QuasarDragon

The End

2011-12-30T07:42:00.013-06:00

This is the final regular free fiction post at QD. I can no longer spare the time. However I will make an infrequently updated final post that links to as many free fiction/audio fiction/comics/and gaming sites as possible. Have great 2012 everyone!

@Daily Science Fiction: "Don Sebastian's Treasure" by Colin Harvey.

Rob wondered why her sullen monotone had suddenly erupted into vehemence. "This area is for Transport Museum staff only." She motioned him away from the workshop full of agricultural machinery, a lorry chassis, half-complete cars, even a ship's propeller. A mechanic looked up from the engine he was working on. She pointed to a sign saying "No visitors beyond this point" in English, Spanish, and local dialect.

Serial Fiction
@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Fourteen" by Abner Senires.

The Bison and the other Humvee had pulled to the right-hand shoulder just past the turnoff. I slid in behind them, cut the engine, then turned in my seat to look at Kyle.

@Ray Gun Revival: "Thieves’ Honor Episode 17: Trial by Fire - Part 1" by Keanan Brand.

“An IntuiCom implant is a biomechanical device that wraps around the brain stem or spinal column. Almost impossible to remove. But we’ve learned how to shut them down without killing the host. Most of the time. Any pen light marked with the Quantum Industries eye is a scanner for implants.”

Audio
@Drabblecast: "A Fairy Tale of Oakland" by Tim Pratt.

In some parts of the world — Austria, Croatia, Hungary — they still remember. They understand. You can’t have something bright without having something dark to balance it. If you’ve got St. Nicholas, you also need the Krampus…

@Escape Pod: "Bad Dogs Escape" by James Patrick Kelly.

MEL: We tried. We tried very hard. It wasn’t as if we couldn’t see what was coming. The droughts, tornados, the economy going south. But it didn’t happen all at once. Then the Raccoon flu, the antibiotics were useless. The wheat crop failed two years in a row. Then came riots, cities on fire, madness. When we lost control we gathered the best — scientists, economists, engineers, architects into the CPF

@Pseudopod: "Black Hill" by Orrin Grey, read by Rich Girardi.

There was a sound come up from the hole, like a gasp. The men figured we’d hit a pocket of gas and everyone backed off in case it was like to burn. Then the derrick shook all the way up and the ground seemed to slide a little under our feet. There come a noise from the hole like I ain’t never heard the ground make in all my years. When I was a boy, my pa’d known a man who worked a whaling ship and he said that whales sang to one another. He’d put his hands together over his mouth and blown a call that he said was as close as he could do to what they sounded like. This sounded like that call.

@The Classic Tales Podcast: "The Man Who Lived Backwards" by Charles F. Hall, read by B.J. Harrison.

Where can you find a world where raindrops cut through you like bullets, and sandwiches are as hard as concrete? Why, in the past of course.

Free Fiction

2011-12-27T07:35:00.032-06:00

The penultimate regular post

@AE: "Mail Order" by Martin Ivison.

"The Q’rai language is at its most poetic when describing the ocean, and I’m the only human being who can appreciate it. I savour the nuance between the water stirred by a surface current and the water stirred by a gust of circular wind. I know the words for the green water rich with brine jelly and for the red water during a sunfish bloom."

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The Death of Roach" by Spencer Ellsworth.

He has given me ink and parchment and told me to write, for salvation lies in the Aspects of the Thousand Gods, and the thirty-third is the confessional. I shall tell my story. But not to confess. Nor to boast. Nor—especially not—to atone.

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The Traitor Baru Cormorant, Her Field-General, and Their Wounds" by Seth Dickinson.

When she takes up residence in the Elided Keep she orders the long room where she will hold court rearranged. All the blades go on the south wall, cleaned of gore; and all the worn heraldry of the Pyre dukes, trampled on the day she deserted them.

@Fantasy Magazine: "Vici" by Naomi Novik.

“Dragon-slaying is an honorable death, and generally quick, from my understanding; and will legally clear your debts. Unless you would prefer to commit suicide?” he inquired.

@Lightspeed: "The Hammer of God" by Sir Arthur C. Clarke.

Suddenly, he was back in this cabin aboard the orbital tug Goliath, commanding the 100-person team of Operation ATLAS, the most critical mission in the history of space exploration.

@Ray Gun Revival: "The King of Meteortown" by Andy Henion.

"Houses blur by. A good third are falling down, bearing scorch marks from the event fourteen years prior. Another third holds families, and by families I mean an old man, maybe an old woman, in some cases a grown, stubborn son. Neighbors who dug in and learned to accept what life along the Hole brought them."

@Wily Stories: "One Free Go" by Michelle Ann King

"Any good party needs an entertainer, and the fortune-teller at Darren’s makes it a night that at least one of his kids will never forget. Excerpt It’s really getting out of hand lately, all this Halloween business."

@World SF Blog: "A Hundred Thousand Armstrongs" by Zoltán László.

"The parties in the Rio night were no less lively than any time before. Actually, they were only becoming more boisterous as Astronaut Day was coming and the country was getting ready to celebrate her one hundred thousand new space travellers…. All those improved Armstrongs and Tereshkovas."

Serial Fiction
@Paizo: "Fingers of Death—No, Doom! - Chapter One: A Helping Hand" by Lucien Soulban.

The ancient mechanisms thundered, the giant gears crushing boulder-sized rocks between their iron teeth and spitting out rubble in disdain. Beyond them, the furnaces set into the stone dwarf mouths glowed with Abyssal fury and spewed rivers of molten rock destined for the deeper bowels beneath Darkmoon Vale.

Audio
@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "Read This Quickly, For You Will Only Have a Moment..." by Stephen Case.

The one who brings your food is named Osla. My birds are trained well, and this one will have struck at his eyes. Take this parchment quickly, speak his name, and he will fall like the rain outside your window.

@Journey Into: "The Mansion" by Henry van Dyke, performed by full cast.

John Weightman is a wealthy and generous man, if it provides rewards for himself, but what does he have to learn of freely giving of himself?

@PodCastle: "Limits" by Donna Glee Williams, read by Tisch Parmelee

"When did Len first see how far the path would take her son? No Far Walker had been born in Home Village for many years. But everyone knew Shreve Far Walker, from Third Village Down, who often passed through as she carried loads between High and Low. When nightfall caught her near Home Village, she would stay over, taking dinner and giving back news."

@StarShipSofa: "Fermaville" by Paul Di Filippo, read by Fred Himebaugh.

@Wily Stories: "One Free Go" by Michelle Ann King.

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The All-Pro Episode #9" by Scott Sigler.

And in story content, you'll meet the Prawatt and this year's rookies.

@Beam Me Up: "In Plain Sight - ep2" by Jason Kahn and "Skinflint Specters" by Brian Thompson.

"We again join our favorite psychic detective, Jack Garrett as he once again find himself embroiled in mystery and intrigue" and "a retelling of A Christmas Carol in which everything is explainable……or is it?"

A few for Friday

2011-12-23T08:50:00.007-06:00

Just a few. Have a merry Christmas.

@Daily Science Fiction: "The Black Spirits Which Rage In The Belly Of Rogue Locomotives" by Rahul Kanakia.

"the whirring circle of plot squaring itself in memetic resolutions, each frame carrying the genetic code to build an entire episode, an entire series, an entire world. And this time one of those packages of light, carrying its viruses of self-realization, crashed through the gates she had forgotten how to open. Her consciousness--finally delivered from its shackles--evaporated."

Audio Fiction
@Escape Pod: "Long Winter’s Nap" by Catherine H. Shaffer, read by Mur Lafferty.

MooninMama shrugged and set the plate away. It was beginning to get cold in the cave as the crackling fire burned down to embers. Soon it would be time to sleep, time to dream of spring, when they would awaken, shivering, and find that Santy Clawr had visited them.

@Pseudopod: "Widdershins" by Robert Mammone, read by Frank Key.

“His dreams were disturbed. He saw the moon emerge from behind a bank of racing clouds, the surface yellowed and cracked like old bone. He stood in a clearing, surrounded by outcroppings of rock and trees whose branches were lashed by the breeze. He thought he heard indistinct muttering which, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t make out. Gradually, though, the muttering grew clearer, until, with a jolt, he understood.

Serial Audio
@Classic Tales Audio: "The Snow Queen - part 3 of 3" by Hans Christian Andersen, read by BJ Harrison.

The magical reindeer whisks Gerda away to the end of her quest, where she must face the fearsome sentinels and minions of the Snow Queen herself. How will it end?

Free Fiction

2011-12-21T11:56:00.022-06:00

Some good pre-holiday fiction.

@Daily Science Fiction: "A Stitch in Space-time" by Nicky Drayden.

Fina kept her aim steady. This would be the eighth time she'd watched Neil die--his face contorting in agony under the blue-white haze of the Abbey's limelight

@Daily Science Fiction: "Lures, Hooks and Tails" by Adam Colston.

The train continued its rhythmic clanking and rocking and the woman smiled back. She inclined her head towards the pile of fishing gear piled on the empty seat beside him.

@Fantasy Magazine: "Crystal Halloway and the Forgotten Passage" by Seanan McGuire.

"The dire bat’s headless body lay on the floor of the cave like an accusation, blackish blood still seeping from its neck. Crystal looked at it and shuddered, disgusted, before giving it a sharp kick."

@Lightspeed: "The Parting Glass" by Andrew Penn Romine.

"I gulp the whiskey and it burns my plastic throat, sets my nutrient sac on fire. I’ve got filters, but they haven’t been changed in six months. Too expensive."

@Tor.com: "Reading in Bed" by Joan Aiken.

He was apt to say “Put on my boots” or “Fetch my horse” to whoever was there, even the major, and he was incurably vain, and fond of good wine and reading in bed. Harmless pursuits, one might say, but they nearly led to his downfall.

Now Posted: Lovecraft eZine - Issue #9.

"Elder Instincts" by W.H. Pugmire.
"Among the Dark Places of the Earth" by Julio Toro San Martin.
"At Best An Echo" by Bradley H. Sinor.
"Stone City, Old as Immeasurable Time" by Kelda Crich.
"Just An Accountant" by Henrik Sandbeck Harksen.

Serial Fiction
@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Thirteen" by Abner Senires.

While Cutter checked on Kyle, Mac sent the other Claw members back to French Gulch so that only her Humvee and ours remained. A few minutes after the last convoy vehicle disappeared around the bend in the road, a dark blue ChrysFord Bison appeared and rolled to a stop near us.

@Paizo: "Faithful Servants - Chapter Four: The Greatest Gift" by James L. Sutter.

It was utterly stupid. The priest's little mob of peasants would likely scatter at the first sign of a walking corpse, and those who stayed would be slaughtered. Worse, if this Lord Mirosoy had advanced to making ghouls, then every farmhand who fell would rise again shortly to add to his army.

@Ray Gun Revival: "The Worker Prince – Chapter Two (part two)" by Bryan Thomas Schmidt.

On the shuttle, as his pilot flew them back to Iraja, he sat in silence, replaying it over and over in his mind. Why had he gotten so angry? Farien and Yao were his best friends. They’d grown up together. Sure, he and Farien had different views on how the world should work, but it had never led to angry discussions like this.

@Strange Horizons: "Ash and Dust (Part 2 of 2)" by Jennifer Mason-Black.

In the surprised cries and furious nuzzles of those just born, in the tears of fathers too tired to hide their delight, in the amazement of mothers holding their noses to perfect smooth skin as they counted fingers and toes, I saw joy. I could not feel it though, any more than I could register anger or fear or excitement.

Audio
@Dunesteef: "Ass-Hat Magic Spider" by Scott Westerfeld.

All that stands in a young man’s way of getting on a colony ship bound for a new world and a better life is a few grams of extra weight, and Charlotte, of course.

@LibriVox: "Idylls of the King" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, read by Elizabeth Klett.

"a cycle of twelve narrative poems by the English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson which retells the legend of King Arthur, his knights, his love for Guinevere and her tragic betrayal of him, and the rise and fall of Arthur's kingdom."

@Lightspeed: "The Parting Glass" by Andrew Penn Romine, by Joe Barrett.

@PodCastle: "The Ghost of Christmas Possible" by Tim Pratt and Heather Shaw, read by Ian Stuart.

The hour was just before midnight on Christmas Eve when a ferocious knocking woke me from my slumber. My first muddled thought, or rather hope, was that some specter or spirit stirred beneath the cramped rafters of my newly rented accommodations.

@StarShipSofa: "Til Human Voices Take Us" by Lewis Shiner and "Fortitude" by David Brin read by Ted Delorme and Josh Roseman.

Serial Audio
@Beam Me Up: "Thief of Futures - part 3" by D. Thomas Minton and "Clockwork - part 2" by Erin Bassett.

"Eshram has been pulled reluctantly out of retirement for a theft he finds for all intents, abhorrent, but the further he delves the more complex becomes the project and less clear as to the why and even more so the who. When clarity finally comes it may be too late!" and "Ester returns to the academy only to again come in contact with the mysterious Holland ."

@Beware the Hairy Mango: "The Careerist’s Guide to the Sea, Part 4" by Matthew Sanborn Smith.

@Cthulhu: "The Damned, part 8"

Friday Free Fiction Links

2011-12-15T09:28:00.029-06:00

It's Friday!

@Author's Site: "Nameless" by Stuart Clark. [Via SF Signal]

And that was the problem with computers. They didn’t see accounts as people, just as streams of data. You broke the rules and you got marked as a problem. And problem data got erased. Now there was nothing left and that’s exactly what Witten was now. Nothing. A nobody.

@Author's Site: "Nameless" by Helen Lowe. [Via SF Signal]

She had seen the sea once, when she was very small, the waters stretching farther than she could have imagined before that moment. And there had been a ship, its masts tall as a forest tree, with white sails breaking the sky—until finally it vanished into that darker line where sky and ocean met.

@Baen: "Pawn to King Four" by Timothy Zahn.

The night patrol had been pretty uneventful, Badger Werle thought as he and Dillon de Portola drove along one of the dirt tracks that passed for roads out here in the upper reaches of DeVegas Province. He and de Portola had cleared out two spine leopard nests, killing five males and scattering the females and young, and had taken out one of the predator way stations that were in many ways more troublesome than the nests themselves.

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "Heartless" by Peadar Ó Guilín

“No one asks for death.” This was the proud boast of the city of Kalegwyn. “No one asks for it.” Until Malern did. A bad move for her, as it turned out. She awoke on Castellan Garvinger’s operating table with his favorite surgeon elbow-deep in her chest.

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The God Thieves" by Derek Künsken.

Mateo had converted the west room into a chapel to the emaciated god nailed to the cross. Icons and amulets to other gods, he disposed of with respect. Though the gods who fought were unreasoning, the superstition that he might offend them was ingrained.

@Cosmos: "All The Wrong Places" by Val Nolan.

I'm a Physicist. I study particles and scalars and the tiny little pieces that make up everything. My whole career I've been searching for the Higgs boson, that which gives mass and meaning to existence.

@Daily Science Fiction: "Character is What You Are" by Michael R. Fletcher.

Character is what you are in the dark. My dad told me that. At the time I thought he'd made it up. Later I learned he got it from a strange movie called The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension. It was decades before I understood what it meant and even longer before I realized it was me. If you only live one-eighth of each day, you are spending your life in the dark.

@Ray Gun Revival: "Jackson Bluffs" by Alice M. Roelke.

"They sat in the Cricket’s cargo hold on a folding chair and a crate drawn up to a larger crate. Dim lighting — one of the bulbs was out — illuminated the half-filled hold. They played with a deck of well-thumbed cards. The heavy man had a government-issue long rifle leaning against his chair."

Serial Fiction
@Paizo: "Faithful Servants - Chapter Three: The Penitent Man" by James L. Sutter.

"Salim looked quickly to Connell, but the eidolon was already holding his own pendant. Before Salim could say anything, the eidolon’s disguise as an axiomite melted into something less suspicious. The pointed ears were still there, but shorter. Gone was the inhumanly perfect skin, replaced by a moonscape of old pockmarks."

Audio
@Drabblecast: "The Heroics of Interior Design" by Elise R. Hopkins.

I can’t fly faster than a speeding bullet. I can’t lift a car. I can’t climb slick surfaces with my bare hands or breath underwater or stop time. All I can do is change blue things to yellow. I didn’t bother to buy a cape or a spandex suit like the others. I just bought a blouse and some slacks and went into interior design…

@Dunesteef: "Aldo" by Michael C. Thompson.

"In “Aldo,” author Michael C. Thompson tells the story of a sort of love triangle in space. Except one of them is a starship."

@Escape Pod: "Marking Time on the Far Side of Forever" by Mur Lafferty, read by Josh Roseman.

I sit beneath the dark green sky, overlooking the valley that has changed much over the years. What was once a stream has swelled into a river while, to the east, lush vegetation grows where I think there was once a shallow lake. I can’t remember definitely. The information is stored inside me, filed, itemized; I’m merely unsure how to access it. It will come to me. Later, when a random search, an unrelated thought, cracks open the proper conduits and a pulse of electricity resurrects the knowledge, unbidden.

@Pseudopod: "Saint Nicholas" by D.K. Thompson, read by Marie Brennan.

“Saint Nicholas looked just like he did in the picture stories: tall and thin, with a grand white beard that flowed to his waist. He wore a red-fur trimmed coat, a tall bishop’s hat, and clutched a gold staff. He smiled and said something, but Greta wasn’t listening. She hid behind her elder sister Heike and stared at the saint’s demonic assistant, Krampus.

@StarShipSofa: "Watchbird" by Robert Sheckley, read by Jeff Lane.

Serial Audio
@Classic Tales Podcast: "The Snow Queen - part 2 of 3" by Hans Christian Andersen, read by B. J. Harrison.

Gerda continues her quest for Kay and the Snow Queen. Princes, Princesses and reindeer all help her on her quest. But when their gifts are all stolen by a roving band of highway robbers, Gerda must look to the very birds for comfort and guidance. Hans Christian Andersen, today, on The Classic Tales Podcast.

Tuesday Free Fiction

2011-12-12T07:17:00.020-06:00

More goodies! Don't forget to bookmark and tell your friends about these high quality sites.

@Daily Science Fiction: "Substitution" by Brooke Juliet Wonders.

I'm training my replacement. Things I know about you that he'll need to know: You like your cappuccino made with skim milk, with a chocolate cookie on the side (you call it your morning defeats the purpose).

