Showing results by narrator "Rayner Bourton" in All Categories

Mowgli returns to the human village and is adopted by Messua and her husband, who believe him to be their long-lost son. Mowgli leads the village boys who herd the village's buffaloes. Shere Khan comes to hunt Mowgli, but he is warned by Gray Brother wolf, and with Akela they find Shere Khan asleep, and stampede the buffaloes to trample Shere Khan to death. Mowgli leaves the village, and goes back to hunt with the wolves until he becomes a man.

Robur the Conqueror (French: Robur-le-Conquérant) is a science fiction novel by Jules Verne, published in 1886. It is also known as The Clipper of the Clouds. It has a sequel, Master of the World, which was published in 1904. The story begins with strange lights and sounds, including blaring trumpet music, reported in the skies all over the world.

An English family have just moved to a house in India. They find Rikki-Tikki-Tavi the mongoose flooded out of his burrow. A pair of large cobras, Nag and Nagaina, attempt unsuccessfully to kill him. He hears the cobras plotting to kill the father in the house, and attacks Nag in the bathroom. The sound of the fight attracts the father, who shoots Nag. Rikki-Tikki-Tavi destroys Nagaina's eggs and chases her into her "rat-hole" where he kills her too.

Martin Eden is a 1909 novel by American author Jack London about a young proletarian autodidact struggling to become a writer. It was first serialized in The Pacific Monthly magazine from September 1908 to September 1909 and then published in book form by Macmillan in September 1909. - Eden represents writers' frustration with publishers by speculating that when he mails off a manuscript, a "cunning arrangement of cogs" immediately puts it in a new envelope and returns it automatically with a rejection slip.

A boy is raised by wolves in the Indian jungle with the help of Baloo the bear and Bagheera the black panther, who teach him the "Law of the Jungle". Some years later, the wolfpack and Mowgli are threatened by the tiger Shere Khan. Mowgli brings fire, driving off Shere Khan but showing that he is a man and must leave the jungle.

During the time Mowgli was with the wolf pack, he is abducted by the Bandar-log monkeys to the ruined city. Baloo and Bagheera set out to rescue him with Kaa the python. Kaa defeats the Bandar-log, frees Mowgli, and hypnotises the monkeys and the other animals with his dance. Mowgli rescues Baloo and Bagheera from the spell.

Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life is the first book by American writer Herman Melville, published first in London, then New York, in 1846. Considered a classic in travel and adventure literature, the narrative is partly based on the author's actual experiences on the island Nuku Hiva in the South Pacific Marquesas Islands in 1842, liberally supplemented with imaginative reconstruction and adaptation of material from other books. The title comes from the valley of Taipivai, once known as Taipi.

"Dagon" is a short story by American author H. P. Lovecraft, written in July 1917, one of the first stories he wrote as an adult. It was first published in the November 1919 edition of The Vagrant (issue #11). Dagon was later published in Weird Tales and is considered by many to be one of Lovecraft's most forward looking stories.

The Jungle Book (1894) is a collection of stories by the English author Rudyard Kipling. Most of the characters are animals such as Shere Khan the tiger and Baloo the bear, though a principal character is the boy or "man-cub" Mowgli, who is raised in the jungle by wolves. The stories are set in a forest in India; one place mentioned repeatedly is "Seonee" (Seoni), in the central state of Madhya Pradesh. A major theme in the book is abandonment followed by fostering, as in the life of Mowgli, echoing Kipling's own childhood.

The Mystery of Edwin Drood is the final novel by Charles Dickens, originally published in 1870. Though the novel is named after the character Edwin Drood, it focuses more on Drood's uncle, John Jasper, a precentor, choirmaster and opium addict, who is in love with his pupil, Rosa Bud. Miss Bud, Edwin Drood's fiancée, has also caught the eye of the high-spirited and hot-tempered Neville Landless. Landless and Edwin Drood take an instant dislike to each other. Later Drood disappears under mysterious circumstances.

Toomai's father rides Kala Nag the elephant to catch wild elephants in the hills. Toomai comes to help and risks his life throwing a role up to one of the drivers. His father forbids him to enter the elephant enclosure again. One night he follows the elephant hunters, and is picked up by Kala Nag; he rides into the elephants' meeting place in the jungle, where they dance. On his return he is welcomed by both hunters and elephants.

Kotick, a rare white-furred fur seal, sees seals being killed by islanders in the Bering Sea. He decides to find a safe home for his people, and after several years of searching as he comes of age, eventually finds a suitable place. He returns home and persuades the other seals to follow him.

On the night before a British military parade for the Amir of Afghanistan, the army's working animals - mule, camel, horse, bullock, elephant - discuss what they do in battle and how they feel about their work. It is explained to the Afghans that men and animals obey the orders carried down from the Queen.

Rayner Bourton, original Rocky Horror and all 'round nice guy, has released this wonderful new book with his memories of the early days of The Rocky Horror Show. It gives a brilliant insight from the first auditions though the original Theatre Upstairs production to the Kings Road shows. For the true Rocky Horror fans, this book is a mine of information.

Rosalie Parker runs the independent UK publishing house Tartarus Press with R. B. Russell. Her previous collections include The Old Knowledge (Swan River Press 2010) and Damage (PS Publishing 2016). "In the Garden" was selected for Best New Horror 21 (2010), and "Random Flight" for Best British Horror 2015. Rosalie lives in Coverdale, North Yorkshire, the magnificent landscape of which inspires and sometimes provides the settings for her writing.

It was a pity about the weather, but even in Yorkshire it couldn't rain all the time. Geraldine pushed her hair into her rainhood and studied the thin drizzle pittering into brimming puddles.

'Today, class,' said Miss Flanders, surveying the room full of Year Ten students seated around the somewhat battered tables, 'we will be looking at the circulatory system. Please open your books at page fifteen.' There were the scrapings and scufflings of chairs being pushed back and bags being opened, and the slap of textbooks hitting the table-tops.

Around three and a half thousand years ago, members of a small community of Bronze Age people spent several days away from their usual activities of farming, hunting, weaving and food processing in order to construct a burial mound.

"In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king." Or is he? In H. G. Wells' acclaimed tale, a stranded mountaineer encounters an isolated society in which his apparent advantage, sight, since all the people are blind, proves less than valuable.

The taxi picked up speed as the post-industrial sprawl of Sheffield gave way to the open hills of the Peak District. Ellen could see the driver glancing at her from time to time in the rear view mirror. Weary after her long rail journey she was grateful for his silence, even though it might have been useful to hear stories of 'The Big House'.