The third in the series of JG Ballard classics that Steven Pacey has read for Rushforth Media, Miracles of Life was released on 14 October, 2014.
J. G. Ballard was, for over 50 years, one of Britain’s most significant writers. Beginning with the events that inspired his classic novel, Empire of the Sun, and followed by The Kindness of Women, Miracles of Lifeis the final in this revelatory autobiography that charts the course of his astonishing life.
Miracles of Life takes us from the vibrant surroundings of pre-war Shanghai, to the deprivations and unexpected freedoms of Lunghua Camp, to Ballard’s arrival in a devastated Britain. Ballard recounts his first attempts at fiction and his part in the social and artistic revolutions of the 60s. He describes his friendships with figures as diverse as Kingsley Amis, Michael Moorcock, and Eduardo Paolozzi alongside recollections of his domestic life in Shepperton – raising three children as a single father following the unexpected and premature death of his wife.
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Steven Pacey reads the next in Susan Hill’s Simon Serrailler series, A Breach of Security. Released last week, on 16 September, A Breach of Security is a short story, just 1 hour and 28 minutes, that will whet your appetite for the upcoming novel, The Soul of Discretion, the 8th in the Simon Serrailler series.
When a bunch of neo-fascist thugs named The Bulldogs attack a Gay pride march in the sleepy country town of Lafferton, detective Simon Serrailler moves quickly to find the assailants. He’s already got his hands full making security arrangements for a memorial service to honour soldiers returning from Afghanistan. When anonymous threats come in, Serrailler wonders if the Bulldogs are behind these too – and worries that they know the Prince of Wales will be in attendance. As the day approaches, the threats intensify, and Serrailler finds himself racing against the clock to prevent catastrophe.
The Soul of Discretion is now available for pre-order. It will be released on 2 October, 2014.
The cathedral town of Lafferton seems idyllic, but in many ways it is just like any other place. As part of the same rapidly changing world, it shares the same hopes and fears, and the same kinds of crime, as any number of towns up and down the land.
When one day DC Simon Serrailler is called in by Lafferton’s new Chief Constable, Kieron Bright, he is met by four plainclothes officers. He is asked to take the lead role in a complex, potentially dangerous undercover operation and must leave town immediately, without telling anyone – not even his girlfriend Rachel, who has only just moved in with him.
Meanwhile, Simon’s sister Cat is facing difficult choices at work that will test her dedication to the NHS. But an urgent call about her and Simon’s father, Richard, soon presents her with a far greater challenge much closer to home.To complete his special op, Simon must inhabit the mind of the worst kind of criminal. As the op unfolds, Lafferton is dragged into the sort of case every town dreads. And Simon faces the fight of his life.
This is the second in a series of JG Ballard classics that Steven Pacey reads for Rushforth Media. Following on from Empire of the Sun, Ballard’s account of a boy’s ordeal in Japanese occupied Shanghai in WWII, The Kindness of Women, Ballard’s sequel, following post-war life in England, will be released on 7 October, 2014, and is now available for pre-order.
The fascinating, and largely autobiographical, sequel to J. G. Ballard’s prize-winning Empire of the Sun, that follows Jim to post-war England. The Kindness of Women continues the story of the boy whose life in Japanese-occupied Shaghai was described so memorably in Empire of the Sun, it sets those traumatic events within the context of a lifetime as we follow the narrator, Jim, to England and suburban Shepperton after the war.
Jim tries and fails to find stability as a medical student at Cambridge and a trainee RAF pilot in Canada. Then, after settling happily into family life, his world is ripped apart by domestic tragedy. He plunges into the maelstrom of the 1960s, an instigator and subject of every aspect of cultural, social, and sexual revolution. All this and much more, we see as the attempt of a bruised mind to make sense of the upheaval around it.
JG Ballard’s best seller, Empire of the Sun, read by Steven Pacey was released on the 9 September, 2014. And soon, the sequel, The Kindness of Women, will be available, too!
From the master of dystopia, comes his heartrending story of a British boy’s four-year ordeal in a Japanese prison camp during the Second World War. Based on J. G. Ballard’s own childhood, this is the extraordinary account of a boy’s life in Japanese-occupied wartime Shanghai – a mesmerising, hypnotically compelling novel of war, of starvation and survival, of internment camps and death marches. It blends searing honesty with an almost hallucinatory vision of a world thrown utterly out of joint. Rooted as it is in the author’s own disturbing experience of war in our time, it is one of a handful of novels by which the 20th century will be not only remembered but judged.
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Reviews of Liberator Chronicles 9, from Big Finish are popping up around the Internet. Here’s a collection of them:
“The voice acting by Steven Pacey and Tony Chadbon was outstanding.”