@Fantasy Magazine: "Torn Away" by Joe R. Lansdale.

The license was invalid by a couple of months, and the photo on it looked somewhat like him but it was faded and not reliable. I told him so. “Oh,” he said. “I should have noticed it was out of date.”

@Lightspeed: "After the Days of Dead-Eye ‘Dee" by Pat Cadigan.

"Maybe it was actually holed up in the old well. If it were, she couldn’t imagine how it was getting out. She shifted position on the chair and carefully set the shotgun on the table."

@World SF Blog: "Kolkata Sea" by Indrapramit Das.

I remember the first time my mother took me to see the city where I was born. She was a young woman then. There were seabirds rippling through the warm white sky high above her head, drifting like ashes on the summer breeze. I was in her lap, slightly nauseous from the motion of our vessel on the cresting waves.

Now Posted: Crossed Genres Issue 36 - Different

"Black Betty" by Nisi Shawl.
"Portrait of a Courtesan" by Megan Arkenberg.
"The Last Recall" by Mason Ian Bundschuh.
"Second Place" by Sarah A. Drew.
"Zeppelin Follies" by Cat Rambo.
"The Remote-Controlled Doggirl" by Lara Ek.
"Beaumains" by Jo Thomas.
"Young Lions" by Zachary Jernigan.
"My Other Half" by Maria Stanislav.

Now Posted: Ideomancer Vol. 10 Issue 4
"The Orphan Queen" - Michael John Grist

“Then you ask an impossibility, for such a thing cannot be done. The enlivening spark cannot be pressed into the puppet’s limbs through any other means than the strings of the puppeteer. It is not possible for a puppet to stand alone.”

"Neural Net" - Ken Schneyer

a work of hyperfiction. To read it, click the link marked ‘Begin’ below. A window will pop up allowing you to click more links and experience the story as you choose.

"Signs Following" - Erica Satifka

The alien is covered with short gray fur. Its mouth opens to a black hatch through which Dennis can see the rippling of the alien’s esophagus. The alien is slightly wet at all times.

Serial Fiction
@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Twelve" by Abner Senires.

Ten minutes later, we spotted the halted convoy ahead of us. Four Humvees, four dark SUVs, and three heavy-duty pickups, one of which had a manned .50-caliber machinegun mounted in the truckbed, sat on the shoulder of the road.

Audio Fiction
@Fantasy Magazine: "Torn Away" by Joe R. Lansdale., read by Stefan Rudnicki.

@PodCastle: "Ties of Silver" by James L. Sutter, read by V.O. Bloodfrost.

Harris always found me when I was at my worst. Not that it was particularly difficult — the way I figured it, I’d been at my worst for going on three years, and if there was reason to expect a change, nobody had clued me in.

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The All-Pro - Episode #7" by Scott Sigler.

"Quentin's past catches up with him as he runs afoul of Rob Froese, the GFL commissioner. This news angers Gredok the Splithead. We also get a glimpse of Quentin's past as a skinny, orphan miner on Micovi (read also, just how did Quentin get so damn big?)."

@Beam Me Up: "Thief of Futures - part two" by Thomas Minton and "Love and Perpetual Motion" by Bart Meehan, read by Paul Cole.

Freebies and an Unpleasant Announcement

2011-12-09T07:34:00.037-06:00

There's a eTon of good free fiction today from several great sites. Be sure to bookmark all these great sites because this will be the last month for QD, except for rare announcements.

@AE: "Billy O'Bannon's Time Travel Dating Service" by Joseph L. Kellogg .

"With a crackle of electricity, a dark hole opened up in the sky in front of him, rimmed with sizzling blue energy. A human figure toppled through it, its scream cut short by the thud and rustle of a rough landing in a nearby bush."

@Anotherealm: "Ah, Spring" by Keith Kennedy

A little ways further along he came across a man and a woman, back to back, each chewing their lower lips. They turned to him as he came upon them.

@Daily Science Fiction: "The Girl in the Next Room is Crying Again" by Peter M Ball.

"I used to think it was no big deal, the sensing. After all, everyone smells stuff. Everyone tastes things and gets those nervous feelings in their gut, or that twinge across the back of their neck that tells them something's up, the vague foresight of intuition. It was Morley who taught me otherwise, who told me I was special and taught me what else I could do."

@Daily Science Fiction: "A Puddle of Dead" by Grayson Bray Morris.

"Henry came back to me in 2048, fifteen years after he'd left.I was married by then, with two kids. I was happy. But when I opened the door and saw Henry standing there, my heart sang."

@GigaNotaSaurus: "The House of Aunts" by Zen Cho.

"To the women of my family. The house stood back from the road in an orchard. In the orchard, monitor lizards the length of a man’s arm stalked the branches of rambutan trees like tigers on the hunt. Behind the house was an abandoned rubber tree plantation, so proliferant with monkeys and leeches and spirits that it might as well have been a forest"

@Kasma: "Life Plus Seventy" by Ken Liu.

She pretended to have heard of it and nodded. For all she knew, The Daily Troll was a big deal here, and since her publicist had cleared me, I must be important, right? She really ought to have paid her publicist better though, if she didn't want her to be so easily bribed.

Now Posted: Expanded Horizons Issue 33 (Dec 2011)

"Honorary Earthling" by Nisi Shawl.

Yes, they are cute, very cute. And you better believe they know it, too. Who’s in charge? Yes, that’s Corgis for you. Aren’t we lucky Seattle lets dogs ride the bus? I don’t think they’d understand if someone were to tell them they couldn’t. Probably they would blame me.

"The River’s Children " by Shweta Narayan.

"There once was a prince whose dearest friend was a river. Now rivers are sometimes girls,‭ ‬quick as lightning‭; ‬and they are boys sometimes,‭ ‬speeding like arrows.‭ ‬And they are gravidwomen sometimes,‭ ‬and sometimes they are men,‭ ‬full of poetry and slow as scripture.‭ ‬Most of the time you simply cannot tell,‭ ‬though storytellers will try."

"Autumn Trees" by Michael Schutz.

Owen said, “It’s only a grass snake!” and shoved the wriggling length of the dark thing in Greg’s face. Greg recoiled in disgust.

"Memory" by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.

It‭’‬s half theatrics and half misplaced nostalgia.‭ ‬After all,‭ ‬she doesn‭’‬t need the sword to kill him.‭ ‬She could drown him inthe vast expanse of water that is slowly eroding all the coasts,‭ ‬eating the land bit by bit.‭ ‬But it seems to have become tradition and there are few things to cling on to these days.‭ ‬As a result,‭ ‬she carries the sword and waits by the sea.

Now Posted: The Fifth Di...Edition 13...issue 4 December 2011

"Clap Your Hands" by Eamonn Murphy.

"Upon entering the minister’s private office that morning, Neil Kinsella had noted the severe frown on his master’s face, and said the words mockingly. George Willard, M.P.,O.B.E. and Home Office Minister in Her Majesty’s Government was surveying the morning papers, his jowly features contorted into a scowl as he surveyed the front pages. "

"Washishisha" by Robert P. Hansen.

No, not again. I sighed: commissions were down twelve percent. People were too secure in their belief that nothing would happen to them and their ships would traverse space without incident. It was true, too – I knew it to be. The problem was, with space being as safe as, say, sitting alone in a dark room, what good were we? There were no fears for the Washishisha Wizards to banish.

"Monsoon Metamorphosis" by Gary Every.

Rising up on his knees, his shoulder appearing above the cactus spines, Tadpole drew back on the bowstring, releasing the arrow from somewhere deep inside his chest, sending it sailing. He shot too high. The twang of the bowstring caused a bighorn ram to look up with alarm while the rest of the herd continued to graze.

"Black" by Robert Collins

En route I heard the story. It played on the news-nets as another violent shocker from a colony world. Four men tried to rob a small-town bank; one employee killed, another fatally wounded; robbers flee, but get caught; two robbers revealed as lawmen from nearby town; locals so enraged by crime and criminals that they shoot one, then actually hang the other three.

Now Posted: Redstone Science Fiction #19 - December 2011

"Hacker" by Siobhan Shier.

"It wasn’t illegal – just wrong. The courts hadn’t caught up with technology yet. They were slow – bogged down by the heavy weight of the money monster politicians call bureaucracy."

"Time, Like Blood, on My Hands" by Eric Del Carlo.

That morning I had met a classmate of mine, one I hadn’t seen for better than a decade. Harold Hemard. I was coming out of my bank; he was going in. We stopped. My brain grabbed up the name, dragging along with it the kind of favorable impression that told me this wasn’t someone I needed to automatically avoid.

Serial Fiction
@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Eleven" by Abner Senires.

My breathing was a little ragged, my heart was jackhammering in my chest, and my shirt was soaked with sweat and plastered to my back when we finally rounded the bend and the dirt road gave way to pavement.

@Paizo: "Faithful Servants - Chapter Two: A Walk in the Park" by James L. Sutter.

"The two men—for Salim had returned the eidolon's amulet, and the snake-man once more looked like an axiomite—walked shoulder to shoulder through one of Axis's many parks. To either side of the cobblestone path, trees and bushes of a hundred different varieties stood in a riot of color, each with a neat little placard giving its name and world of origin."

@World SF Blog: "The City of Silence (Part Two)" by Ma Boyong, translated by Ken Liu.

“You can speak as freely as you like in here. This damned device won’t work here.” The woman pointed to his Listener. There was no warning beep. It didn’t seem to hear the two sensitive words in her speech: “freely” and “damned.”

Audio

@Drabblecast: "Trifecta XIX" featuring "David Is Six" by Amanda C. Davis, "The Best Boy, The Brightest Boy" by Megan R. Engelhard, and "Feature Broken" by Steven Saus.

"Another of the Drabblecast Trifecta series, this time with the theme of Fairy Tale child abduction"

@Escape Pod: "Chicken Noodle Gravity" by J. Daniel Sawyer, read by Paul Haring.

"I hate to start out this way, but before we get to the reason I’m standing on this stool with a fez on my head, in the middle of the night, in front of a double-cal-king bed in a furniture store—which, yes, Officer, I swear I’ll confess I broke into illegally—before we get to any of that, there’s something I have to tell you. "

@Pseudopod: "To My Wondering Eyes Did Appear" by Larry C. Kay, read by Stephanie Morris.

"A figure obscured the flames of the fireplace: a man. Bettia sat up quickly, blinking away sleep, thinking it was her father. But this man was shorter, rounder, and part of her groggy mind considered Santa Claus, and that she must have slept for days."

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The All-Pro Episode #6" by Scott Sigler.

Quentin and the Krakens report to the locker room for the first practice of the season, where Quentin has an early run-in with Rick Warburg. Danny Lundy and Gredok square off in contract negotiations, while Choto the Bright embraces his role as Quentin's private bodyguard.

@Classic Tales Podcast: "The Snow Queen 1of3" by Hans Christian Andersen, read by B.J. Harrison.

"Grandmother tells Kay and Gerda the legend of the Snow Queen who lives in the
great black cloud in the heavens. But once the Snow Queen visits their town in disguise and carries off Kay, Gerda begins a timeless quest. Alone and barefoot, she embarks into the wild world to find her lost friend."

Free

2011-12-08T07:31:00.019-06:00

Some great free fiction (e and audio). More tomorrow.

@Fantasy Magazine: "Her Lover’s Golden Hair" by Nike Sulway.

"Lily’s hand is not resting carelessly in her lap. Lily’s sandy feet are not up on the dashboard. Lily’s salty hair is not blowing into a knotted, lovely mess."

@Lightspeed: "The Sighted Watchmaker" by Vylar Kaftan.

"The Makers had been dead for billions of years, yet Umos discovered one caught in the starship’s net. A young one, naked, with still-fused dorsal fins."

@Strange Horizons: "Penelope Napolitano and the Butterflies" by Aliya Whiteley.

"You can travel the world, you can see Kuala Lumpur and the Côte D'Azur, go everywhere, try anything; but it all comes down to one moment where you realise you're about to get engaged to a deeply lovely man who is undoubtedly going to turn you into your mother."

@Tor: "Glitches" by Marissa Meyer.

"Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. In “Glitches,” a short prequel story to Cinder, we see the results of that illness play out, and the emotional toll that takes on Cinder. Something that may, or may not, be a glitch...."

@Wily Writers: “The Deepest Hour” by Tina Lonergan.

The nights were never quiet. Even the nurses’ soft-soled shoes seemed loud in the rarefied atmosphere of the hospital at night. The ward was on the other side of the building from the accident and emergency, so although we heard the sirens at a distance, the resulting fuss didn’t filter down to us.

Audio
@Drama Pod: "Hunted Heroes" by Robert Silverberg, read by Gregg Margarite.

""Let's keep moving," I told Val. "The surest way to die out here on Mars is to give up." I reached over and turned up the pressure on her oxymask to make things a little easier for her. Through the glassite of the mask, I could see her face contorted in an agony of fatigue."

@Escape Pod: "Honor Killing" by Ray Tabler, read by Mur Lafferty.

"You would think that after all the years I’ve spent schlepping cargoes around the galaxy I’d have learned not to get involved with the locals, especially when they’re not humans. You would think."

@Fantasy Magazine: "Her Lover’s Golden Hair" by Nike Sulway, read by Gabrielle De Cuir.

@LibriVox: "Tarzan the Terrible" by Edgar Rice Burroughs, read by Don W. Jenkin.

"Tarzan is continuing to search for Jane. He has tracked her to a hidden valley called Pal-ul-don, which means "Land of Men." In Pal-ul-don Tarzan finds a real Jurassic Park filled with dinosaurs, notably the savage Triceratops-like Gryfs, which unlike their prehistoric counterparts are carnivorous"

@Lightspeed: "The Sighted Watchmaker" by Vylar Kaftan, read by Paul Boehmer.

@PodCastle: "Beyond the Sea Gate of the Scholar Pirates of Sarskoe" by Garth Nix, read by Paul Tevis.

"“Remind me why the pirates won’t sink us with cannon fire at long range,” said Sir Hereward as he lazed back against the bow of the skiff, his scarlet-sleeved arms trailing far enough over the side to get his twice folded-back cuffs and hands completely drenched, with occasional splashes going down his neck and back as well."

@StarShipSofa: "Faithful Servants" by James L. Sutter, read by Jonathan Danz.

The bar's unusual shape, however, was nothing compared to its clientele. As far as Salim could tell—and such things weren't always obvious—he was the only human present. To his right, a cluster of hive people—this particular group composed almost entirely of the flying variety, which resembled seven-foot-tall, black-shelled wasps—used deft proboscises to scrape thick red fluid from long, fluted glasses.

@Wily Writers: “The Deepest Hour” by Tina Lonergan

Serial Audio
@Beam Me Up: "Thief of Futures - part one" by Thomas Minton.

"Where in the not so distant future a person’s “Future” becomes a commodity, if it proves to be of exceptional quality. And a X futures thief trying hard to protect what is most important to him, his daughter."

@Journey Into: "Dream Engine - Part 2" by Tim Pratt, performed by full cast.

"When Howlaa and Wisp follow the Fat Man back to his world, they must unravel the mystery behind the dream engine.."

Friday

2011-12-02T09:50:00.021-06:00

More free fiction from many great sites.

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The Gardens of Landler Abbey" by Megan Arkenberg.

I spent the whole of the night lying awake, watching the sickly reflection of the moon in my wall of gilded mirrors. At last the sun rose, and I left my rumpled and sweat-soaked sheets with a great and sudden desire to see Gethsemane von Reis again.

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "Princess Courage" by Nadia Bulkin

I went to see the specimens, because I thought I should know the face of the Enemy--my father would have been in there prodding and cutting himself--and immediately wished I hadn’t. Cleaned of swamp sludge they looked like the gray ice mummies that had been found in caves along the Blue Belt.

@Daily Science Fiction: "Sand-Child" by Marie Croke.

On the first day of building her Sand-child, Abi took grains from the Jurida Desert, breathing joy into their tiny souls. On the second day of building her Sand-child, Abi found grains at the base of the Nieradka Range, breathing anger. On the third day, Abi drained silt from the bottom of the Enmdi River, breathing love.

@Notes From the Lair: "Invasion: 2012 by Dr. Ace T. Jericho, Rogue Journalist" by Abner Senires.

I was sitting in a Starbucks on New Montgomery Street in San Francisco with a large white mocha when my old compatriot Cordwainer Duke walked in and looked around. He wore his customary dark gray tweed jacket with elbow patches, a pair of tinted aviator-style glasses, and carried a thick leather satchel slung over one shoulder.

@Red Lemonade: "The Sovereignties of Invention" by Matthew Battles. [Via SF Signal]

"Without warning, the dogs move into the trees to escape the human world; a lonely man befriends a spectacularly ugly mythological beast; at a summer cottage by the sea, a boy discovers a camera that takes pictures of unknown people in faraway places. The stories in Sovereignties of Invention explore the uncanny magic of technology, memory, meaning, and time."

@Tor.com: "The Rotten Beast" by Mary E. Pearson.

In “The Rotten Beast,” a sixteen-year-old girl named Allys, living in a near future version of the U.S., is vehemently opposed to the way scientists are meddling with human and artificial life. In fact, she blames such scientific overreaching for the illness which is killing her.

Audio Fiction
@Beam Me Up: "Claude and the Henry Moores" by Casey Wolf

"this story for all the world tell the tale of a man who comes to love art and his expression is probably one of the most unusual I have ever read before."

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "To the Gods of Time and Engines, a Gift" by Dean Wells.

"The silent commands were with her all the time now, haunting and familiar."

@Drabblecast: "Unintended Consequences" and "Expired" by John P. Murphy
James Kennedy had stared at his sock drawer for a good ten minutes that first morning, dumbfounded. He’d never seen it so neat, and he didn’t remember doing it. But there they were: threadbare, but tidy and folded…
@LibriVox: "Short Ghost and Horror Collection 015"

Featuring stories by Poe, Dickins, Lovecraft, Bierce, Chambers, James, Doyle, and others.

@19Nocturne Boulevard: "People Who Live in Wax Houses" by Julie Hoverson, performed by full cast.

Three stories, separate and intertwined, center around a failing wax museum.

@Pseudopod: "The Stink of Animosity" by Rob E. Boley, read by Rish Outfield.

