Wednesday

Some great free fiction today, including Lightspeed, StarShipSofa, Cosmos, SFFaudio, and many more.  Be sure to check out all the sound good and visit SF Signal for more free fiction links. And be sure to check out Regan Wolfrom's (SF Signal's free fiction linker extraordinaire) new round up of writing articles.  

[Art from "Goblin Market" in audio fiction]




Fiction
• At Black Gate: "The Turtle in the Sea of Sand" by Mary Catelli. Fantasy.
     "The sea of sand touched many shores — the meanest beggar’s brat knew that — and many sands drifted up from them, but Persinette always maintained that black sand meant death, and mingled with red, a bloody death. Kyre jeered at that: as if someone wasn’t always dying in the city, and most of the time, dying violently."

• At Cosmos: "Behind the First Years" by Stewart C Baker. Science Fiction.
     "In his darker moments, Pete felt the first people were mocking him, conspiring to erase all knowledge of why they had been sent away, what calamity had befallen Earth."
 
• At Daily Science Fiction: "The Left Side of Your Lover's Broken Face" by Brynn MacNab. Magic Realism.
      "A story is a little tiny piece. A brick, a section of straight pipe, half a radiator. It should be an important piece; if it's not important, pick a different bit"

• At Lightspeed: "Interview: On Any Given Day" by Maureen F. McHugh. Science Fiction.
     "I had this virus, and it was inside me, and it could have been causing all these weird kinds of cancers…. All sorts of weird stuff I’d never heard of, like hairy cell leukemia, and cancerous lesions in parts of your bones, and cancer in your pancreas." 

• At Lightspeed: "Leaving the Dead"  by Dennis Danvers. Fantasy.
     "Darwin thought he might be more alive than other people. Not a whole lot, but ever increasingly, until finally, in a checkout line at Target, he was the last person left alive but his checker"

• At Wily Writers: "Where the Dacouvri Died" by Brian Dolton.
      "Caught between two enemies, the Dacouvri turned to the goddess of the mountains for protection. But what does that protection really mean – and what does it cost?"

• At The World SF Blog: "Sanditon" by Helen Marshall.
"They were in the elevator, Gavin’s voice surprisingly deep and gruff, but his smile was so charming, it lit up his entire face. He touched her lightly on the arm, and she was happy for the warmth of him, but wryly wary. He was married. She knew that. He pressed the button for his floor, and Hanna felt the ground dropping away beneath her, again when he slipped his arm around her waist, not too firmly, gently really, and it was the warmth of it she loved."

Flash Fiction

• At Beware the Hairy Mango: "Bone Wet"  by Matthew Sanborn Smith.
• At Beware the Hairy Mango: "A Case of the Lumps"  by Matthew Sanborn Smith
• Ay Daily Science Fiction: "A Little Sleep" by Melissa Mead. 
• At Enchanted Conversations: "Love Like Salt" by Jennifer A. McGowan. Fairy Tail Poem. 
• At Every Day Fiction: "Resetting Alexandria" by Cory Cone. Science Fiction
• At Quantum Muse: "The Trees of Tismont" by Michele Dutcher.
• At Strange Horizons: "And the War is Never Over" by Shira Lipkin. Speculative Poem/Audio
• At 365 Tomorrows: "The Man With No Name" by Desmond Hussey. Science Fiction
• At 365 Tomorrows: "Salary Man" by Ray Daley. Science Fiction

Audio Fiction
• At Lightspeed: "Leaving the Dead"  by Dennis Danvers. Fantasy.
      Described Above

• At StarShipSofa: “The Night Whiskey” by Jeffrey Ford.
     No Description

• At SFFaudio: "Goblin Market" by Christina Rossetti. Fantasy Poem.
     "Morning and evening / Maids heard the goblins cry: / 'Come buy our orchard fruits, / Come buy, come buy:"

• At SFFaudio: "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" by H.P. Lovecraft. Horror.
     "During the winter of 1927–28 officials of the Federal government made a strange and secret investigation of certain conditions in the ancient Massachusetts seaport of Innsmouth. The public first learned of it in February, when a vast series of raids and arrests occurred, followed by the deliberate burning and dynamiting—under suitable precautions—of an enormous number of crumbling, worm-eaten, and supposedly empty houses along the abandoned waterfront. Uninquiring souls let this occurrence pass as one of the major clashes in a spasmodic war on liquor."

• At Wily Writers: "Where the Dacouvri Died" by Brian Dolton.
     Described  Above

Other Genres

• Audio at Protecting Project Pulp: "Arson Plus" by Dashiell Hammett. Noir.
• Fiction at Author's Site: "Heroics" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch.
• Flash Fiction at Every Day Fiction: "Simply Lila" by Wendy White Lees.