…

  • The Classics – Gene Tierney and Leave Her to Heaven

    Looking back at one of my favourite actresses in film history, Gene Tierney and one of her finest perfomances in Leave Her to Heaven.

  • Conversations with My Chiropractor: Commuting With Books

    Commuting is one of those modern evils that most of us have to endure each day.  For me, my trip to the office involves two trains and a bus, basically the gamut of all the horrors of public transport in South and West London.  To while away the anything from the hour to many hours…

  • You Must Remember This

    What started out as a critique of Karina Longworth’s You Must Remember This has kind of morphed into a bit of a love letter to her podcast.  Its a show that makes you look forward to Tuesdays.

  • Star Wars: The Force Awakens

    My spoiler-free review of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.  No plot details or spoilers that I noticed.  Spoiler: I loved it.

  • SPECTRE

    A New Bond film is a special thing.  You see all kinds of people excited for something that at the best of times is plain silly fun.  With the forth Daniel Craig Bond film, SPECTRE, upon us, we have been having a bit of a golden time with our old 007.  While I had issues with Skyfall,…

  • Jessica Jones

    Jessica Jones, as Marvel’s latest Netflix series pits her, is in the time old tradition of noir PI’s.  Surly, short tempered, drunk and surprisingly good at what she does.  The fact she is super strong and can take a beating kinda of helps too.  In this latest foray into TV, Marvel has taken one of their…

  • For The Prosecution: Skyfall

    We are in the midst of Bond-fever, SPECTRE is printing it’s own money and all the initial reviews have been stellar.  I’ve not got round to seeing it yet due to a lack time and, oddly, worry.  Skyfall related worry.  Skyfall opened in October 2013 to universal relief.  Quantum of Solace, in this writers humble opinion, is…

  • Why Sinatra Matters by Pete Hamill

    We live in an age where an artist’s “Reienvention” is hailed as something special, something remarkable.  Every time Lady Gaga appears in a new frock, the media goes nuts, because, that is what their readers expect.  The thing is, Madonna did it before and David Bowie did it better than all but one, the man…

  • Warriors of the Storm by Bernard Cornwell

    Uhtred of Bebbanburg is one of those characters that has survived a rocky road and not just in the situations that Bernard Cornwell, his creator, has thrown him into.  Now on his 9th adventure, Uhtred has survived a variety of foes, former friends.  I wrote a while ago, after the announcement of the BBC TV series of…

  • The Physical and The Ethereal

    Does something that you cannot heft in your hands have less value, physically and emotionally, than something that does?  This is something I’ve been juggling with for a while, especially when it comes to books.  Books are my addiction.  Having a book in my hand elicits a response that fills me with joy.  But, is…

  • Slow West

    Having grown up with Westerns, you’d think I’d come to them predisposed to loving them.  Not so much.  For every good Western, there are a saddlebag of worthless entries to go alongside.  But, the Western is the one genre where, against the backdrop of a huge, never ending sky, just about any tale can be…

  • The Classics – Flashman

    Brigadier-General Sir Harry Flashman VC KCB KCIE was Victorian Britain’s greatest Hero.  Despite being expelled from Rugby School for drunkenness, an event that Thomas Hughes recounted in Tom Brown’s Schooldays, Sir Harry turned his life around.  Commissioned into the 11th Light Dragoons in 1840, Sir Harry served with distinction from the retreat from Kabul in…

  • For the Defense: Quantum of Solace

    This post is really based upon the following review by Mark Kermode on the Radio 5 Live show he does with Simon Mayo on a Friday afternoon.  Back in 2008 when Quantum of Solace came out, well, they both hated it and have, in the ensuing six years, repeatedly stated how much they dislike it.  Here is…

  • The Empty Throne by Bernard Cornwell

    Back in July, The BBC and Downton Abbey producers announced that they would be adapting Bernard Cornwell’s The Saxon Stories/Warrior Chronicles.  I was so delighted, I blogged about it here.  Uhtred is one of Cornwell’s characters that you can tell he loves, but that he has struggled with.  A couple of the middle books lacked his usual abandon,…

  • Where Did You Get That T-Shirt?

    One of my many foibles, and there are a good number, is that I do enjoy peoples reactions.  When I was younger I would say stupid things just to see what people would do.  At school this lead to the odd received right hook and later, some rather upset friends.  Luckily age has mellowed this…

  • You Can Keep Your Dragons, Uthred Is Coming

    It is rare that entertainment news makes me happy.  Thankfully, last week, the BBC did just that, announcing that they were adapting The Last Kingdom.  The Beeb is in an interesting place at the moment, they have huge global hits with the likes of Sherlock and Doctor Who, win Emmy’s for fun with Neil Cross and Idris Elba’s Luther and mange to…

  • Looking Back – Jodorowsky’s Dune

    It being the time of year where everyone is looking back and compiling lists, I’m struggling to do the same.  This year has been an odd one to say the least.  The opening seven months being the happiest I can remember.  Not wanting to descend into hyperbole, it was an amazing time and while the…

  • “Oh… You’re supporting Fulham this week?”

    The title of this post is a running joke with a friend of mine and his dad and it popped into my head the other day following the local team Crystal Palace’s promotion to the Premier League.  This is a good thing.  Palace are a great South London club and have been beset by financial…

  • Mickey Mouse’s Mercy Killing: Farewell LucasArts

    On Wednesday The House of Mouse announced that LucasArts, the game development arm of George Lucas’ company, would be closed and it’s efforts moved towards licensing the titles it had amassed.  Of course, this means licensing the golden goose (or should that be golden Bantha) that is Star Wars.  The problem with LucasArt’s games output over the last few…

  • Heroes – Part 1 – Woolf Barnato – The Greatest Bentley Boy

    I’ve been in an odd mood recently.  I think it was triggered by the latest issue of Motorsport magazine which is leading with reminisces about Gilles Villeneuve by friends and rivals as it’s the 30th anniversary of his death during practice at the 1982 Belgian  Grand Prix at Zolder.  I’ve got to thinking a lot about Heroes. …

  • The Longest Day

    Six and a half hours. That was it. For the three of us, the realisation of this came as a bit of a shock. For three guys who barely ever shut up, to find that we ran out of banter at just past the halfway point of our epic charity challenge was a humbling experience.…

  • Act of Oblivion by Robert Harris

    Act of Oblivion by Robert Harris

    Author Robert Harris has returned with the tale of the hunting of Colonels Edward Whalley and William Goffe as they flee the retribution of King Charles II.

  • The Complete Hedge Hopping

    For just about two years, I had the privilege of working with Alex Churchill, Zack White and the History Hack team making podcasts. During that time, I hosted 22 episodes of the Second World War aviation show Hedge Hopping. You can find them all here.

  • The Pathfinders by Will Iredale

    To see in the dark and to hit their target was the challenge Bomber Command faced in the Second World War. To see in the dark and stay hidden only complicated matters more. In Will Iredale latest book, The Pathfinders, he paints a vivid of the force set up to guide Bomber Command’s squadrons to…