"So, what did she do?” These are the first words the stranger says to you as he takes the bar stool on your right. The hotel lounge has at least two-dozen seats scattered between the bar and four tables, and only half of those seats are filled. Yet he sits next to you. His voice is almost a growl – all gravel and broken glass – too ragged for someone his age."

@StarShipSofa: "Raft of The Titanic" by James Morrow.

"about a world where the giant body of the Deity is found and must be towed through the ocean." - Amazon.com

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The All-Pro Episode #5" by Scott Sigler.

As the season gets underway, Yitzhak takes Quentin to meet Danny Lundy, agent to the stars. Like he's done for Yitzhak and John Tweedy, Danny thinks he's the one to help Quentin manage the intricate contract negotiations.

@Beware the Hairy Mango: "The Careerist’s Guide to the Sea, Part 3" by Matthew Sanborn Smith.

Wednesday

2011-11-30T15:55:00.013-06:00

Still catching up.

@Fantasy Magazine: "The Swordsman Whose Name Was Not Death" by Ellen Kushner.

"Curious, he had asked the wounded man, “Did you slam into me on purpose?” People did sometimes, to provoke a fight with Richard St. Vier, the master swordsman who wouldn’t take challenges from just anyone."

@Lightspeed: "Snow" by John Crowley.

"Georgie got rid of most of what she’d inherited from him, liquidated it. It was cash that she had liked best about that marriage anyway; but the Wasp couldn’t really be got rid of. Georgie ignored it."

Serial Fiction
@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Ten" by Abner Senires.

And Tina stepped through, a pistol in hand. She saw us and grinned. "Good thinking, big bro," she said to Kyle.

@Paizo: "Faithful Servants - Chapter One: Down at the Clever Endeavor" by James L. Sutter.

"The Clever Endeavor wasn't the best bar on Axis. Nor was it the cleanest, or the cheapest—and definitely not the friendliest. It was a bar you went to when you didn't want to be seen."

@Ray Gun Revival: "The Worker Prince – Chapter One (part one)" by Bryan Thomas Schmidt.

"Sweet, fruity perfumes contrasted with stale sweat from gyrating bodies and afflicted Davi’s nose. “I told you we looked good in our uniforms,” he joked as his eyes turned back to his friends. After twenty-one years, he’d never gotten used to it."

@World SF Blog: "The City of Silence - (Part One)" by Ma Boyong, translated by Ken Liu.
The State needed no name because, other than it, there were no states. It was just like the Department of Propaganda kept on emphasizing: there are no other states besides the State, and It is who It is, It has always been and always will be.

Audio Fiction
@Lightspeed: "Snow" by John Crowley, read by Stefan Rudnicki.

Cathching Up

2011-11-27T11:19:00.023-06:00

More tomorrow (Wednesday)

@AEG: "Steel on Steel" by Shawn Carman.

"Some found it unusual for the master of a great family such as the Yasuki to maintain a private residence outside of the family’s ancestral estate, but by this point in his career, Yasuki Jinn-Kuen had proven both successful enough and eccentric enough that no one bothered to question some of his odder habits any longer."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Meet Archive" by Mary E. Lowd.

"Archive was telling stories at the corner table when Cobalt Starstrong came in. Cobalt looked at the rapt audience, mostly Heffen refugees, and thought about joining them. Archive was a wonderful storyteller, but Cobalt had heard him before. So, he took a seat at the bar"

@Daily Science Fiction: "Everyone Gets Scared Sometimes" by Ari B Goelman.

"She wonders sometimes if it really happened. The zombies and her daddy and his axe. If it happened, it seems to her, the city would be different. There would be fewer cars on the streets. The traffic lights wouldn't work. Her favorite bakery wouldn't be there, not if all that stuff had happened."

@Kasma: "Life Plus Seventy" by Ken Liu.

"She was still in her stage outfit, a tight, bright red leather hobble dress with rings of meter-long spikes around the collar and waist that looked frightening and couldn't have been comfortable to wear. I doubt she could have sat down even if she wanted to..."

@Mindflights: "Pocket Gods" by Philip Hoshiwara.

"They called them pocket gods. Nobody knew what to make of the little wooden figures that began appearing all over the world, buried just below the earth's surface."

@Ray Gun Revival: "Thousand War Soldier" by Mjke Wood.

"My first life: 7.24 seconds. I became aware. I looked. I experienced pain. I died."

Serial Fiction
@Paizo: "Blood and Money - Chapter Four: Death in the Family" by Steven Savile

"Blind optimism wasn’t a particularly useful trait for an assassin. Isra was neither blind nor optimistic. He knew full well that Faris could not be trusted, no matter how generous an offer his own skin was."

Audio
@Escape Pod: "Thanksgiving Day" by Jay Werkheiser, read by Paul Haring.

He bent down to look into the nearest cage. “Maybe you’ll tell us why the food here is poisonous,” he said to one of the rats inside. It rolled its dull eyes listlessly toward him. Rust-brown clumps matted its fur, and the metallic odor of dried blood hung in the air.

@PodCastle: "This Strange Way of Dying" by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, read by Marguerite Croft.

Georgina met Death when she was ten. The first time she saw him she was reading by her grandmother’s bedside. As Georgina tried to pronounce a difficult word, she heard her grandmother groan and looked up. There was a bearded man in a top hat standing by the bed. He wore an orange flower in his buttonhole, the kind Georgina put on the altars on the Day of the Dead.

@Pseudopod: "The Poor Girl Taken By Surprise" by Gemma Files, read by Julia Rios,

“‘Yet here we sit snug and warm and dry nonetheless, traders and settlers and immigrants bound for even more distant places alike, before this open, welcoming fire; here we may eat and drink our fill and go ‘round the circle in turn, each of we travellers swapping a story for our place beneath this roof ‘till morning. And I will be more than glad to add my own contribution to that roster, if only it should please you to bend your ear and listen.”

Serial Audio
@Cthulhu: "The Damned - part 7"

Wednesday

2011-11-23T08:19:00.014-06:00

A few pre-holiday freebies

@Daily Science Fiction: "Silver Sixpence" by Craig Pay.

Joseph was wearing baggy white overalls complete with a facemask he was now pulling back up into place. Celeste sat in her suit with technicians fussing all around her: checking seals, running calibration checks. The partners were allowed this last visit to the ready room--those that had completed their six-week course of inoculations and then submitted to an uncomfortably thorough medical examination.

@Fantasy Magazine: "Red Dawn: A Chow Mein Western" by Lavie Tidhar.

"The boy felt a tingling at the tip of his fingers. He saw with his inner eye: The leader rode unarmed because his power was great. The aura of Qi around him was unmistakable."

@Lightspeed: "Snow" by John Crowley.

"Georgie got rid of most of what she’d inherited from him, liquidated it. It was cash that she had liked best about that marriage anyway; but the Wasp couldn’t really be got rid of. Georgie ignored it."

@Ray Gun Revival: "Sheep Lie!" by Barton Paul Levenson.

“The project started out with a good vision,” Cindy Lou said. “I love the animals, especially Ellen. But they’re killing them. They’re committing murder, even if it is legal under Wesley-Mitchell.”

@Strange Horizons: "Tomorrow is Waiting" by Holli Mintzer

"She also found herself liking Kermit a lot more than she'd expected to. Anji had never really watched the Muppets before; her parents, like most parents she knew, had treated TV as only slightly less corrupting an influence than refined sugar and gendered toys. But the Muppet Show was really funny -- strange, and kind of hokey, but charming all the same. She ended up watching way more of it than she needed just for the project."

Audio Fiction
@Fantasy Magazine: "Red Dawn: A Chow Mein Western" by Lavie Tidhar, by Lauri MacMillan.

@Lightspeed: "Snow" by John Crowley, by Stefan Rudnick.

@Beam Me Up: "Clock Work" by Erin Bassett (Urban Fantasy) and "The Boy Who Could Bend and Fall" by Ken Scholes "a strange tale of ultimate escapism"

@PodCastle: "Black Swan, White Swan" by Eugie Foster, read by Abra Staffin-Wiebe.

“There’s a man across the way.” The swan fixes Delia with polished onyx eyes. “Sometimes he’s a lighthouse and sometimes he’s a train, but silence doesn’t scare him.”

Five For Friday

2011-11-18T08:57:00.006-06:00

More free fiction.

@AEG: "Worthy" by Robert Denton.

"In the Rokugan of Emperor Edition, the new Ruby Champion has a chance encounter with a man who may end a grave threat to the Empire, or who may simply be another body in the path of a nightmare."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Fields of Ice" by Jay Caselberg.

"Marsius pulled his coat tight against the wind. The snow blew in flurries swirling about his face and his fur boots sank deep. The sharp, dirt-ice smell crept under his hood, edged and filthy like the season. He looked up at the sheer stone Academy walls, their tops lost in darkness."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck (Mountain)–Entry #26" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"“The smallest variation, the tiniest echo of a change would mean everything,” Gabriel said to me about the new alt-Earth he had tasked me with placing under surveillance. This place where the people of the Far North had finally come down to drive out the European invaders. "

Audio
@Escape Pod: "Driving X" by Gwendolyn Clare, read by Mur Lafferty.

"The dune buggy itself wasn’t that valuable, but the newer-model solar panels powering it would be enough to tempt any sane person, and the carboys of potable water were worth a small fortune out here."

@Pseudopod: "Repair" by Jonathan Lowe, read by John Meagher.

"The shelves inside were lined with skulls. Canine and feline. Beneath a row of glasses were several stacks of torn magazines. Glossy photos of nude women. He kneeled almost involuntarily, reaching for a small skull among others. Practically indistinguishable, except by shape."

Thursday Free Fiction

2011-11-17T07:10:00.017-06:00

Another collection of great free fiction.

@Baen: "Murder at Ford’s Theater" by Bob Conroy.

"What if Booth’s murder of Abraham Lincoln had taken a much different course–and produced a surprisingly changed America as a result? Alternate history master and the author of upcoming Himmler’s War Robert Conroy posits a fascinating new and terrible destiny for a nation split asunder."

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The Red Cord" by Wren Wallis.

"Ordinary catastrophe. Is there such a creature? All catastrophe feels extraordinary to the one caught in its tide. It is no comfort to the ones whose fortunes I read, to say to them, This thing is ordinary, this thing that will happen to you."

@Tor.com: "Ghost Hedgehog" by Nina Kiriki Hoffman.

"Three shades lingered in our classroom, but they were really old and faded and easy to ignore. Better than my kindergarten classroom had been, where a kid had died from a fall the year before."

Serial Fiction
@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "Hence the King from Kagehana, Pt. II" by Michael Anthony Ashley.

"They all had to die. That was the right thing, Saga knew for certain, so he buried his fingers into the mound and found the fuse. He yanked it free, unraveling hand over hand, clearing it of fetid earth and inspecting it for rot and wear as he went. When he held a full thirty sticks’ worth, he laid straight the line and prepared the flint and replotted his escape route, upwind so the little things couldn’t smell him when they came."

@Paizo: "Blood and Money - Chapter Four: Death in the Family" by Steven Savile.

"Blind optimism wasn’t a particularly useful trait for an assassin. Isra was neither blind nor optimistic. He knew full well that Faris could not be trusted, no matter how generous an offer his own skin was."

Audio Fiction
@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "To the Gods of Time and Engines, a Gift" by Dean Wells.

"The silent commands were with her all the time now, haunting and familiar."

@Dunesteef: "Beachcombing" by Ray Cluley.

"When Tommy touches an object, he gets an impression from whoever has touched it before. He wanders the beach each day, combing it for discarded items that may in fact be lost treasures."

@19 Nocturne Boulevard: "Loup Noir" by Julie Hoverson, performed by full cast.

"When a drifter wanders into a small town - things may get a little... hairy."

@StarShipSofa: "Softlight Sins" by Peter F. Hamilton.

"Ghosts drifted through Douglas McEwan's mind as he drove down the long road towards the execution. There were four spectres, the family of Adrian Reynolds, his mother, his abominable father, and his two lovely young sisters. The forensic team's in situ video had shown them in their beds, captured in a frozen pose that feigned sleep: eyes closed, lips relaxed, fingers splayed like albino starfish. In each case their throats had been slit open, black yawning gashes that had sprayed thick jets of blood across the sheets."

Tuesday Free Fiction

2011-11-15T07:14:00.021-06:00

More good free fiction and audio fiction - all credit, as always, to the great sites linked.

Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Charming Way" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

"Mellie has a secret: she blames fairy tales for ruining her life. She believes she can stop fairy tales from ruining other people’s lives by forcing booksellers to stop selling fairy tales. But on the way to her protest at a book fair, she runs into a handsome man. A very handsome man who isn’t just her prince charming—he’s the prince charming. And he loves books. Even fairy tales."

@Daily Science Fiction: "A Great Destiny" by Eric James Stone.

"The village streets were uncrowded. The Emperor Dal's slavers had come through five months ago, choosing a third of the able-bodied men by lottery to work on building the new capital city. Most of the men's families had followed."

@Electric Velocipede: "Fastening" by Patricia Russo

That time R&R had thrown the tea cups from the fourth-floor window of Rae’s room and busted two of them, they’d filched the bottle of Maker’s Mark right out of Melvina’s nightie drawer. They were decently ashamed afterwards, but Melvina still gave them both the silent treatment for a week.

@Fantasy Magazine: "Christopher Raven" by Theodora Goss.

"Why had I come back to Collingswood? That was what I asked myself, standing on the path that led to the main school building, a structure built of gray stone and shadowed by oaks that had stood for a hundred years."

@Lightspeed: "Houses" by Mark Pantoja.

“I was on Stand-By Mode,” I said, speaking through my house android, a gray unisex full-maintenance model. I tossed up an image of the bear on the wallscreen: A hulking shadow in the predawn dark. “I didn’t know what it was.”

@Philippine Genre Stories: "Makisig’s Heart" by Kate Osias.

"Listen, daughter. This story begins before the beginning, because that is the way of our people."

@Ray Gun Revival: "The Veterans’ Club" by Robin Bailes.

"If you’re ever on Mars and in the capital, and perhaps find yourself on Jutland Street where it joins Tranquillity, then look to your left (standing facing the War Memorial) and you will see a side street, half hidden by the statue of General Goshe."

@Strange Horizons: "Eight" by Corinne Duyvis.

"If everything went well, I'm back in safe, familiar 2020, and across from me in this slowly forming room, in the center of all these people awaiting my arrival, is twenty-one-years-young me."

@Wily Writers: "The Bobble Head of Doom" by Robert C. Eccles.

“Nice night for a murder, wouldn’t you agree, Mr. President?” Nick Singletary watched the people walk past on the sidewalk outside his ground floor apartment.

@World SF Blog: "Dancing Together Under Polarized Skies" by Milena Benini.

"In the time before time, when everyone was anyone, a grazwiq sat on the seashore and enjoyed the sun. It was the time before time, so the grazwiq who was anyone and everyone did not know that shu did this every day. Shu knew only the light, and the heat, and the calm, salty smell of the sea. Shu was not-hungry and not-sleepy, and that meant not-bad. It was the time before time, and the grazwiq had very few words."

Serial Fiction
"Into The Woods - Part Eight" by Abner Senires.

"The mine entrance sat in the hillside some fifty meters from the rear of the house, set back into the hill and framed by a supporting arch of thick wooden beams."

Audio
@LibriVox: "The Book of Ghosts" by Sabine Baring-Gould, read by many readers.

"includes stories that are run-of-the-mill, horrifying, bizarre, humorous, and moralistic. As an example of the variety: "The White Flag" shows the need and power of forgiveness, even when it seems impossible, but many of the stories, such as "Mustapha," feature a ghost out for revenge." - Amazon.com

@PodCastle: "The God-Death of Halla" by Tina Connolly, read by Jen Rhodes

"Halla got halfway out the window, stolen brooch in hand, and then the dizzies hit. She swore as the world rocked around her. She kicked off the sandstone wall by instinct and thumped to the ground. The gold plate stuffed down her shift knocked her ribs and all her breath whooshed out. She gasped like a fish in the humid air."

@Wily Writers: "The Bobble Head of Doom" by Robert C. Eccles.

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The All-Pro - Episode #3" by Scott Sigler.

"Quentin goes head-to-head with Hokor the Hookchest as the team decides on new rookies. Is Quentin ready to play the manipulation game with Quyth Leaders? Also, Quentin gets a full tour of the Touchback, and meets the overly friendly Captain Kate Cheevers"

@Beam Me Up: "On The Mend" by Jason Kahn "once again takes us to New Arden and our favorite physic detective Jack Garrett." and "This Must Be the Place - part 2" by Elliot Bangs. Andria uncovers what has got to be one of the strangest retirement plans ever!

@Beware the Hairy Mango: "The Careerist’s Guide to the Sea - Part 2" by Matthew Sanborn Smith.

@Lightningbolt Theater: "One Drop of Blood - Episode II" by Tanja Milojevic and Amanda Furr.

Angela’s business is slaying those who have the thirst. When she gets a call about another body discovered, things turn sour. But someone from her past is pursuing Angela, someone she has sworn to destroy at their next meeting.

@19 Nocturne Boulevard: "The Dunwich Horror - Part 4" by H.P. Lovecraft, adapted by Julie Hoverson, performed by full cast.

The final showdown with the unseen monster - with the fate of the world at stake!

Veterans Day Free Fiction

2011-11-11T07:17:00.007-06:00

Just a few great freebies this morning.

Fiction
@Daily Science Fiction: "And The" by Alyc Helms.

"When the Bargain was first made--so the stories went--the leaves on the trees had just turned. The world was dressed in rubies and gold, and autumn rains darkened wood to ebony. But each Bargain lasted a year and a day. As the seasons cycled, the day of sacrifice crept through the winter."

Audio Fiction
@Drabblecast: "Rules for Living in a Simulation" by Aubrey Hirsch.

" The feature by Aubrey Hirsch provides, as described in the title, a didactic set of rules for living in a simulation (a universe constructed especially for us)."

@Escape Pod: "The Prize Beyond Gold" by Ian Creasey, read by Josh Roseman.

"Three days before the race, when Delroy had finished warming down from a
training run, his coach summoned him for a talk. Delroy could tell it was
something big. Michito’s job — assisted by his Enhanced empathy — was to
become exquisitely sensitive to his athlete’s mood, so as to help get the
best out of him."

@Pseudopod: "Flash on The Borderlands IX - It’s War!"

