Free Fantasy, SF, and Horror

Some very good free fiction today (new, classic, and audio)










@Fantasy Magazine:"The Machine" by M. Rickert. Fantasy.

"Graveyards creak with too many bones, and the weight of headstones, and when the wind blows the air is dusty with the dead. Ah life, its hoary inevitability. What’s the point?"

Now Posted: Expanded Horizons #30 (July 2011). Speculative Fiction.
"The School" by Lavie Tidhar.

"There had been another boy at the school, called Ender, but he’d attacked and seriously hurt and in at least one case we knew of killed one of the other boys, and they finally had to put him down, though he kept protesting, the day they came for him, that it wasn’t his fault."

"A Handful of Earth" by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.

"He left, crates filled with earth, bound for England. Left us behind, promising to send for us. We believed him. But as the days went by, I realized he’d lied."

"Standing in Line at the End of the World: How One Man Became a God As Told to Isha Kiss" by Malon Edwards.

"For you, the Day of the Redeemer is a day to throw off the genteel and chaste Iaran shackles of society, let your hair down (or preen your crest feathers or touch-up your nacreous black lips), raise your petticoats and fulfill your every desire."

"The Representative" by T.N. Collie.

"Alex Haley, a man big on freedom and dignity, once said, “When you clench your fist, no one can put anything in your hand.” Well, my hands were clenched when the woman’s business card appeared in one of them as I sat outside of Beanie’s Café sipping a zebra mocha."

@Week in Rewind: Free Kindle eBook: “Draugr” by Arthur Slade [via SF Signal]. Horror.

“Are you afraid of the dead?” her grandfather asked. Sarah Asmundson will discover the answer to that question. She is prepared for her grandfather’s scary stories, but is anything but prepared when events from the story about a draugr–a man who comes back from the dead–begin to happen around her.

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site. "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck (Mountain)–Entry #13" by Jeff VanderMeer. Science Fiction.

"It has been five days since my last confession, father, and I have sinned…Except I don’t believe in God or priests, despite the fact Marty does, and my “father” was my mother, too,"

@L5R: "Goddess (Part 1)" by Shawn Carman. Fantasy.

"The Hiruma scout carefully surveyed the land to the south and then crept back down the stone outcropping like the shadow of a cloud crossing a midday garden. He hurried back to the command group and bowed sharply. “There is movement again to the south, my lord Benjiro-sama,” he reported. “I believe the Destroyers definitely know that we are here, and are moving to separate any avenue of escape we might have.”"

Classic SF/Horror
@Gutenberg: A Book of Ghosts by S. Baring-Gould (1904). Horror. Ghost Stories.

"If He Went Out For a Walk They Trotted Forth With Him, Some Before, Some Following."

@Munseys and Project Gutenberg: Pharaoh's Broker by Ellsworth Douglass (1899). Science Fiction. Mars.

"I now understood the more composed behaviour of the women. They were accustomed to the idea of being taken in war, and never suffered slaughter or hardship thereby, but merely a change of masters. As they now left the Park they eyed me curiously, as if wondering from what sort of new master they had escaped. I imagined I could detect some signs of disappointment among them, at being cheated out of a trip to a new star or being dismissed from the service of a god. "

@Munseys and Project Gutenberg: "The Premiere" by Richard Sabia, from Amazing Science Fiction Stories September 1959. Science Fiction.

"The young actor was great.... They didn't realize just how great until the night of"

@Munseys and Project Gutenberg:"The Merchants of Venus" by A. H. Phelps, rom Galaxy Science Fiction March 1954.

"A pioneer movement is like a building—the foundation is never built for beauty!"

@Internet Archive: "The Black Brain" by Robert Bloch, from Fantastic Adventures (March 1943). [via Marooned - Science Fiction & Fantasy books on Mars]

"If this was the brain of a Martian millions of years, how could it be alive? How could it keep on growing?"

Reviewed Free SF
BestScienceFictionStories.com: "Cucumber Gravy" by Susan Palwick (2001). Science Fiction.

"I do not need the government crawling up my backside to regulate me, and I have a lot more customers this way, and I make a lot more money. Being legal would be nothing but a pain in the ass, even if I didn’t have to worry about keeping people from finding out about the space cucumbers."

BestScienceFictionStories.com: "Ej-Es" by Nancy Kress (2003). Science Fiction.

"You had to be a little insane to leave Earth for the Corps, knowing that when (if) you ever returned, all you had known would have been dust for centuries."

Escape Pod has posted it's 300th episode!! "We Go Back" by Tim Pratt, read by Mur Lafferty. Science Fiction.

"My best friend Jenny Kay climbed in through my window and nearly stepped on my head. If I’d been sleeping a foot closer to the wall, I would’ve gotten a face full of her boot, but instead I just snapped awake and said “What who what now?” and blinked a lot."

@Beam Me Up: "Greeters" by Zachery Cole. "What is it like to be a greeter for a big box department store now imagine you have been built expressly for that purpose – and all you want is a little time to figure out how the world works."and part 1 of "Paid" by Deanna knippling. "Boregard is both a multi-dimensional time traveler or a down and out gum-shoe. Neither and both are correct depending on what version of himself you ask….." Science Fiction.


@SFF audio: "The Stolen Bacillus" by H.G. Wells, read by Dawn Keenan.

"An anarchist, intent on wreaking ruin on a city, steals a phial from a bacteriologist."

@LibriVox: A new reading of The Time Machine by H. G. Wells, read by Mark F. Smith. Science Fiction.

"Surely the Time Traveler threw great dinner parties! His guests were treated to a once-in-forever trial of a miniature time machine – an exquisite miniature that acted so flawlessly as to appear to be stage magic."

@LibriVox: A new reading of Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, read by Caden Vaughn Clegg.

"Frankenstein starts to recover from his exertion and recounts his story to Walton. Before beginning his story, Frankenstein warns Walton of the wretched effects of allowing ambition to push one to aim beyond what one is capable of achieving."

@LibriVox: Violet: A Fairy Story by Caroline Snowden Guild, many readers.

"A charming fairytale -- with realistic touches -- from the mid-19th Century."

Serial Audio
@Journey Into: "Cyberpunk (Part 1)" by D.K. Thompson, full cast. [Via David Barr Kirtley] Science Fiction.

"Log on or die. Test gamer Billy Gibson didn't realize his next job would change his life and family forever."

@Author's Site: "The Starter (Episode 22)" by Scott Sigler. Science Fiction.

"Quentin and the Krakens head to To to square off against Quentin's favorite team from his childhood. Quentin will lead his team against Frank Zimmer, the best QB in the league, and the hero of Quentin's youth. Will the Krakens prevail?"

@Triplanetary: The Adventures of Superman "The Radar Rocket (Parts 1-5)"

"Leapin' lizards! Jimmy Olsen is trapped in space aboard the radar rocket. Can even Superman save him?"

Fan Audio
@Misfits Audio: "GL-Man Without Fear: “History Lesson – Part 1”"

"Sodam Yat, holder of the mighty Ion powers, has questions for Guy and Kyle about Sinestro. In an attempt to find such answers the trio consults the great “Book of Oa”, which explains exactly how the most disciplined GL became their most feared foe!"