Wednesday 17 September 2008

A note on Tim and the Hidden People CD...

I posted back in February about how the series Tim and the Hidden People got me into fantasy at a very young age, and mentioned the fact that I have a CD containing scans of all the books. Despite the post being made some time ago, I've received several requests in the past few weeks from folks that would like to obtain a copy of the CD.

I thought it would be easier to respond here, rather than sending loads of emails.

While I can easily understand that fans of the series would love to get their hands on a copy of the CD I have, I'm afraid that I'm not willing to make these copies. I'm not going to explain why, because I don't feel the need. Please however don't send me any more emails requesting copies, as they'll be ignored.

If you do desperately want to get your hands on the original books, you'll just have to keep an eye on ebay, where copies sometimes crop up (for eye-wincing prices).

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

thats kinda selfish! these books are out of print and years old, you are denying lots of people alot of pleasure deciding not to share the books since there is no way to buy them that will profit the author's estate.

whispering trees said...

^^^^^^with dr_zoidberg^^^^^^

please post the cd somewhere, there would be thousands of grateful people

Anonymous said...

just a thought, but all books that are for sale on ebay state "school stamp inside on page blah blah"
so clearly they were mostly all stolen anaway. Jesus christ just give us the cd man. please.

Anonymous said...

it's people like you that are the bane of society! ...
selfishly engrossed in yourself, a pathetic excuse u give ...

Imran Chaudhry said...

C'mon james - you can tantalize us with the CD and then not let us have it. please share it with all of us 30-somethings who adored these wonderful books as children. Some of us have children of our own and your scans are the only realistic way of sharing this wonderful world with them! So please, reconsider. The books are out-of-print anyway so it's not like the publishers are going to lose major cash. Making it available will spread the the wonderful nature of these books to others. Please, please, pretty please - make your CD available! I suggest getting it on a bit-torrent network somehow (bit-torrent is a way to get at plenty of legitimate material aswell such as linux).

Anonymous said...

James - please read these comments and make a few people very happy indeed by releasing a link to this cd. These are all genuine attempts by like minded people wishing to rediscover the magic of fantasy from an early age - something which I am sure you can relate to. This would mean the world, please make our dreams come true!
madboymonkey@hotmail.com send me an email mate Cheers

Anonymous said...

The complete set of repackaged Tim books were reprinted a few years ago. I picked up a complete set last year, including the extra three novellas.
The reprints are now also out of print but should be a lot easier to find than the originals. This link has the ISBN numbers.
http://www.timandthehiddenpeople.moonfruit.com/#/finding-the-books/4512289558

Anonymous said...

I have the complete set of books, and am thinking of getting hold of the copyright. Quite rightly I would not be happy to see this CD floating around. There appears to be a market for these books and I will be looking into the costings of republishing them.

craftyla said...

to invict2007:
all the best with your application for the copywright, you would make a lot of people VERY happy indeed if you managed to reprint these fantastic books!!!!

Ade said...

I am going to be 41 this year, and these books were very dear to me when I was younger, as all the C S Lewis books a bit later on. I remember keying Tim and the Hidden people many times over the years and next to nothing came up. I really regret missing out on this opportunity. I sent an e-mail a long time back explaining how these were in the last of my top 5 nostalgic things to get (I even managed to get hold of some old Time and Tune pamphlets from the mid 70S, and a descent priced copy of Charley, Charlotte and the Golden Canary), and offered to do a trade if money was not wanted, but I didn't even get a response. It is pretty disappointing and sad that you would deny so many like minded people the joy and pleasure that you got from finding something as special as this, especially with you knowing how high the prices are.
The one other thing I am missing is from the puppet series The Bubblies, very few people can remember this amazing feel good childrens puppet series, and there is next to nothing on the net about it. I saw somewhere that a woman said she has 2 1 hour VHS tapes that they play to their child. They are probably two of the very few in the whole country. I would want for nothing else from my childhood days if I had copies of these items. I remember the name of every book from my child hood apart from one and it has always bugged me all these years. It was about two children who went to stay with their Grandmother in her big house in the countryside for the school holidays.They explored the house, and found a big old book in the attic. When standing on the book and reciting the words .......... , turn your pages on me book (sorry cannot remember the whole lot), they were sent to this strange land and had adventures with these weird and wonderful friendly creatures. To get back they had to recite the lines 'turn again oh book please turn, through your pages I return' and they were back in the attic again. The adventures ended when the school holidays were over. If anybody knows what this book was please, please,please let me know. adehughes007@hotmail.com

James said...

I'm the bane of society simply because I won't share something with you that I bought with my own money? What a load of bullshit. If anyone's the bane of society here, it's you - posting pathetic messages without leaving your name. That's really mature of you.

Anyway, on to the point of this post - contrary to what you all think (that I'm some sort of black-hearted bastard), the reason I won't give anyone a copy of the CD is because a year ago I was contacted by Sheila McCullough's nephew, who politely but firmly requested that I not make any copies of the CD, as he owns the copyright and does not want bastardised versions of his aunt's books floating around.

I promised him that I would make no copies, and I haven't. Unlike most people, I keep my promises. Plus, I have no interest in potentially getting sued for breach of copyright, or whatever (and yes, it COULD happen if word got around).

THAT is why I won't make copies or even reply to emails asking me to do so. Whether you believe it or not is entirely up to you, I couldn't care less.

I genuinely understand how much people want to get hold of these books, I really do. But I can't help.

So...please stop the vitriolic emails and comments, as they won't do any good.