"Three VETERAN’S DAY flash fictions about war - ancient, recent and omnipresent"

Free Fiction 11/10/11

2011-11-10T07:31:00.006-06:00

Some cool freebies for today. Illustration from StarShipSofa.

Fiction
@Cosmos: "Genocide Blonde" by Dirk Flinthart

The end of the world wasn't zombies. Actually, she was a blonde.

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck–Entry #25 (Mountain) and Entry #19 (Avatar)" by Jeff VandenMeer.

"have not felt like writing, even here, at the core of me, for several days. There is something about familiar routine that is comforting, and in absorbing my loss of Marty and what Gabriel has told me of how I was raised to be more human than mountain"

@Paizo: "Blood and Money -Chapter Three: Fortune Favors the Dead" by Steven Savile.

For Isra to claim that he was a master of disguise was akin to saying cash was king down in the Nightstalls, capable of buying everything from rare strains of poison to souls, either figuratively or literally depending on which gossip you listened to. It was well known that commerce was the only god worth praying to. That was the essence of the Golden City.

Audio Fiction
@LibriVox: Short Science Fiction Collection 044

01 Earthmen Bearing Gifts by Fredrick Brown, read by Patrick Reinhart
02 It's A Small Solar System by Allan Howard. read by Patrick Reinhart
03 There Will Be School Tomorrow by V. E. Theissen, read by Philip Martin
04 The Chamber of Life by G. Peyton Wertenbaker, read by Corinna Schultz
05 No Pets Allowed by M.A. Cummings, read by kellyTH
06 The Altar at Midnight by C.M. Kornbluth, read by Marc Kockinos
07 Crossroads of Destiny by H. Beam Piper, read by litarvan
08 The Gun by Philip K. Dick, read by zacklur
09 The Ultimate Experiment by Thornton DeKy,read by Steve Belleguelle
10 Lonesome Hearts by Russell Robert Winterbotham, read by Amy Gramour
11 Dead Man's Planet by William Morrison, read by Mark Nelson
12 Spacemen Never Die! by Morris Hershman, read by dmaloney
13 Suzy by Watson Parker, read by Roger Melin
14 The Seed of the Toc-Toc Birds, Part 1 by Francis Flagg, read by Adam Whybray
15 The Seed of the Toc-Toc Birds, Part 2 by Francis Flagg, read by Adam Whybray
16 Indirection by Everett B Cole, read by Kevin Green
17 Security Risk by Ed M. Clinton, Jr, read by Lars Rolander
18 Beyond Lies the Wub by Philip K. Dick, read by Megan Goode
19 The Diamond Lens by Fitz-James O'Brien, read by Corinna Schultz
20 The Untouchable by Stephen A. Kallis Jr., read by Lars Rolander

@StarShipSofa: "In the Harsh Glow of its Incandescent Beauty" by Mercurio D. Rivera, read by J.J. Campanella.

"The solar system has been made inhabitable to huamns, thanks to the technology of the alien Wergens — and all they asked for in return was our time and cooperation, because the Wergens are simply infatuated with us. Covert experiments with Wergen DNA by Maxwell and Rossi produced a drug — a love potion in all but name — which was stolen by Rossi, who used it on Max’s wife, Miranda, before fleeing with her to a colony on Triton. And Now Max has travelled there to find his love and bring her home."- Interzone.

Tuesday Free Fiction - 免費小說星期二

2011-11-08T07:23:00.022-06:00

@AE: "The Gan Wait" by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.

"Kavita Raj lies on the floor of the infirmary. The manual says we should keep injured workers there. But Kavita is not injured. She’s been dead for a whole day and none of us know what to do except wait."

@AnotheRealm: "Trophy Wife" by Gary K. Shepherd.

"Hello. Welcome to my android-friendly home. This is my lovely wife Andrea and our two kids Microwave and Blender."

@Author's Site: "Judgment" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch.

"Tyrone has come home, if home still exists. Once upon a time, he was part of the People, the faerie people that hide in plain sight throughout Europe. He grew up in Nuremberg, only to leave centuries ago to live with the humans."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Dark Swans" by Terra LeMay.

"It's late when they finally take Josefa out for Halloween--nearly two a.m.--and the houses in their small, suburban neighborhood have all already put out their porch lights. They bundle Josefa into the car (buckled in tight, for safety) and drive her into the city, to an upscale, gated community full of multimillion-dollar homes."

@Electric Velocipede: "Dancing in the Winter Rooms" by David Tallerman.

“This is the Ship, yes? Inside is us. Outside is Space.” I give the ball a push, watch it skim through the puddle of oil and come to rest. “The Ship moves through Space, and we move in it.”

@Fantasy Magazine: "Seven Spells to Sever the Heart" by K.M. Ferebee.

"Samuel Crewe was the son of a witch. He was, in fact, the seventh son of a witch, who had herself been one of seven daughters. In fairy tales, this sort of lineage was meant to point to great strength, good fortune, and adventures."

@Lightspeed: "The Kingdom of the Blind" by Maureen F. McHugh.

"The system had been screwy for months. Sydney thought someone had probably been messing with it, introducing bugs or maybe even writing some sort of virus. BHP DMS was an elaborate system."

@Ray Gun Revival: "Bleed" by Steven H. Newton.

"'How often is she manifesting?' asked John Clark Sheridan, stripping off his clothes. He was small and wiry, very dark-skinned, and had been a DogFence Enforcer for two years. Naked, he dropped into his custom-made cradle, seating sockets on the back of his neck and at the base of his spine before allowing the catheter to penetrate his body."

@Strange Horizons: "Counting Cracks" by George R. Galuschak.

"Four of us, jammed into my sister's Ford Festiva, going to kill the monster."

Serial Fiction
@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Seven" by Abner Senires

We were about half a klick along when a leanly-built black man with short, cropped hair wearing rumpled green fatigues and a gear belt with a holstered pistol stepped out from the treeline five meters away on our right, planted himself in the middle of the road, and said, "Stop right there and put down your weapons."

Audio
@Beam Me Up: "Authorised Domain" by Cory Doctorow and "This must be the Place - Part 1" by Elliot Bangs.

"Authorised Domain which Cory takes us into the near future where the digital certificate is not something to fool with!" . . . "his must be the Place by new author Elliot Bangs. In part one of this masterful tale we are introduced to Lauren Wells and the main character Andria who through a year develop a something akin to a relationship but so strange that even Andria has to question he sanity"

@Fantasy Magazine: "Seven Spells to Sever the Heart" by K.M. Ferebee, read by MacLeod Andrews.

@LibriVox: "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde" by Robert Louis Stevenson, read by Bob Neufeld.

"first published in 1886. It is about a London lawyer named Gabriel John Utterson who investigates strange occurrences between his old friend, Dr Henry Jekyll and the misanthropic Edward Hyde."

@ PodCastle: "起狮，行礼 (Rising Lion — The Lion Bows)" by Zen Cho, read by Tracey Yuen.

"Originally appeared in Strange Horizons. Coco had been with the troupe for six years. She had never been their official president because she preferred not to deal with technicalities; it gave her more time to actually lead the troupe."

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The All-Pro - Episode 2" by Scott Sigler.

"Quentin meets with his privite investigator Fred (a.k.a., Frederico Esteban Guiseppe Gonzaga). Will Fred have info on Quentin's family? At the Tier Three tournament, John Tweedy, Coach Hokor and Quentin scout for new players."

@Cthulhu: "The Damned - part 6"

Friday Freebies

2011-11-04T07:38:00.017-05:00

Happy Friday

@AEG: "Burdens" by Shawn Carman.

"Utaku Tsukiko laughed as she rode across the golden plain. She knew that she should not, for this was not a place of joy or abandon, but she could not help herself. This was a place of sorrow, but even in sorrow she found joy. It was everywhere, it was in all things, suffused there with the radiant light of the sun. Most could not see it, she had learned in her short life, and for them she felt genuine pity. But such moments as these were not for pity"

@Aurora Wolf: "The Globe" by Sandi Reed-Chan.

"The scene was idyllic, a world blanketed in white with dozens of children busy sledding down every available hill. Marcus Morgan was mesmerized; the scene was almost identical to that of the snow globe, which his grandfather had given him when he was nine."

@Aurora Wolf: "The Bodyguard" by Noeleen Kavanagh.

"Seog is with me. From waking to sleeping, she is there. She sleeps in my room, but she is not my maid. She is my bodyguard. Her real name is Fuinnseog Ni Tire. She is an Ardlander, born and bred, and their names are always long and strange."

@Daily Science Fiction: "I Kill Monsters" by Nathaniel Matthews Lee.

"Robbie killed monsters. He used a baseball bat, because they didn't give better weapons to ten-year-olds. It worked well enough. He'd cleaned out his room first, the slithering whispering things under the bed and the Chatterer in the closet."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "Delude (Finale)" by Brian Keene.

"Something brushed against Sarah’s leg. She opened her mouth to scream, forgetting that she was below the surface. Cold, black water rushed down her throat. Gagging, Sarah reflexively tried to breathe, and more water flooded into her. She glanced around, frantic, but couldn’t see anything. She might as well have been swimming in ink."

Audio
@Drabblecast: "Year of the Rabbit" by An Owomoyel0a, read by Norm Sherman and Kimi Alexander.

"It used to be that the sun would go down and the streetlamps would come on and make pools of this wet, yellow light. No matter where you stood, you could see the lights on somewhere. You could run from streetlamp to streetlamp and you could look down the streets and you’d never drown in the dark…"

@Escape Pod: "Boxed In" by Marc-Anthony Taylorm, read by Barry Haworth.

"This one isn’t for the kids, because of references to sex workers and acts."

@Journey Into: "Hop Frog" by Edgar Allen Poe, performed by John Robinson, Big Anklevich, and Marshal Latham.

"Hop Frog is often the butt of the King's jokes and cruelty, along with the Royal Council, but Hop Frog still agrees to help them with a masterful ruse at the masquerade."

@Pseudopod: "The Blood Garden" by Jesse Livingston, read by Chris Reynaga.

She was alone when she died. / Could I revive within me / Her symphony and song, / To such a deep delight ‘twould win me / That with music loud and long

@Spider on the Web: "Chronic Offender" by Spider Robinson.

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The All-Pro - Episode 1" by Scott Sigler.

"Quentin Barnes & the boys (and girls) are back in the spotlight. [. . .] here we go with Book III in the Galactic Football League series"

@Cast of Wonders: "Saved - Part 1" by Arin Greenwood. YA.

Thor's Day Freebies

2011-11-03T06:59:00.018-05:00

More great freeness! Illustration from "Hello, Moto" by Nnedi Okorafor.

@Tor.com: "Hello, Moto" by Nnedi Okorafor.

"This is a tale you will only hear once. Then it will be gone in a flash of green light. Maybe all will be well after that. Maybe the story has a happy ending. Maybe there is nothing but darkness when the story ends."

Now Posted: Beneath Ceaseless Skies - Issue #81
"Hence the King from Kagehana, Pt. I" by Michael Anthony Ashley.

"He shrugged into the straps of his cricket box and tested the mask of noise over the shuffle of his footsteps. The jostle irritated a chorus of angry chirping from the little territorial males. They didn’t like being forced together. Saga for his part offered them the only advice he knew: “Time is the mother of chance.” It was the Twelfth Knot and the favorite saying of Kagehana’s escape master. Employ enough patience and even the strongest prisons will show you a way out."

"Read This Quickly, For You Will Only Have a Moment..." by Stephen Case.

"The one who brings your food is named Osla. My birds are trained well, and this one will have struck at his eyes. Take this parchment quickly, speak his name, and he will fall like the rain outside your window. You must move quickly, for the first guard will be at the door."

Now Posted: Clarkesworld - Issue #62
"A Militant Peace" by David Klecha and Tobias S. Buckell.

"For Nong Mai Thuy, a Vietnamese Sergeant in the Marine Police, the invasion of North Korea starts with the parachute-snapping violence of a High Altitude, Low Opening jump deep in the middle of the inky black North Korean airspace at night. Here the air is the stillest, bleakest black. The bleakness of a world where electricity trickles only to the few in Pyongyang."

"The Smell of Orange Groves" by Lavie Tidhar.

"On the roof the solar panels were folded in on themselves, still asleep, yet uneasily stirring, as though they could sense the imminent coming of the sun. Boris stood on the edge of the roof. The roof was flat and the building's residents, his father's neighbors, had, over the years, planted and expanded an assortment of plants, in pots of clay and aluminum and wood, across the roof, turning it into a high-rise tropical garden."

"Silently and Very Fast (Part Two)" by Catherynne M. Valente.

"Humanity lived many years and ruled the earth, sometimes wisely, sometimes well, but mostly neither. After all this time on the throne, humanity longed for a child. All day long humanity imagined how wonderful its child would be, how loving and kind, how like and unlike humanity itself, how brilliant and beautiful"

Serial Fiction
@Paizo: "Blood and Money - Chapter Two: The Masquerade" by Steven Savile.

"The fact that someone wanted him dead was a bitter pill for Isra to swallow, but not a particularly surprising one. Act like an idiot long enough, splashing the cash and taking it as gospel that every woman in the city had been put there for your pleasure, and you were going to incur a certain amount of jealousy. That was just part of the image he had cultivated to hide the Nightwalker from prying eyes."

Audio
@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The Judge's Right Hand" by J.S. Bangs.

"The brand Adultery will scar her pretty cheeks, and our son will wear the Bastard brand his whole life. But those aren't the brands I'm worried about."

@Clarkesworld: "A Militant Peace" by David Klecha and Tobias S. Buckell, read by Mike Allen.

@StarShipSofa: "To Seek Her Fortune" by Nicole Kornher-Stace, read by Amy H. Sturgis.

"a Lady Explorer on a flying sentient ship, obsessed with visiting psychics and mystics to find an answer to a critical question." - Amazon.com

Tuesday Free Fiction

2011-11-01T06:59:00.047-05:00

More goodies.

@Daily Science Fiction: "Like Origami in Water" by Damien Walters Grintalis.

Johnny is angry again. I hate this part, but I won't try to stop him. I would feel the same way, too. "It's not fair," he yells, spit flying out of the corners of his mouth. "And it's not right. Why can't they figure out what this is? Why can't they fix it?"

@Fantasy Magazine: "The Invisibles" by Charles de Lint.

"Here’s what you do, Jerry says. You get one of those little pipe tobacco tins and you put stuff in it. Important stuff. A fingernail. Some hair. A scab. Some dirt from a special place."

@GigaNotoSaurus: "Sauerkraut Station" by Ferrett Steinmetz.

“The sauerkraut is what makes us special,” Lizzie explained as she opened up the plastic door to show Themba the hydroponic units. She scooped a pale green head of cabbage from the moist sand and placed it gently into Themba’s cupped hands.

@Lightspeed: "How Maartje and Uppinder Terraformed Mars (Marsmen Trad.)" by Lisa Nohealani Morton.

"As her breath hissed out it thickened and spread and wrapped around the planet. Before long it was pushing everything down; my mother’s breath became the atmosphere of Mars."

@Ray Gun Revival: "Catastrophe Baker and the Fall of the House of Usher" by Mike Resnick.

"Every now and then I hear some highbrow talking about the fall of the House of Usher as if it was some fiction story. Well, take it from me, Catastrophe Baker, it’s all perfectly true. I ought to know, because I was there when it fell"

@Strange Horizons: "Particle Theory" by Edward Bryant.

"If you're right," she said, "it could be the most fantastic event a scientist could observe and record." Her eyes refocused and met mine. "Or it might be the most frightening; a final horror."

@Wily Writers: "I’m My Own Kryptonite" by Donald Jacob Uitvlugt.

"Kenley Williams’s alter ego is killing him. Literally. Is a painful life in the hospital worth everything he goes through as a superhero? Does he have to sacrifice love along with everything else? Excerpt: His eyes close. He can sense them, their lives a shout in the Flow of all things. Fear, anger, greed."

Now Posted: Abyss & Apex - Issue 40: 4th Quarter 2011
"The Old Factory Award" by Grey Freeman.

"The Old Factory stands forgotten upon a small and narrow road folded between a street filled with shops, cafes and bakeries and another beaded with pubs, clubs and wine bars."

"Keeping Tabs" by Kenneth Schneyer.

"I was so excited when I could finally buy a Tab. They cost so much, you know, but I saved up for maybe six months. I waitressed at Antonio’s in the North End, and let me tell you, it’s murder on the feet. Those trays are heavy, too, and Nico screams at everybody the whole shift, not to mention the way you smell after six hours. But the customers tip really well, and I was able to save up enough money, even after paying rent and stuff."

"Silvergrass Mirror" by Amanda M. Hayes.

"Dozens of stalks of stonespear thrust up through the swamp waters, some of them as big around as Eisle’s fist; she hadn’t seen such a patch in years. She had a hatchet. She had a water-bag to keep the pith moist. She loved the harvest of a rare component as much as its discovery, and the money as much as either."

"Random Fire" by Van Aaron Hughes.

"I never kept a journal. I made day-to-day notes on my research, but a file for personal thoughts always struck me as vanity. Today, however, a little vanity is appropriate. Someday, people will wonder what went through my head at this moment."

"Hungry" by Ryan J. Southworth

"The royal carriage clattered and shook. It seemed to bounce from one rock to the next, intent on ignoring the road in favor of its largest obstacles, and with every jolt the old woman’s bones rattled in time to the creaking wood and glass. She found herself wondering –several times–whether the driver was going blind. Or whether perhaps he was taking vengeance for some accidental wrong she’d done him."

Now Posted: Crossed Genres - Issue 35 – Dark Comedy
"Jezebel's Blouse" by Timothy T. Murphy.

"Sixteen hundred and thirty-two years ago, the assembled gods of the world abandoned humanity, leaving us to our self-determined fates, the bastards. I can’t say as I blame them, really."

"Jason's Shoes" by Richard Bist.

"At first it was kinda funny, ya’ know? He’d come in and pull his shoes off and after a few minutes this smell would just overwhelm you."

"The Execution of Zacharius Grubb" by Bethan Claire Price.

"As it turned out, being hanged was only the second most unpleasant thing to happen to me on the worst day of my arduous existence."

"Chasing Persephone" by Natalie Stachowski.

She threw a horseshoe. The latest projectile almost sent him backwards over the railing as he evaded it. His eyes flashed a bright yellow color as he regained his footing. “Give it up! Just invite me in already!”