“… script is narrated by Steven Pacey’s Tarrant, and the actor’s long experience of audiobook reading comes in handy here, as he provides voices for a number of other characters along the way – including a dealer who brings back memories of The Phantom Menace!”
“The narration is carried chiefly by Steven Pacey, and his dialogue scenes with Tom Chadbon flow naturally; the two actors are great together.”
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Agatha Christie’s Poirot, Series 13, Episode 2: The Big Four, featuring Steven Pacey, will be re-broadcast in the UK on:
ITV Encore
Saturday
6 September, 2014
7:00pm-9:00pm (2 hours )
The sleuth is reunited with sidekick Captain Hastings (Hugh Fraser), secretary Miss Lemon (Pauline Moran) and Inspector Japp (Philip Jackson) in a case that plunges him into the world of global espionage as the Second World War looms. The public are in panic after the shocking death of Russian grandmaster Ivan Savaranoff during a game of chess. Poirot must try to determine the good guys from the bad, as a complex plot by a gang of dangerous dissidents sees a host of international figures used like pawns. David Suchet stars in a story adapted by Mark Gatiss and Ian Hallard
Just had to share this BLOG post from author, Laurian Smith, titled Steven Pacey Versus My Book Dysfunction:
I do have a trend when deciding what to read versus to what I will listen, however: I will read non fiction 90% of the time. With fiction, I like reading larger tomes myself, whereas, I enjoy listening to shorter books. Another factor is the narrator. One of my faves is Steven Pacey. Were I wealthy enough, he would read everything to me at my behest.
“Mr. Pacey, would you be so kind as to read the morning paper to me, sir?” I would say.
Or, “Mr. Pacey, would you please read my utility bill aloud?”
He would, of course, answer in the affirmative and I would continue to happily pay him his due.
The moral of the story: Between Steven Pacey reading things to me and reading a good-smelling book slowly, Steven wins hands down, I guess.
Laurian Smith, 25 August, 2014. Entire post.
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Steven Pacey reads JG Ballard’s best seller, Empire of the Sun. This is the first of three JG Ballard audiobooks Steven is reading for Rushforth Media. Empire of the Sun will be released on 9 September, 2014, and is now available for pre-order.
From the master of dystopia, comes his heartrending story of a British boy’s four-year ordeal in a Japanese prison camp during the Second World War. Based on J. G. Ballard’s own childhood, this is the extraordinary account of a boy’s life in Japanese-occupied wartime Shanghai – a mesmerising, hypnotically compelling novel of war, of starvation and survival, of internment camps and death marches. It blends searing honesty with an almost hallucinatory vision of a world thrown utterly out of joint. Rooted as it is in the author’s own disturbing experience of war in our time, it is one of a handful of novels by which the 20th century will be not only remembered but judged.
JG Ballard was born in 1930 in Shanghai, where his father was a businessman. After internment in a civilian prison camp, he and his family returned to England in 1946. He published his first novel, The Drowned World, in 1961. His 1984 best seller, Empire of the Sun, won the Guardian Fiction Prize and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. It was later filmed by Steven Spielberg. His memoir Miracles of Life was published in 2008. J. G. Ballard died in 2009.
10th Planet Events are advertising that Steven Pacey will be attending a signing event in Barking in September on AUGUST 23, THIS WEEKEND!
Saturday 27th September SATURDAY 23rd AUGUST
between 10.00 am and 13.00 pm
FREE ENTRY
Barking Learning Centre,
2 Town Square, Barking,
IG11 7NB
Tel: 020 8724 8710
Autographs are £10 each (buy 4 get 5th free)
Please note: Tenth Planet Events as well as all associated graphics, logos, and/or other tradermarks, tradenames or copyrights are the property of the Tenth Planet Events and are used herein for factual descriptive purposes only. We are in no way associated with or authorized by theTenth Planet Events and neither that entity nor any of its affiliates have licensed or endorsed us to sell tickets, goods and or services in conjunction with their events.
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Agatha Christie’s Poirot, Series 13, Episode 2: The Big Four, featuring Steven Pacey, will be re-broadcast for Australina viewers on:
ABC
Friday
15 August, 2014
8:00pm
Poirot does not appear to be repeated on ABC iview.
Set against the backdrop of the impending WWII, The Big Four plunges Poirot into a world he has never been in before…one of global espionage. The public are in panic after the shocking death of Russian grandmaster Ivan Savaranoff (Michael Culkin) and Poirot must try to determine the good guys from the bad, as a complex plot sees a host of international figures used like pawns. The film welcomes back iconic characters Captain Hastings (Hugh Fraser), Inspector Japp (Phillip Jackson) and Miss Lemon (Pauline Moran).
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