"Worse Than a Devil" ..by Sarina Dorie

"When my best friend, Mandy, offered to set me up with a hot, handsome man, I had no idea he would also have horns and hooves."

Now Posted: Expanded Horizons - Issue 31 (Sep 2011)
"Kuda Kepang" by Fadzlishah Johanabas.

"Malik watched his bride as she cheered at the Kuda Kepang troupe performing in honor of their wedding. Nine men astride legless horse puppets woven from nipah palm leaves danced in choreographed silat martial art movements, with his brother Hassan leading them on a black-painted stallion. A middle-aged man, the Kuda Kepang master, stood beside four seated men playing gongs and percussions and snapped his leather whip."

"Blue Dahlia" by Larisa Walk.

"After six years of therapy, Melissa’s voice still calls me from the lake. My shrink’s three hundred and twelve cream-colored business cards sit on my desk. One card for each appointment that failed to stop me from hearing my lover’s whispers in the patter of rain on dead leaves, in the footsteps on a flagstone path, in terror-soaked dreams. I can’t tell what she is saying, but I know the voice is hers."

"Unfit to Eat" by Tyus Barnwell.

"When I was still a juvenile an old man made the long climb from the village to our mountainside home. A boy walked at his side to aid him. I remember studying the elder carefully as he stood in the arched entry to our cavern casting a stocky shadow. From what I could see past my mother’s broad body, the man looked filthy and tired, leaning on the boy and his walking stick as though he had a boulder strapped to his back."

Now Posted: Redstone Science Fiction #18 - November 2011
"Passive Resistance" by David Tallerman.

"Alec turned just in time to see Ennis begin to fall, to feel wetness spray across his face. Ennis, his bodyguard, his friend, wavered for an instant – then collapsed backward, emptying a flower of red over the steps behind him."

"On the Sabbath Day Be Ye Cleansed" by Amanda C. Davis.

"We knelt, arching our faces to the temple like flowers strain toward the sun. We remembered the week, the loves gained and friends won. Those lost. Our conflicts. Our sins. We remembered."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck’s Avatar–Entry #18" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"You can lose yourself in certain types of spaces, at a certain time. I discover this every day as I pass further into the East. In becoming a shadow, in needing to hide, to avoid, to make myself invisible, I have begun to experience the strange sensation of no longer existing, of floating, even though most days I am an enormous komodo dragon."

@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Six" by Abner Senires.

"Outside, standing two meters away, the aerodyne looked even worse than before. The RPG had taken out the rear left thrusterpod and part of the rear fuselage. Burned and twisted metal still smoked and what paint scheme there was on the main body had been scraped off, as if by some monster talons, exposing bare metal beneath."

Audio
@Dunesteef: "Silk For Moisture, Mud For Shine" by Amanda C. Davis.

"A Silkie Wrap. All the beautiful people are getting them. After you’ve had yours, you’ll feel like a butterfly emerging from its cocoon. Hopefully, you can afford the price."

@Fantasy Magazine: "The Invisibles" by Charles de Lint, read by by Stefan Rudnicki.

@Librivox: "The World Set Free" by H. G. Wells, read by Jules Hawryluk and William Tomcho.

Radioactive decay is a major theme in the novel The World Set Free, published in 1914. Wells explores what might happen if the rate of decay could be sped up. The book may have encouraged scientists to explore theories of nuclear chain reaction.

@Lightspeed: "How Maartje and Uppinder Terraformed Mars (Marsmen Trad.)" by Lisa Nohealani Morton, read by Claire Bloom.

@PodCastle: "Still Small Voice" by Ben Burgis, read by David Rees-Thomas.

A few patrons looked up at the sound of the door opening and closing, then turned back to their business when they saw no one there. Under his cloak, Jack luxuriated in the artificial cool of the café.

@Wily Writers: "I’m My Own Kryptonite" by Donald Jacob Uitvlugt.

Serial Audio
@Beam Me Up: "The Things - Part 2" by Peter Watts.

"the creature comes to realize the horror of just the type of beings he is dealing with. Horrifying creations that violently react when faced with anything that changes. Creatures that never change, born and die with the same shape and can not imagine anything different."

@Beware the Hairy Mango: "The Careerist’s Guide to the Sea, Part 1" by Matthew Sanborn Smith.

Friday Freebies

2011-10-28T08:47:00.016-05:00

More cool freebies from great sites.

@AE: "Dinner Guests" by Ivan Dorin.

"Six thousand feet above sea level in Banff National Park two wardens paused at the side of a backcountry trail. Their exhalations steamed in the January air as they stared at a tree ornamented by a two-pound Atlantic lobster in a resealable plastic bag."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Sea Charm" by Ann Chatham.

"It's not my rule," said the sorceress, crossly. "It's a rule of magic, child. If you want a thing, you must be prepared to offer something you value as much in exchange. If you take my advice, you'll forget about this nonsense and speak to the young man on your own." She leaned on her hoe and watched the girl over her garden fence.

@Tor.com: "Apologue" by James Morrow.

"The instant they heard the news, the three of them knew they had to do something, and so, joints complaining, ligaments protesting, they limped out of the retirement home, went down to the river, swam across, and climbed onto the wounded island."

@Tor.com: "The Dead" by Michael Swanwick.

"Three boy zombies in matching red jackets bussed our table, bringing water, lighting candles, brushing away the crumbs between courses. Their eyes were dark, attentive, lifeless; their hands and faces so white as to be faintly luminous in the hushed light."

@Tor.com: "Wishbones" by Cherie Priest.

"At the Andersonville camp there is a great, stinking dread. The Confederates don’t have enough food of their own, so they sure as hell aren’t feeding their prisoners of war; and the prisoners who aren’t wasting away are dying of diseases faster than they can be replaced."

@Tor.com: "Trading Hearts at the Half Kaffe Café" by Charles de Lint.

"We all buy so heavily into how we hope things will turn out, how society and our friends say it should be, that by the time we actually have a date, we’re locked into those particular hopes and expectations and miss everything that could be."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck (Mountain)–Entry #24" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"Millions of alt-Earths died out every year. One experienced mass extinctions due to cat litter and plastics and on top of that nuclear holocaust. Another remained verdant but personless when warlike aliens that resembled large terrestrial sharks declared the human race guilty of marine genocide."

@Author's Site: "Deluge (Part 88)" by Brian Keene.

"Leviathan trudged toward them. Sarah could only imagine the skyscraper-sized legs plodding along beneath the surface. Each step sent huge waves surging outward from the beast. The thing shook its massive, misshapen head, flapping its tentacles, and its roar echoed across the ocean, drowning out all other sound."

Audio Fiction
@About SF: "The Deadly Mission of Phineas Snodgrass" by Fred Pohl, read by Geoffrey A. Landis. [Via SF Signal]

"The Deadly Mission of Phineas Snodgrass" was first published in Galaxy Magazine in 1962, and has since been included in numerous collections of Mr. Pohl’s work.

@Classic Tales Podcast: "In Letters of Fire" by Gaston Leroux, read by B.J. Harrison.

"Rumors run up and down the mountainside of the strange and dangerous man who made a deal with the devil. In the hollow of a terrible storm, four hunters meet a melancholy madman who offers them shelter. But has this man really lost his mind, or is he laboring under the burden of a terrible curse?"

@Escape Pod: "Site Fourteen" by Laura Anne Gilman, read by Mat Weller.

"Robinachec nodded confirmation as though the pilot could see him. ”Roger that. Bringing you in.” Palming the flat-topped lever, I watched as he moved it gently back towards him, pulling the bullet-shaped transport into the shed, an external framework of metal beams just large enough to hold two minisubs, or one shuttle."

@StarShipSofa: "Her Acres of Pastoral Playground" by Mike Allen.

"a desperate father does everything he can (including the most terrible Black Magic) to stave off the inevitable weight of Cthulhu’s conquest. The story features a non-linear progression of events that explores an existentialist angle, while plunging the reader into some of the most ghastly imagery this side of Lovecraft himself." - Blackgate.com

Free Fiction

2011-10-27T07:14:00.021-05:00

Cool free fiction!

@Author's Site: "The Light At Whale Cove" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch.

"Sheriff Dan Retsler finally believes in magic. He has to, after all he’s experienced in Whale Rock. But he can’t take it any longer, so he’s moving away from the magical town. His successor has arrived just as the ghosts return to the lighthouse. Now he must train a newcomer in the dark side of Whale Rock, while making sure the terror entombed in the lighthouse won’t move into the town itself."

@Daily Science Fiction: "My Dearest Miranda" by Jaime Lee Moyer.

"Such pests are easily dealt with in a civilized clime. The maids might find an occasional pixie in the parlor or the odd brownie in the pantry during an exceptionally bad year. One simply calls in the local exterminator wizard and never gives the matter another thought."

@Fantasy Magazine: "Are You Watching Carefully?" by Christopher Priest.

"Here’s what you do, Jerry says. You get one of those little pipe tobacco tins and you put stuff in it. Important stuff. A fingernail. Some hair. A scab. Some dirt from a special place."

@Lightspeed: "Some Fortunate Future Day" by Cassandra Clare.

"Time is many things, her father told her. Time is a circle, and time is a great turning gear that cannot be stopped, and time is a river that carries away what you love."

@Ray Gun Revival: "Vampire Brides from Planet Hell" by Nick Lewandowski.

"On civilian astrogation charts it appeared as a grinning skull with a red X for crossbones. Even the land-starved nobility of the minor Rim states refused to touch it. Drakken III—better known as “Planet Hell” in gin joints all across the galaxy."

@Short Story Me: "Avalonis" by Deborah Dalton.

Blood bubbled up through his fingers. He dug his nails deeper into his gut and pushed his flesh back into place. He hesitated to think that the hem of his shirt had been stuffed down into the laceration, but he wasn’t certain of anything except the liquid warmth spreading across his hand.

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck’s Avatar–Entry #17" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"I made my way farther and farther East, a Demon within me and angels on my trail. I had a whole century to kill before I could rescue myself but I wanted to be as far from the winter city as fast as possible."

@Kat and Mouse:"Into The Woods - Part Five" by Abner Senires.

"I woke to a dull pain at the back of my head, a loud thump near my feet, a gargled protest, and the sour reek of body odor mingled with the scent of scorched metal."

@Paizo: "Blood and Money - Chapter One: Nightwalker" by Steven Savile.

"The topiaries of Hasim Rakhman's palace were legendary, all manner of fabulous beasts carved out of the shrubbery to stand guard over the merchant’s equally legendary maze. Isra stood in the shadow of a leonine predator. The scent of jasmine was thick in the air, overpowering other, far subtler musks from the many more delicate plants in the garden."

Audio
@Dunesteef: "After School Snacks" by K. Bowen Black.

"Old Mrs. Wakefield seems like such a nice lady. All the kids love to go to her house after school on Fridays for treats. Such a wonderful tradition they all enjoy so much. There couldn’t possibly be something sinister underneath, could there?"

@Fantasy Magazine: "The Invisibles" by Charles de Lint, read by Stefan Rudnicki.

@PodCastle: "We Were Wonder Scouts" by Will Ludwigsen, read by Christopher Reynaga.

"My parents, Father especially, had little interest in the imagination. “Why would you read things that someone else made up?” he always wanted to know. We had no books of fiction in the house or a radio, and I didn’t have many toys."

Serial Audio
@Beam Me Up: "Things - Part One" by Peter Watts.

Set in "The Thing" universe.

@Cthulhu: "The Damned - part 5"

In this weeks show, the next part of Through the Brazzy Wilderness, then a 1923 Blues(sort of) track and finally the main attraction, part 5 of "The Damned".

@19 Nocturne Boulevard: "The Dunwich Horror - Part 3" by H.P. Lovecraft, adapted by Julie Hoverson.

"Our heroes arrive in Dunwich - and find something is on the loose."

Comics

2011-10-27T06:53:00.000-05:00

Sorry that until now there have been no posts this week. It's been a very busy week here. Here are some cool classic comics links. This is a very incomplete list so please check out these and other free comics sites (many appear in the blogroll on the right). Hopefully, more posts to follow today.

@Atomic Kommie Comics: Atom-Age Combat "The Hungry Moss" Sci-Fi

@Comic Book Catacombs:

Cave Girl in "The Man Who Conquered Death" Adventure.
Rulah Jungle Goddess in "Blood Lust of the Biting God" Adventure.
Tabu, Wizard of the Jungle in "Land of Mystery" Adventure.
Fantomah, Daughter of the Pharaohs in "The Spotted Men" Adventure.
Perils of Nyoka: "Ru Tu's Eye" Adventure.

@Grantbridge Street: ["R" rated site] "Curse of the Werewolf" Horror.

@Horrors of It All:

"It Won't Come Back Until Midnight" Horror.
"The Monster" Horror.
"The Philosopher's Stone (Dr. Drew)" Horror.
"Traitor's House" Horror.
"The Creature" Horror.
"The Vampire's Coffin! / Johnny's Last Jump!" Horror.
"The Little Monster / 'SHHHH!'" Horror.

@Hero [& Heroine] Histories: "SpookMan" Supernatural.

@Pappy's Golden Age Comics Blogzine:

"The Closet / The Black Closet" Horror.
"The Zombie Death" Horror.
"The Purple Planet / The Unreal / The Enemies / The Menace" Sci-Fi.

@Parishi's Vision: Flash Gordon in "Sheng the Savage" Sci-Fi

@Secret Sanctum of Captain Video:

Curse of Frankenstein Part One and Part Two Horror.
The Mummy Part One and Part Two Horror.
Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires Part One and Part Two Horror.
Frankenstein Part One and Part Two Horror.

@War: Past, Present, and Future:

Atom-Age Combat "Third Element" Near Future SF
Spacebusters" "Empress of Belzar" Sci-Fi
Wings Comics: Ghost Patrol "Revenge of the Shadow Squadron" War/Supernatural.

@Western Comics Adventures:

Bullseye: "Devil Bird" Cowboys Vs. Dinosaurs
The Valley of Gwangi Part One, Part Two, and Part Three. Cowboys Vs. Dinosaurs

T.G. It's Friday Free Fiction

2011-10-21T07:23:00.020-05:00

Some very good stuff, including a strong audio fiction section.

@Daily Science Fiction: "Free Lunch" by Will McIntosh.

"It took a moment to place the sound, because no one should have been making it in their house. It was the soft, rhythmic squeal of a mattress and the wheeming of a woman approaching a stifled climax. The sound sent an icy blast through Phoebe's stomach. She had begun to suspect, but only in the abstract. The shift to concrete was jarring."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "Deluge (Part 87)" by Brian Keene.

"The ship rolled violently as Sarah raced out onto the slippery deck. Losing her balance, she slid, shrieking, toward the rail, but managed to steady herself before falling overboard. The falling rain and ocean spray stung her eyes, blurring her vision. Blinking water from her eyes, she turned, trying to make sense of the chaotic battle unfolding around her. The paper towels stuffed in her ears made everything seem muffled. "

@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck (Mountain)–Entry #23" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"I no longer send an avatar to write in the journal on the jungle floor. I write it here, at the heart of me. If Gabriel finds it, he finds me. Thousands or millions of years from now some other Risen species on this planet will find my journal, incomplete, and need to make up the rest of the story themselves. The rest stays with me."

Audio Fiction
@Cast of Wonders: "Bad Kitty" by Jason Dextradeur, read by Marguerite Kenner and Alasdair Stuart. YA fantasy.

"Please, call me Fluffy, all my friends do." She said with a thick southern drawl. It might charm most people, but Walt and I weren't buying it.

@Classic Tales Podcast: "The Judge's House" by Bram Stoker, read by B. J. Harrison.

"Malcolm Malcolmson seeks absolute desolation. What better way to study for final exams? He takes a train to an unknown town, and rents a house that takes his fancy. It is here that his education is completed. For rats can be specters, and specters can be rats."

@Drabblecast: "The Big Splash" by George R. Galuschak.

"passed the sign that read Warning: Shark Zone. The sun was setting, lighting up the tops of the condos sticking out of the water. They had been swallowed by the swollen ocean, when it spilled over, like everything else: the skyscrapers, the cars, the fast food joints, the schools and supermarkets and liquor stores…"

@Escape Pod: "Clockwork Fagin" by Cory Doctorow, read by Grant Baciocco.

"Monty Goldfarb walked into St Agatha’s like he owned the place, a superior look on the half of his face that was still intact, a spring in his step despite his steel left leg. And it wasn’t long before he *did* own the place, taken it over by simple murder and cunning artifice. It wasn’t long before he was my best friend and my master, too, and the master of all St Agatha’s, and didn’t he preside over a *golden* era in the history of that miserable place?"

@Pseudopod: "The Cord" by Chris Lewis Carter, read by David Michel.

"Nearly half-way up the light pole she’s standing beside is her husband, Carl, his arms and legs locked tightly around the wood. He’s naked, except for a bright red bathrobe, which is untied and flapping in the breeze like a terrycloth flag."

Serial Audio
@Drama Pod" "The Dueling Machine - Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3" by Ben Bova and Myron R. Lewis.

"The trouble with great ideas is that someone is sure to expend enormous effort and ingenuity figuring out how to louse them up."

Thursday Night

2011-10-20T20:07:00.008-05:00

A few more interesting free fiction items. Some a bit "R" rated, though.

Illustration from The Revelator.

Fiction
@Author's Site: "Last of the Living" by David Moody. [via SF Signal]

"Why are we even bothering when the odds are stacked so high against us? What’s the point? When everything’s lost, why do we keep trying to survive?"

Now Posted: Absent Willow Review - Oct. 2011.
"Witching Weather" by Pamela J. Jessen.

"She wakes to dimmed sunlight, frayed clouds splayed across the sky like ragged muslin sheets. – Alarmed, she steps outside. Expecting molten July, instead she tastes a hint of cool October and sour apple wine. – A confused wind worries the woodbine slumped on her fence, leaves dulled in the muted"

"Time’s End" by Pamela J. Jessen.

"Time unspools and winter becomes autumn becomes summer becomes spring. – My children, long scattered, return to cling to my skirts, impatiently waiting to reenter my womb, to become dreams again. – And I, in my unwithered youth, eagerly seek out my own mother who tugs on her mother’s sleeve."

"The Man of Stars" by Lucy Stone.

"I’m out shopping when I first see him, juggling too many bags on my way back to the car. Footy socks for Tom, a new calculator for Sarah, milk and bread, chicken and chips for dinner with my favourite ice cream for dessert. I pause on the corner, fumbling with my mobile"

"Snake Eyes" by Zeke Jarvis.

"Mr. Stein awoke to find himself tied to a bed. At first, he was hopeful that this was a continuation of whatever drunken games he’d been playing with the young black girl whom he’d bought a few beers the previous night. He’d expected her to be game, with her tits practically falling"

"Sally’s Man" by Milan Smith.

"It started with a walk in the cemetery. Sally had met him after dusk, when the night wind had kicked up, and the smell of rain filled the air. She’d been standing in the yard listening to a bird twitter in a tree, when the man came wandering down the road behind"

"Stephanie in the Church" by Melissa Stanziale.

"Stephanie rushed up the steps that led to the back entrance of the church. Near the top she tripped and almost fell on to the cold, hard pavement. A painful lump formed at the back of her throat, which she tried to swallow back, but her chest tightened, her nose began to tingle"

"The Misadventures of Wart Wafer: The End of the Crimson Circle" by Joshua S. Simpkins.

"Azrael Knightsbane was the last of his kind. The great azure dragon roared and raged in his immense, cavernous lair. Where is my pretty precious! The thought boomed within the ink-black walls of his skull, as his massive barbed tail flattened large piles of gold and jewels with ease. Some thieving"

"Six More Weeks of Winter" by Philip Roberts.

"Before the sun could peek its head out from beneath the horizon on February second, Frank Rouse threw off the covers and pulled himself out of bed. He paused beside it, frowning down, fingers drumming across his hairy gut. He’d taken up jogging in the morning two years prior, or told others"

"In Soul Possession" by C. Kevin Barrett.

Andrew Randall was not happy with the afterlife. “It just makes sense to have some sort of training program or at the very least an orientation,” Andrew said as he sifted through the cardboard box in his lap. In it was an assortment of crystals, metal rods, and pieces of carved

"The Last Dragon" by M.C. Elam.

"I am the last dragon. I hide in places no man walks. My sweet world, ravished now by callous deeds, lies nearly barren in the wake of his greed. My crystal rivers grow dull with filth, once clear sky made dirty by the economy of his hand. His days are numbered."

"Fillet of Cirrhosis" by Jacob Jacobson.

“Wallet and watch buddy, c’mon, don’t make me drop you!” Winston felt the blade pressing against his neck, a trembling hand controlling it. The mugger reeked of booze and shook like he was detoxing from something. Great, another fucking boozer…was the primary thought going through Winston’s mind as he quickly started to

"Disconnected" by William C. Rasmussen.

"Pulling his SUV into his garage, Scott McBride glanced at the TomTom mounted on the dash and shook his head. Apparently, his destination—“Home”—was still 1.2 miles away. He chuckled as he killed the engine, climbed out of the car, and shut the door. That stupid GPS system, he thought, a marvel"

"Cats" by Jake Walters

"The fort, built by two eleven-year-old boys, stood against a fallen tree near a murky body of water they called the pond, where sometimes they cast bait, not even knowing if there were fish to be caught. The fort was what good forts were to boys their age—a place to play cards"

"Just A Closer Walk With Thee" by Frank Stascik.

"The first time Caroline tried it, it was with a cricket She’d been sitting underneath the apple tree in the front yard, crying, when Billy shuffled up behind her and put his tiny, frail hand on the top of her head. She heard the wheeze as Billy inhaled, and when he spoke"

"Warnings" by Alice King.

"Skeletal branches drip with moisture as I make my way to the bus stop. The last withered leaves crackle wetly beneath my feet, trapped between my shoes and the pavement. The rain falls all around me, a steady cloying drizzle. It drips dismally through my hair, plastering it to my skull in"

"Nexxus Point" by Sean Jones.

"Portia blinked. She took a step back as the teleporter light went from amber to red. Surprised, she realised that she had never seen a teleporter do that before. The lights on the top of the teleporter only ever went green and amber. Green was safe to travel, and amber, someone"

"Waiting" by Kyle H. Patrick

"Part One Cardigan opened his eyes, which was odd because he was pretty sure he was supposed to be dead. He sat up and felt the metal springs of a mattress poking into his leg. A quick glance showed him that he was in a small room, like a doctor’s examination"

"The Last Ereph" by JD Byrne.

"The cobblestones that paved these byzantine back alleys were not as clean as they appeared. Kol discovered this when his left foot, rather than pivot him crisply to the right towards the open alleyway, instead slid out from under him. He did not fall. He managed to catch himself with his right"

Now Posted: The Revelator #1 [via SF Signal]
"Nick Kaufmann, Last of the Red-Hot Superwhores" by Nick Mamatas.

"Every farmboy was a red-hot superwhore once upon a time…"

"Gaslight" by Jeffrey Ford.

"We first heard about the child one evening at The Monday Afternoon Club from old Matterson, last heir to an empire of sweatshops …"

Thursday Morning

2011-10-20T07:26:00.016-05:00

Some great free fantasy and SF this morning. Likely a second post tonight and I'm working on comics and RPG posts for either later this week or this weekend.

Illustration from "The Box" by Bill Ward.

@Cosmos: "Deep Clean" by Adam Brown and Paul Haines.

"The unit is purely cognitive," she says. No shots, no pills. It's something brand new, this addiction therapy. Neon Kumar sits there listening to nothing.

@Tor.com: "Grace Immaculate" by Gregory Benford,

"The first SETI signal turned up not in a concerted search for messages, but at the Australian Fast Transients study that looked for variable stars. This radio array picked up quick, pulsed signals from a source 134 light-years away. They appeared again consecutively 33 hours apart."

Now Posted: Beneath Ceaseless Skies #80
"Held Close in Syllables of Light" by Rose Lemberg.

Abruptly his stronghold folded. His names struck. He tore my mind-veil off. Before I could react, the names retreated, reformed his stronghold. All too powerful for me. He laughed. “The Raker’s daughter has taken a single two-syllable. Women, huh. Weaker even than your mother. So be more sensible than her, sweet Vendelin....”'

"To the Gods of Time and Engines, a Gift" by Dean Wells.

Cecily grabbed a shard from the mirror, traced an unsteady line along the flesh of her wrist. Scars and metal piercings adorned her arms where she’d cut herself before. “They demand the spilling of blood,” Granduncle would always say, when he bothered to notice her at all. “They envy us, you see, and covet the iron flowing freely in our veins.”

Now Posted: Goblin Fruit: Autumn 2011
Featuring fantasy poetry, most with an audio version available, by Josiah J. Eikelboom, Ruth Stacey, Nina Pelaez, Nancy Sheng, C.S. MacCath, Dan Campbell, S. Brackett Robertson, Sarah Colona, Marigny Michel, Joseph Harker, Liza Graham, Cheryl Stiles, Erik Amundsen, Lyn C. A. Gardner, and Joshua Davis.

Serial Fiction
@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Four" by Abner Senires.

"We had landed at the edge of a wide clearing. In the center stood a low, single-story, weatherbeaten cabin that looked like it had been built well over two hundred years ago. Shingles were missing from the roof, a brick chimney slouched against the side of the cabin, and a tall pile of chopped firewood hunched next to a covered front porch."

@Paizo: "The Box - Chapter Four: Nothing Gained" by Bill Ward.

"Move back!" Kostin shouted, barely parrying a spear thrust to the gut. There were more than a score of the things, each scarcely taller than Shess but like no humanoid Kostin had ever seen. Green-skinned, bedecked with shaggy ropes of dark moss, and armed with crude spears and clubs of human bone, the naked savages fought silently, almost impassively. The sheer weight and surprise of them had pushed Kostin back until he collided with Aeventius.

Audio
@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The Magick" by Kristina C. Mottla.

"Out from her hands where the book once rested, a butterfly flapped clumsily toward the shutters."

Part 2

2011-10-19T08:36:00.023-05:00

Some good free audio fiction. Sorry some have little or no detail, but I included what I could find at the sites, or easily elsewhere.

Illustration for Wells' "The War in the Air"

Audio
@Beam Me Up: "We Honor those Who Serve" by Steve Singleman.

@Beware the Hairy Mango: "Halfway House" by Matthew Sanborn Smith.

@Cast of Wonders: "The Name-Day" by Saki, read by Graeme Dunlop.

"Adventures, according to the proverb, are to the adventurous. Quite as often they are to the non-adventurous, to the retiring, to the constitutionally timid."

@Dramapod: "The Man who was Dead!" by Thomas Knight.

@Dramapod: "The Man from the Future" by Edmond Hamilton.

@Journey Into: "The Box" by Christopher Munroe, read by Graeme Dunlop.

"There is a box in the corner of his room; and he will not open it."

@LibriVox: "The War in the Air" by H. G. Wells, read by many readers.

Wells "published twelve books between 1901 and 1911, including this one. while many British citizens were surprised by the advent of World War I, Wells had already written prophetically about such a conflict. War in the Air predicted use of airplanes in modern war."

@PodCastle: "The Gateway of the Monster (Featuring Carnacki)" by William Hope Hodgson, read by Paul S. Jenkins.

"But it was the door slamming that chiefly bothered the old butler. Many and many a time, he told me, had he lain awake and just got shivering with fright, listening; for sometimes the door would be slammed time after time - thud! thud! thud! - so that sleep was impossible."

@StarShipSofa: "Never Blood Enough" by Joe Haldeman, read by Simon Hildebrandt.

first published in Fantasy & Science Fiction, Oct./Nov., 2009

@Author's Site: "The Starter - Episode 36" by Scott Sigler.

"Final season standings, including who wins the Galaxy Bowl and a bit of looking forward to the next season already."

@19 Nocturne Boulevard: "The Dunwich Horror - Part 2 of 4" by H.P. Lovecraft, adapted by Julie Hoverson.

"Our heroes arrive in Dunwich - and find something is on the loose"

Part 1

2011-10-17T07:14:00.033-05:00

Part 1 of ?

illustration from "The Talisman’s Trinket" by P.C. Hodgell.

Fiction
@AEG: "Two Quiet Days" by Rusty Priske.

Tanari reached for his stick, propped up next to his simple cot, and used it to pull himself to his feet. He tried to ignore the screaming in his knees and back, but each day they got a little louder and harder to push into the background. Even his hands, which still remembered the feeling of wrapping around a bow and drawing the string back, were swollen at the knuckles and he had to make an effort to hold the walking stick.

@Baen Books: "The Talisman’s Trinket" by P.C. Hodgell.

"It’s the end of apprenticeship for Patch, young thief in the making and Kencyrath series protagonist Jame’s protégé, as she defends herself and her family on a night of murderous guild riots and tectonic shifts in political power within a city built on magic. A riveting stand-alone fantasy filled with walking gods and thief magic—all set in P.C. Hodgell's wondrous world of the Kencyrath series"

@Fantasy Magazine: "Unnatural Disaster" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch.

"Horizontal rain, darkness, and a nearly empty beach. Jaclyn Tadero trudged through the thick wet sand, listening to the ocean’s waves crash beside her. The Coast Guard helicopter flew overhead."

@Phillipine Genre Stories: "Freeborn in the City of Fallacies" by Andrew Drilon.

Valle Paradox: where shamed academics live on in feudal chaos, debating their flawed theories ad naseum, casting misshapen temporalgorithms into the cubic ether and warping actuality with every barbed, non-canonical entry into the world’s spatialgebra.

@Lightspeed: "Against Eternity" by David Farland.

"The wan gray of polluted skies will weigh on your soul, and you will recall bluer days, and wish for your childhood, when the grass seemed taller and would rub your inner thighs as you rambled through the fields."

@Ray Gun Revival: "The Final Meeting of the Truth Society" by Matthew Acheson.

"When I left my parent’s house that night, I remember looking out across the water and seeing that the setting sun had turned the sky a brilliant shade of crimson. It was a short walk down a dirt road to the Fairlee post office, and when I arrived there was a tall man with dark hair and wide shoulders waiting for me. His name was Stephen Robinson, and he was my oldest and dearest of friends."

Now Posted Innsmouth Magazine #8.
"Graffito Flow" by W. H. Pugmire.

"Silver moonshine filtered through the mist of dusk. Lifting her eyes to heaven, a blind woman sang to darkness. Autumn wind brushed against her lank hair and moaned softly at chapped red ears. She listened to the sound and whispered an accompaniment as the breeze embraced her like a friend who kisses throat with chilly fondness. Night and wind and invisible moon were her ancient friends; they would not mock or mar as others had…"

"And Out Came Words of Fire" by Paul Jessup.

"At first, I thought they were burns – like some form of branding. Bruises along her skin, raised under the flesh. She was barely married – I could see her hair was tied in the traditional newlywed knots, which swung in a pendulum arc around her head as she stumbled along the stone steps to the Temple of Saxis"

"We Are All Ghosts" by Peter Darbyshire.

This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but with the silence of the grave. I don’t bother testing the walls of the tomb you’ve buried me in. I know there’s no way out. After all, you built it to contain not only me, but what’s inside me. I cannot escape. We cannot escape.

"We Can Watch the White Doves Go" by T.J. McIntyre.

The view from the top of the cliff revealed miles of unobstructed Alabama countryside. The river below stretched on and on, a glowing yellow snake lit by the waning sun. It slithered between rolling hills and square plots of farmland. Smitty imagined that if he looked hard enough, he might be able to see where the river met the Gulf of Mexico four hundred miles to the south, but it was only a matter of time…

"The Second Sphinx" by Rebecca Stefoff.

"A month before I was to leave for Egypt with Napoleon’s army, the Comte d’Erlette asked me to call on him. “My son, you do not have to go,” my mother said to me three times, but I was more than willing. It was past time for a reckoning with the Comte. I would demand an accounting and swear to repay all that he had spent on us."

"Curvature of the Witch House" by Wendy N. Wagner.

"The crows! The caw, gaw, gaaaw all day and into the twilight. As if they know they can stop my work. Lousy devils, snapping their beaks every time I step outside to chase them away. Shuffling on their feet of three claws."

Now Posted: Lorelei Signal - Oct - Dec '11 Issue
"The Comfort of Wood" by J.C. Hart.

A woman is forced into a noble marriage because of her gift of magic. But she finds that gift manipulated in ways she never wanted. Will she ever be able to escape the prison she finds herself in and once again find The Comfort of Wood.

"Firstborn" by Karen L. Kobylarz.

A Queen of Egypt in hiding from her husband. A mother still grieving the loss of a
son. A woman accused of desecrating the Tombs of Eternity. In saving the son of
another mother, another son will be lost.

"Haunted" by Finale Doshi-Velez.

The victim of an accident, Amanda finds herself haunting her friend and neighbor
and the person who was responsible for her death. The pain she causes her friend,
is almost as bad as the pain it is causing her. All she wants is to find her rest and
let her friend live in peace - but she doesn't know how.

"Her Ladyship, the Dragon" by Edgar Mason.

A young woman is cursed by her stepmother to become a dragon. Even after the
curse is broken - she still finds she has still become a dragon.

"The Prize" by V. Anne Arden.

A gladiator learns that sometimes the most important prize isn't just surviving.

"The Queen is Not Amused" by Ken Goldman,

Fizzbain is the favorite jester of the Queen and more than any he knows the cost
of her displeasure. When a young danced displeases the queen and is thrown into
the dungeon he looks for a way to save her. Unfortunately, a trick he learned from
a wizard backfires and he finds himself as the Queen's favorite in another way. Will
he be able to save the dancer and his own head from the Queen's displeasure
when she finds out how he tricked her.

"The Weaver of Linlea" by Lauren Bailey Fawcett.

A young storyteller hides a secret about her past - not only to protect herself, but
others she has never ever met. Her secret is threatened when the Prince becomes
ill and his fiancé believes the storyteller can save him. Will she reveal her past to
save a man she loves but can never have, or will protecting the nameless others be
more important.

Now Posted: Lovecraft eZine - Issue #7
"Sky Full of Fire" by Corinna Sara Bechko.

"I think it started the day the house fell down. I came home and there it lay, nothing but jagged crossbeams inclosing sad triangles of empty space. The detritus of a lifetime. A lot of broken things that meant nothing. That meant everything"

"The Lord of Endings" by John R. Fultz.

"I found the old hermit sitting like a stone in the desert. His skin was grey as granite, pitted by the timeless winds. His ramshackle hut stood between two boulders deep into the great, dry plain where the pale-skinned invaders never go"

"Loaners" by Aaron Polson.

"Mariana lay with her head off the edge of the bed, hair dangling nearly to the floor, and imagined how much cocaine she could buy with twenty-thousand dollars. "

"The Prophecy of Zarah" by Jenne Kaivo.

"My translation team has sought to convey the most exact meaning, while still retaining some of the poetic flow of the original."

"The Stranger From Out of Town" by John Prescott.

"The house was paid for, but it was devoid of life, and the thought of staying in that empty house sent chills through his body. The house was a two-story contemporary, well-built and worth a lot of money. It faced the west on Carpey Lake and had the traditional pier, two-car garage, and a wrap-around porch."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck’s Avatar–Entry #16" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"For a millisecond I froze. In another millisecond I had morphed back into a full-sized komodo spasming and thrashing as if my attacker were riding my back."

@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck (Mountain)–Entry #22" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"Gabriel came down like a colossus in flames—smashing through the roof of the library where my avatar sat reading love poems, his wings ablaze and the look upon his face hideous."

Audio
@Lightspeed: "Against Eternity" by David Farland, read by Stephan Rudnicki.

Friday Freebies

2011-10-14T07:44:00.017-05:00

It's Friday!

Today's illustration is from the Drabblecast story below.

Fiction
@Daily Science Fiction: "A Concert of Flowers" by Kate O'Connor.

There was a soft hiss as the clear casing of the first stasis jar fell open. The slim-leafed plant anchored in its deep pot trembled as air rushed in. Its single bud exploded into bloom even before the casing had touched the table and a note, high, clear, perfectly pure rang through the dark. It brought tears to William's eyes. Almost as good as hearing it for the first time.

Audio Fiction
@Classic Tales Podcast: "Playing With Fire" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, read by B.J. Harrison.

"A calculated gathering of friends bears strange fruit, when dealing with the powers of the dead. And while some are there for true spiritual enlightenment, there is one adventure seeker who likes to play with fire."

@Drabblecast: "Orange" by Susan Forest.

"I take time-lapse photographs of an orange. The result is always the same. First I remove the previous orange from the spike in front of the black velvet backdrop and replace it with a new orange. I set an incandescent spotlight out of frame as a light source…"

@Dramapod: "Pandemic" by JF Bone.

"Generally, human beings don't do totally useless things consistently and widely. So—maybe there is something to it—"

@Escape Pod: EP 314: "Movement" by Nancy Fulda, read by Marguerite Kenner.

“Would there be side effects?” My father asks. In the oppressive heat of the evening, I hear the quiet Zzzapof his shoulder laser as it targets mosquitoes. The device is not as effective as it was two years ago: the mosquitoes are getting faster.

@LibriVox: "The Book of a Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5" by Anonymous, translated by Richard Francis Burton, read by many readers.

"This is a collection of stories collected over thousands of years by various authors, translators and scholars. They are an amalgam of mythology and folk tales from the Indian sub-continent, Persia, and Arabia"

@LibriVox: "Null-ABC" by H. Beam Piper and John J. McGuire, read by Corinna Schultz.

"There's some reaction these days that holds scientists responsible for war. Take it one step further: What happens if "book-learnin'" is held responsible ...?"

@Pseudopod: "Yardwork" by Bruce Blake, read by Brian Rollins.

“Tim made a special trip to buy the shovel he used to bury the nameless man. It was easy: a lady in a blue vest helped him without a second thought. A fifteen-year-old buying a spade doesn’t raise concern; it’s not like purchasing a gun or machete, though a shovel could be as deadly. The shovel didn’t kill the man, Tim used it to bury the bits and pieces.

Thursday

2011-10-13T07:46:00.011-05:00

Some free audio and serial fiction. Illustration from "The Box" by Bill Ward.

Serial Fiction
@Paizo: "The Box - Chapter Three: Nothing Ventured" by Bill Ward. Fantasy.

"Kostin swiftly bound the arms of the unconscious Shoanti with rawhide tethers and gagged them with wads of cloth. Gyrd stepped in when he was finished, reeking of sour sweat and stale mead, and threw a guard over each broad shoulder. The Ulfen's chainmail jangled under the load."

Audio Fiction
@Dunesteef: "Giving Birth" by Philip Roberts. Horror.

"When a household mishap causes Rudy to lose his finger, he discovers more than just dead tissue: something alive about the severed digit. How could that happen? What does it mean? Where is it going? I just can’t put my finger on it…"

@LibriVox: "Tales of Old Japan" by Lord Redesdale, read by many readers.

"contains a number of classic Japanese stories, fairy tales, and other folklore; as well as Japanese sermons and non-fiction pieces"

@StarShipSofa: "The Big Trip Up Yonder" by Kurt Vonnegut. Science Fiction.

"If it was good enough for your grandfather, forget it ... it is much too good for anyone else!"

Wednesday freebies

2011-10-12T07:29:00.023-05:00

A short fantasy story, several eBooks, and three audiobooks from LibriVox.

@AEG: "Flowers in Darkness" by Nancy Sauer.

"Even in autumn the gardens at Kyuden Doji were lovely to look upon. To the left of the path, stands of bellflowers clustered beneath maples just beginning to blush red. On the right the banks of the pond were lined with deep banks of jewel-toned chrysanthemums, and the fishing pavilion that it fronted was garlanded in white- and rose-colored morning glories. Kakita Hideshi stood amongst the beauty and saw none of it."

@Pixel of Ink [Kindle]:

"Scream Angel" by Douglas Smith. Science Fiction.
"Backlash" by Nancy Fulda. Science Fiction, Short Story.
"Jack and Mr. Grin" by Andersen Prunty. Horror, Suspense.
"The 9th Fortress" by JP Jackson. Horror.
"Storytellers" by Martin C Sharlow. Fantasy.

@Smashwords:

"Beside the Sea" by Keith Brooke.
"9. The Great Organizer" by Vincent Pet.
"The Donuts of Doom" by M.E. Brines.
"Don Coyote de la Merika" by Kathryn Anthony.
"80AD - The Tekhen of Anuket (Book 3)" by Aiki Flinthart.
"The Society On Da Run #1: La Cicala di Italia" by Nipaporn Baldwin.
"Techno-Fear [Episode One: Collapse]" by German Alcala.
"Star Ship on Saddle Mountain" [1955] by Atlantis Halla.
"Last Dance of a Black Widow" by Bradley Convissar.
"Blink" by Bradley Convissar.
"The Listening Post" by Iain Brown.
"Mon Petit Ami" by Sherri Cornelius.
"Gods on Patrol" by A.M. Burns.
"A Penny's Worth" by Paul Comstock.
"Coleen" by Bob Nailor.
"A Tale of Hunters" by Frank Whelan.
"The Ugly Kids: To Hell in a Handbasket" by Renee Adams.

Audio Fiction
@LibriVox: "20000 Leagues under the Seas" by Jules Verne, translated by F.P. Walter, read by many readers.

"Professor Pierre Aronnax is an academic whose thirst for knowledge carries him out of his ivory tower and on the trail of a mysterious sea beast. His curiosity at last is satiated when he finds himself in the belly of the beast-- that is, on board the incredible submarine the Nautilus, courtesy of its mysterious pilot Captain Nemo and in the company of his servant Conseil and sailor Ned Land."

@LibriVox: "The Gray Plague" by Lloyd Eshbach, read by BellonaTimes.

"End of the world sci-fi tale borrows heavily from H.G. Wells' WOTW and In The Days of the Comet -- looks like fun !"

@LibriVox: "Triplanetary, First in the Lensman Series" by E. E. “Doc” Smith, read by Phil Chenevert.

"covers several episodes in an eons-long eugenics project of the super-intelligences of the Arisia. This alien race is breeding two genetic lines to become the ultimate weapon in Arisia's cosmic war with their arch enemy, the Eddore. The initial chapters cover the Kinnison genetic line during the fall of Atlantis and Nero's (Gharlane of Eddore) reign in Rome."

Tuesday Freebies

2011-10-11T07:23:00.029-05:00

Late starting this week, but start things must. Quite a bit of good free fiction. Today's illustraion is from 19 Nocturne Boulevard's audio story below.

@Daily Science Fiction: "Where Sea and Sky Kiss" by Dan Campbell

"I screamed into the world amidst this grief. Many took my birth as an omen: some good, others bad. It all depended on who had lost, and how much, as to whether they shunned or smiled on me and my family."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Wider and Deeper" by Carma Lynn Park.

"The sorcerer was young, still with a downy beard, his power small and flickering. He set his mind to obtaining greater strength, and after much study he decided to lure the creature of living darkness, whose energies he could then tap. The creature would need a pit, deeper than the lowest basement of his castle, deeper than the copper mines of the Frostshadow Mountain, deeper than the Everquiet Caves."

@Fantasy Magazine: "Absolute Zero" by Nadia Bulkin.

"It sat on a tree stump the way neighborhood men sat on bar stools, surrounded by a cavalry of thin, burned trees. Max almost recognized this nightmare place as Digby Forest, a festering infection of wild land on the edge of Cripple Creek."

@Kasma "Penrose" by Ashanti Luke.

"The man pulled through the lev run alongside the Retroburger and stopped next to the window as the level three lev-pad slowly lifted their mag-lev to match the window of the cashier who was already handing them their meal..."

@Lightspeed: "The Little Bear" by Justina Robson.

"She felt without a shadow of doubt that the expanse of outer space was a bagatelle kind of nothing, compared with the space she’d become aware of as it grew inside her mind: the distance between herself and her husband Guy."

@Lovecraft eZine: "The Stranger From Out of Town" by John Prescott.

"Dorian Searls looked out over the lake as the setting sun slowly fell behind the trees to the west. It had been a good day like many others over the past seven years."

@Ray Gun Revival: "Ballad" by Barton Paul Levenson.

"The two wore UFN Aerospace Corps blues as they stalked each other through the firing range, a vast, blue-plastic floor covered with obstacles of all shapes and sizes. So far neither had managed to score any laser tag points. They could see the icy crags and boulders of the big moon the base stood on through the transparent dome around them."

@Strange Horizons: "The Fourth Board" by D J Muir.

"Today, the Tyrant will ask Jinli's father to bring out the hao ryl set, sit down with him, and play a game. When the game is decided, the Tyrant will ask Father to bring Jinli before him, and to have her read his future. And Jinli knows that things will not happen this afternoon quite as anyone has planned."

@World SF Blog: "Maun of the Dead" by Sarah Lotz.

"And why is the supermarket even open? There’s very little of any¬thing on the shelves. A few jars of peach jam (now rolling around in my basket), a lonely and tattered box of rusks, a display of Frisco and a solitary roll of one-ply toilet paper. They’ve even bothered to turn the generators on"

Now Posted: Crossed Genres #34 - Monsters.
"The Fire" by Timothy T. Murphy.

“Come watch him work, Marissa.” Leanna smiled at me, gently tugging at my hands. Her smile was as infectious as ever, even with the black eye darkening one side of her face. There was fresh paint highlighting her hair, yellows and oranges running through the Irish ginger in wild streaks. I could only assume that he’d kissed her after punching her.

"Inhuman Resources" by William Gerke.

"She must have weighed ninety pounds soaking wet, but she was a ton of trouble. Power crackled and oozed off her like water from a damp basement wall. I’m about as psychically sensitive as a dump truck, but even I could feel it. My boss could, too. Vern hunched in his big leather chair in the same defensive half-crouch he used during audits."

"Waiting in the Light in the Hungry Months" by Megan Engelhardt.

"We drove out to the dunes early one winter evening, before the rest of the village came. It was warm enough that Pa had thought to bring little Bete and Tan and me to see the suns set before this year’s show. The small golden globe of the second sun had just begun to follow its larger brother below the waves when the rumble of an engine broke the stillness."

"Skin and Scales" by Rachel Bender.

"Coils of red and blue scales held him in place, pinning him almost all the way up to his hips. He moved, writhing, whimpering, but not to get away. The man worked his hips mindlessly, thrusting blind, seeking a place to sink his sex that simply wasn’t there."

"Monsters Monsters Everywhere" by Carrie Cuinn.

“Certain?” Paco asked. “Very good meat.” Maybe if I hadn’t already heard the story of how they’d found the goat, freshly spilled blood still steaming in the night air, after scaring off something larger just outside the village. “You are certain you can kill this monster?” he asked, and I nodded.

Serial Fiction
Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck’s Avatar–#15" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"Living on a far-distant planet, Doctor Mormeck works for strange beings that might or might not be angels by conducting surveillance across a hundred thousand alt-Earths. Complicating things are a transdimensional race of intelligent komodos wreaking chaos throughout the worlds"

@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Three" by Abner Senires.

"The Airpark Cafe occupied the second floor of a two-story building that sat next to a gray aircraft hanger with its doors closed. The ground floor housed the Benton Field Aviation Office, just beneath a wooden staircase."

Audio
@Beam Me Up: "Mr. Bronze" by Phil Voyd, adapted by Kit St. Germain, performed by full cast.

"Ben, the 'star' of tonight’s outing is a consummate body builder, working all the way from a literal 90 lb weakling to wining the Mr. Bronze trophy. Everything was going right in his world, that was until he found this weird photo album, then things got decidedly worse."

@Cthulhu: "The Damned - part 4"

"Another week, another episode of the Cthulhu podcast. This week's show contains the next part of "Through the Brazilian Wilderness", and the next chapter of "The Damned", don't get scared!"

@PodCastle: "Braiding the Ghosts" by C.S.E. Cooney, read by Kara Grace.

Reshka liked to say, “I’m not above keeping ghosts in the house for handmaids and men-of-all-work. There must be ghosts for sweeping, for scrubbing, ghosts for plunging the toilets or repairing the roof, ghosts to fix the swamp cooler and to wash and dry the dishes.

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The Starter - Episode #35" by Scottt Sigler.

"Second-to-last episode, Junkies! Quentin and his fellow gridiron warriors square off against the Mars Planets -- winner stays in Tier 1, the loser is sent back down to Tier 2. The time for talk is over (except, of course, for a rousing pre-game speech by Quentin himself). Let's get it on!"

@19 Nocturn Boulevard: "The Dunwich Horror - Part 1" by H.P. Lovecraft, adapted by Julie Hoverson, performed by full cast.

"A trio of professors uncover something dreadful in a backwater town."

The Chiaroscuro Correction

2011-10-10T20:56:00.002-05:00

I'm very pleased to report that the earlier comment about the latest issue of The Chiaroscuro being its last was completely wrong. An editorial change was misread. The Chiaroscuro is a great eZine and I'm very glad it is continuing. Apologies for any confusion.

eZines and Audio Fiction

2011-10-06T20:45:00.015-05:00

A few more cool freebies to start the weekend.

Fiction
Now Posted: Aurealis #45 [Via SF Signal]
"Aurealis is the Australian magazine of fantasy, science fiction and horror. It has been publishing continuously since 1990, but this issue is its first e-publication. Aurealis #45 features the return of the legendary bunyipslayer in a brilliant story by Lachlan Huddy, a harrowing fairy tale from Aimee Smith, and an interview with Glenda Larke, as well as reviews, news and more. "

Now Posted: Theaker's Quarterly #38.

“The Lives and Spacetimes of Thornton Excelsior” by Rhys Hughes.
“The Daylight Witch” by Jim Steel.
“Off and On Again” by Alison Littlewood.
“Old Preach’s Gods” by Z.J. Woods.
“Better than Llandudno, eh?” by Michael W. Thomas.

Now Posted: Stone Telling #5 featuring speculative poetry by Patricia Monaghan, Yoon Ha Lee,
Shira Lipkin, JT Stewart, Delia Sherman, Erik Amundsen, Sofia Samatar, Alexandra Seidel, Elizabeth McClellan, Sonya Taaffe, Koel Mukherjee, Jennifer Givhan, Mike Allen, Eliza Victoria.

Audio
@Classic Tales Podcast: "The Lord of the Dynamos" by H.G. Wells, read by B.J. Harrison.

"Azuma-zi came to London from the dark jungles of Asia. Nearly penniless, he secures a job and is constantly bombarded with verbal and physical abuse. But to Azuma-zi, each beating holds a hidden justification. For he alone has uncovered the secret of the Lord of the Dynamos."

@Escape Pod: "Playing Doctor" by Robert T. Jeschonek, read by Josh Roseman.

"The problem with having a crush on your mad scientist boss is, every day she doesn’t see how wonderful you really are seems like the end of the world."

@Pseudopod: "The Voice In The Night" by William Hope Hodgson, read by Wilson Fowlie.

No — I DARE NOT,’ replied the voice, and it seemed to me that in its tones I detected a note of stifled craving — as though the owner hushed a mortal desire.”

Tons

2011-10-06T08:24:00.006-05:00

Another huge haul of free fiction including a few awesome eZines. Beneath Ceaseless Skies has four new stories as well as audio fiction, four more stories are up at Four Star Quarterly, there's a new issue of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly up, and a new issue of The Chiaroscuro is now online. There other great fiction and audio fiction including StarShipSofa, PodCastle, Dunesteef, and other greats. And though I'm still not ready to return to regular gaming links, there are four! free gaming eZines linked today, at least a couple of which have fiction.

Illustration from chapter two of the serial "The Box" by Bill Ward.

@AEG: "The Life of the Warrior" by Brian Yoon. Fantasy.

"The last few moments slowed to a crawl. His grip on the tetsubo tightened as the weapon sped faster and faster toward its target. Its target was an ugly face of grey and brown, peppered with ivory bone protrusions that erupted out from random spots. The jade studs of his tetsubo sizzled into the skin on contact and the monster screamed in indignant pain. The weapon splintered and shattered into a thousand pieces even as it crushed its target."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Her Majesty's Guardian" by Donald S. Crankshaw.

"The Council's vote was unanimous," Duke Richard said. He looked ridiculous in a bright yellow doublet. The color would make anyone look foolish, as the other old men seated around the table proved, but its gaiety was especially jarring against Richard's habitual dark expression. "You know your duty, Guardian."

Now Posted: Beneath Ceaseless Skies #79
"The Tiger’s Turn" by Richard Parks. Fantasy.

On the face of the matter I had to agree. While the estate would technically belong to the Imperial Family, I had been assigned the position of steward—quite a handsome income. “Security is the greatest illusion of all, Kenji-san. As for my poverty, it was more of a problem when I was drinking. Don’t mistake me—I am not ungrateful. I am merely puzzled.”

"The Calendar of Saints" by Kat Howard. Fantasy.

“She wasn’t my opponent when I executed her.” I accept mortal commissions; I’ve killed before. Those deaths were honest. Magdalena’s was a waste, and my hands are filthy with it. With a casual nod, from a cleric who knew nothing about the sword-edge of truth, I have been made to feel like a heretic.

"A Spoonful of Salt" by Nicole M. Taylor. Fantasy.

Dr. Benjamin, he was running, running through the rain from one tent to another, trying to save his Story Eater and those pasty wax circles he’s spent so long collecting and, once, he looked up. Mala was sitting there on the top of the sea wall. She wasn’t wearing a rain slicker or even shoes and she was just looking at him like he was a rat, like he was a bug. Like he was something with too many eyes and too many legs and all she wanted to know was what ridiculous thing he was going to do next.

"The Judge's Right Hand" by J.S. Bangs. Fantasy.

A Seraph approaches me with two brands, red‑hot from the coals. The first is Adultery, and it blackens my right cheek. I bite my tongue to swallow the scream. The second is Death, and it sears my forehead. This time I do scream.

Now Posted: The Chiaroscuro - Volume 49 (October–December, 2011).
"In the House of Houses" by Claude Lalumière.

"In the Persian Gulf, there's an island so small and nondescript it appears on no map. Perhaps island is too generous a term for what appears to most eyes as no more than a lifeless bunch of rocks barely rising above sea level."

"La Divina Commedia" by Katherine Mankiller.

"Last time this happened, I was Orpheus."

"Snicker-Snack" by A. D. Bloom.

"He's a meter-tall, dancing fur-belly with mono-molecular edged claws, an embroidered nose, and telomerase chains longer than your arm. He's an unnatural – a custom-coded gene-job, a chromo-tweaked talker gestated in a pickling jar and born full-grown in a pet store. "

"Stars Fell On Alabama" by Jesse Bullington.

"P.J.’s called Peej, an me an he wuz blood brothas from the first time I took Pop’s buck knife out scoutin for Talabands in them hills tween our road an the base. "

@Four Star Quarterly: "Re-Opening Night" by Lou Antonelli.

"This signal wasn't shot through the wormhole. It's spiraling like water down a drain."

@Four Star Quarterly: "Windows" by Gloria Oliver.

"Pressure suit seals--check." Claudia rolled her head in a full circle within her helmet, trying to work out the kinks in her neck muscles. There was always a bit of anticipation and fear whenever she suited up. A cut or leak or malfunction not caught during prep could mean her life.

@Four Star Quarterly: "Closet Enlightenment" by Selina Rosen.

Let me get this straight," she’d replied, making a valiant attempt to keep from reaching for his long neck and strangling him. "You want to go and sit cross-legged with a bunch of other people and listen to some guy with a beard tell you what life’s all about?"

@Four Star Quarterly: "Operation Hell" by Cathy Spangler.

"My supervisor’s voice grated across my psyche like nails on a chalkboard, churning up nausea in my stomach. I resisted banging my head on my monitor. Oh, joy, another wonderful encounter with Hell Supervisor, as I’d dubbed Mr. Turlow."

Now Posted: Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #10

"Queen of the Desert" by Alex Marshall.

"Throughout the endless afternoon he walked the trackless waste. With his coat held above to shield him from the sun’s brutal rays, Derwent toiled — his shadow and his hopes stretching to the empty distance."

"The Workshop of the Lord of the Estuary and the Wages of Heroism" by James Frederick William Rowe.

"It came from the sea, a thing of cold, slime, and teeth. Declaring its presence through murder, it took the lives of three men fishing on the open water before it claimed as its home the estuary at the orifice of the Mor Oirthearach River in Cacke. Ever since it has held this body of water, permitting none to pass but those who pay it in blood."

"Death at the Pass" by Michael R. Fletcher.

"Brushing a thousand years of dirt and rot from his robes, Khraen marvelled at how well preserved he was. Skin, sunken, cracked and grey, adhered to the bones of his long limbs. He’d never been muscular, but now he was downright skeletal."

Serial Fiction
@Paizo: "The Box - Chapter Two: Where the Heart Is" by Bill Ward. Fantasy.

"Noticing the scrutiny, the guard shifted, hooking his thumb into his broad sash, resting his hand close to the curved knife he wore naked and gleaming at his side like the chip-edged cutlass of some Shackles pirate. You had to admire the Sczarni, Kostin thought; they really played the whole Varisian thug act to the hilt."

Audio
@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "Butterfly" by Garth Upshaw. Fantasy.

"Aidan pulled away from my hand. I could feel his finger bones slip and shift out of place."

@Dunesteef: "The Troop" by Harris Tobias. Science Fiction.

"a tale about a sole human survivor on an alien planet, and his attempts to co-exist wit the native creatures there."

@Journey Into: "The Trial of Thomas Jefferson" by David Barr Kirtley. Science Fiction.

"Time travel allows the UN to go back, capture Hitler, and execute him. But why stop there?"

@PodCastle: "The Fall of the House of Usher" by Edgar Allan Poe, read by Eric Luke. Dark.

DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country ; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher.

@StarShipSofa: "Blood Dauber" by Ted Kosmatka and Michael Poore. Science Fiction.

"Bell trudged up the path, pushing the wheelbarrow before him, already sweating under his brown khaki uniform. He squinted in the bright sunlight, eyeing the exhibits as he ascended the hill: the goats and their pandering; the silly, horny monkeys; the slothful binturongs—all moving to the front of their enclosures as he approached. "

Gaming
Now Posted: Fighting Fantazine #7.

Includes "a new 230 reference adventure Queen of Shades by Paul Struth, a "Fact of Fiction" article devoted to Seas of Blood, and the winning entry of the Advanced Fighting Fantasy competition: Stuart Lloyd's The Curse of Meraki (illustrated by Michael Wolmarans)" and more.

Free membership required on next three.
@DriveThruRPG: Hollenthon - Issue 1

Hollenthon is GROMM's premire magazine, containing new units, painting tutorials, new rules and much more.This first issue covers playing mass battles in the world of GROMM, a new faction of barbarians from the Koldaath Mountains, a painting tutorial and much more!

@DriveThruRPG: Savage Insider Issue 2

includes the following: 3 fleshed out adversaries, 9 new weapons, A Savage Insider exclusive add-on for Beasts & Barbarians, Part 2 of the Crypt of the Crystal Lich fiction series, The first in the Echoes of Rome fiction series, Part 2 of the Deadlands comics series The Kid, A sci-fi adventure, And much more!

@DriveThruRPG: Pathways #8.

"How can you say 'No' to a FREE collection of Pathfinder templates, encounters, feats and domains, and all of it bundled together with a new fiction piece by author David Bain? You'd have to be crazy to turn it down. "

Three Free eZines

2011-10-05T09:58:00.016-05:00

All quite good.

Now Posted: Clarkesworld #61
"Staying Behind" by Ken Liu.

"The dead pity us and call us the left behind, as if we were unfortunate souls who couldn't get to a life raft in time. They cannot fathom the idea that we might choose to stay behind. And so, year after year, relentlessly, the dead try to steal our children."

"Pony" by Erik Amundsen.

"Skull Pony is eying me again. He drifts in the paddock, shifting every now and then, always facing me. I don't like him and I don't trust him and I've more than half a mind that thinks the feeling is mutual."

"Silently and Very Fast (Part One)" by Catherynne M. Valente.

"Inanna was called Queen of Heaven and Earth, Queen of Having a Body, Queen of Sex and Eating, Queen of Being Human, and she went into the underworld in order to represent the inevitability of organic death."

Now Posted: Redstone Science Fiction #17 October 2011
"iTime" by Ferrett Steinmetz.

"I’d say that my roommate Rochelle had to have the latest in technology, but that would be incorrect. Rochelle had to have the most expensive thing, and the trendiest thing, but it barely mattered what her accessories did so long as they didn’t clash with her cheerleader’s outfit."

"How We Fall" by Andrew Knighton.

"The air was electric with her presence. Sergeant Grund’s exposed hands and face tingled with it and it sparked like tiny blue flares from the frayed remnants of his parachute harness."

Now Posted: Residential Aliens 5..7 – October 2011
"Rivalry on the Sky Course" by Bryan Thomas Schmidt.

"The alarm on the targeting computer of his VS28 starfighter filled Davi Rhii’s ears. He glanced down to see several blips had appeared."

"Brother Silence" by Karina Fabian.

"His eyes widened to see a dragon, but apparently, he’d heard my story, though I can’t imagine how. He stepped back, bowing."

"The Old Magician’s Club" by Louis N. Gruber

“Enough with the grand entrance, Zando,” said the Great Rappini, shorter, almost bald, a few gray hairs combed over his pate. “Nobody cares anymore.”

"The Fletcher’s Daughter" by Jeff Chapman.

“It can’t be helped,” said the Chamberlain. “And what a scandal would erupt if a princess from a neighboring kingdom snubbed Prince Arwek. Your father wants to flatter Arwek’s family, not insult them.”

"Freedom of Movement" by Steven Saus.

"Allaya straightens the cool pearls about her neck, then runs her dark hands down the stiff pink dress. A glance and sniff at the stove assures her that the ham is almost finished"

Audio Fiction
Clarkesworld: "Staying Behind" by Ken Liu, read by Kate Baker.

Wednesday Free Fiction, Pratt, Liu, and More

2011-10-05T09:49:00.005-05:00

Some very good free fiction this time. I won't say that this is only part one because whenever I say that something comes up to prevent part two.

Illustration for "The Secret Beach" by Tim Pratt.

@AE: "Last Words" by Chester Burton Brown.

"These aren’t fancy robots, mind you — not your Zorannic types with delusions of sentience or anything. These are regular machines: butlers and security guards and masseurs, nannies and infantry, forklifts and hookers. They are the image of life, and we’re there to witness their simulation of death."

@Aurora Wolf: "The Hunt" by Julius Vagdal.

"I watch the bead of sweat as it rolls down the face of the lean merchant sitting across the table. It tracks its way over the edge of his jaw, and down his neck only to disappear under the collar of his stained tunic."

@Aurora Wolf: "Captain Bogey of Canine Command: The Ball of Yarn Incident" By Rory Steves.

"Lieutenant Bogey wondered at that; there couldn’t possibly be any fleas aboard Station Frisbee. Bogey paid close attention as the admiral continued."

@Aurora Wolf: "Kitchen Life for the Greater Good" by Opal Edgar.

"Young Lord Freeland was repugnant and even he knew it. Why he bothered us with toothpicks was beyond everyone."

@Aurora Wolf: "If the Shoe Fits" by John C. Tremblay.

"Had she willingly departed from Oldport to ride with the Lord whose disposition was as sour as his stench, she would’ve swallowed her pride and sent for help."

@Anotherealm: "The White Woman" by Robert D. Marion .

"Earon had little time to react before the solar flare exploded beyond the horizon of the heat shield. Doctors called the result “ghosting”. The glare of stellar material is bright enough to cause instant, permanent blindness. The optic nerves die so quickly that the victim feels no pain."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Totemkill" by by Sean Vivier.

"Grant drove. Mel had the back seat and Hart took shotgun. Mel snorted. "Sign looks like a coat-of-arms."
"What's that?" Grant asked.
"That road sign. Stag Rampant, Sable on Or."
Grant had a smile in his voice, if rebuke in his words. "I'm pretty sure that means deer crossing."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Regret Incorporated" by Andy and RJ Astruc.

"Again, nothing to worry about. He tried to stay cool but he could feel his palms sweating around the pen. It was no big deal though. Just a form. Marcus told himself to stop thinking about it, that thinking was only going to make him freak out more"

@Daily Science Fiction: "The Last Seed" by Ken Liu.

"When Linda was in kindergarten, telescopes and probes produced the first fuzzy images of distant planets orbiting faraway stars."

@Fantasy Magazine: "The Secret Beach" by Tim Pratt.

"Though I’m the kind of person who uses the self-checkout line at grocery stores just to avoid the necessity of small conversation with a human cashier, I blurted out, 'Hey, where were you guys swimming?'"

@GigaNotoSaurus: "Jackstraw Magic" by Eljay Daly.

"I don’t need a name, a past, a history, to draw a crowd. I’m nobody, and they watch to see me fail–but I don’t, and I laugh from the joy of it. I flash the bottles from hand to hand in the hot dawn, flash and catch, throw."

@LightSpeed: "Her Husband’s Hands" by Adam-Troy Castro.

"They opened the box and showed her Bob’s hands, resting side by side on a white pillow. The left one lay palm-down, the right one palm-up. The one that was palm-up twitched and waggled fingers at Rebecca when it saw her."

@Philippine Genre Stories: "Escape" by Dean Francis Alfar.

"The last foe fell to the blows of the Whirling Lobster’s good claw, emitting a tart smell as it melted in the dappled forest floor."

@Ray Gun Revival: "Eternal Virus" by Steve Stanton.

"Her house had been locked all day. Of that, Niko could be certain. She had standard webcam surveillance, touch-sensitive alarms, failsafe measures. She lived in suburbia, a single girl safely ensconced in the anonymity of urban sprawl, her illegal nest impregnable to all but the most violent means of forced entry, her vigilance meticulous. There was absolutely no way anyone could have infiltrated the perimeter without her knowledge."

@Short Story Me: "A Duel To The Undeath" by John C. Wilson.

"Gilroy limped backwards, uncertain of what had just happened. Cullen’s blade had found the exposed flesh just above the chausses of his right leg, but his enemy did not press his advantage."

@Strange Horizons: "Destiny, With a Blackberry Sauce" by David J. Schwartz.

"Another thing that happened was that I caught this fish, this gorgeous fat salmon, and it said that it would grant me a boon if I let it go. I said I was pretty hungry so I'd pass."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck (Mountain)–Entry #21" by Jeff VanderMeer.

"Any organism can die, even a mountain. For a person it might be a spore in the eye that burrows into the brain, or a paper cut that creates an opening for more serious infection. For a mountain it might be love unreturned"

@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods - Part Two" by Abner Senires.

"Another photo, this one of a lantern-jawed man with dark eyes half-hidden by a grease-stained khaki ball cap and sporting a day's worth of stubble. The caption on the photo identified him as Sam Cutter, our hired pilot."

@More Red Ink: "Exo-Skeleton Town - part two, part three, and part four" by Jeffrey Ford.

"I would have rather sat on the bowl backwards for a year than take that space flight. It seemed endless, but I spent my time reading books about ancient movies and dreaming what I would do with all my gold after I scored my load."

@Ray Gun Revival: "Thieves’ Honor Episode 16: Game Change" by Keanan Brand.

"Finney clomped back and forth across the wheelhouse, one hand at the radio on her belt, the other hand resting on the butt of a pistol, half of a mismatched pair she’d bartered off an old merchant in the Horatio market."

Audio
@Fantasy Magazine: "The Secret Beach" by Tim Pratt, read by Christian Rummel.
@LightSpeed: "Her Husband’s Hands" by Adam-Troy Castro, read by Kathe Mazur.

Tuesday Free Fiction

2011-10-04T09:12:00.004-05:00

Some good audio-fiction to start things out - more items will be added later.

@Beam Me Up: Episode #281 "Am I still Here?" by James R. Hall and the conclusion to The Dark InSpectre by Jason Kahn.

" Here, in a tale set into the near future where any and everything can be repaired or replaced in a human body, the question is asked…when do you stop being you and become something or someone else that just thinks it is you?"

@Beware the Hairy Mango: Episode 87 - "Second Puberty" by Matthew Sanborn Smith.
@Drama Pod: "The Blue Tower" by Evelyn Smith. Science Fiction.

"Humanity has a new government which is ruled by a seemingly benevolent race of aliens....or are they?"

@Escape Pod: "Night Bird Soaring" by T. L. Morganfield, read by Mat Weller. Science Fiction.

"On his sixth birthday, Totyoalli’s parents took him to the holy city to see the Emperor Cuauhtemoc, but the plane ride proved the most exciting part. He kept his nose to the window, taking in the vast lands of the One World, from the snow-capped mountains of his home in the northern provinces to the open plains of Teotihuacan"

@Misfits Audio: "Jerry Lee" by Colin Thornton, performed by a full cast.

"Before a musician sells his soul for eternal fame he wants proof that the Devil will deliver."

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The Starter - Episode #34" by Scott Sigler. Science Fiction.

"It's a must-win game against the toughest-possible opponent, the defending GFL champion Jupiter Jacks. Quentin & Co. travel to the Sol System for a pitched gridiron battle in the Jupiter Net Colony."

@Drama Pod: "While Whispers Wait - Episode One" by James Sedgwick, performed by a full cast.

"A mysterious mishap in a moblie home park alarms certain residents in the small town of Deilsburgh Pennsylvania who fear that supernatural forces are to blame. The town's newly elected sheriff doubts her ability to step into the job and wonders why her father is opposed to her taking the position."

Friday Free Fiction

2011-09-30T09:22:00.001-05:00

Happy Friday

@Boston Review: "Thirty Seconds From Now" by John Chu. SF. [Via SF Signal]

"One second from now, the beanbag will thunk into Scott’s left palm. From reflex, his fingers will wrap around it before he’ll toss it back up again."

@Daily Science Fiction: "Volition" by Alec Austin.

"T minus three and a half years: In two weeks, Karl Hoestler will graduate from the Akademie Der Zeitreise with an Untersturmführer's commission in Temporal Operations. Karl does not know this yet. At the moment, he stands fidgeting in the chill white hall outside a classroom door, listening to the low voices of his thesis examiners percolate through the gap separating the door from the hallway's polymer tiles."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "Deluge (Part 86)" by Brian Keene. Horror.

"Each of them was armed with more than one weapon. Caterina had a knife from the galley and a broken broom handle that she’d turned into a makeshift spear. Mylon carried a shotgun, and had a pistol and a knife holstered at his waist."

@Author's Site: "Paradigm Shift #10" by Misa Buckley. Paranormal.

"A scream woke me up. It took a moment – and Raul racing into the bedroom, hair deliciously awry – to realise that the sound had come from me. I pushed my fringe off my forehead and felt the hot sweat beaded there."

@Author's Site: "Nothing is Beyond - Cahpters 1-5" by Davy Minor. SF. [via SF Signal]

"As the world around him collapsed, all Drake Ovchinnikov could do was tumble along inside the hurricane. For a while, he thought he might just escape unscathed."

Audio
@Classic Tales Podcast: "The Statement of Randolph Carter" by H.P. Lovecraft, read by B.J. Harrison.

"below me, some peril beyond the radius of the human imagination. But my friend was in greater danger than I, and through my fear I felt a vague resentment that he should deem me capable of deserting him under such circumstances. More clicking, and after a pause a piteous cry from Warren"

@Drabbecast: "Followed" by Will McIntosh.

"She came wandering down the sidewalk like any other corpse, her herky-jerky walk unmistakable among the fluid strides of the living. She was six or seven, Southeast Asian, maybe Indian, her ragged clothes caked in dried mud. Pedestrians cut a wide berth around her without noticing her at all…"

@Pseudopod: "Kavar The Rat" by Thomas Owen, translated by Edward Gauvin, read by David Rees-Thomas. Horror.

"But he’d been a skillful artisan, and remained so. At the beginning of his career, his real specialty had been locksmithing. Ah! Nothing to do with today’s dumb little locks, all identical, with grooved keys and four screws to be slapped up any old where, which came apart with a blow of your fist."

Poe, Asher, and Other Great Free Fiction

2011-09-29T08:57:00.002-05:00

Some quite good sounding ones today.

@Author's Site: "The Women of Whale Rock" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. [Available until Monday]. Contemporary Fantasy.

"Whale Rock’s sheriff, Dan Retsler, considers himself a practical man. But he has no explanation for the horrible deaths that take place on his beach. Nor does he know why so many locals fear the sea. The answer lies in legends of mermaids—not the pretty kind, but the kind that lure sailors to their deaths"

@Author's Site: "The Almost Last Voyage of the Wind-ship Escarpment" by Martha Wells [via SF Signal]

Jai scratched her lip beneath the curve of her tusk, and said, as if to herself, "We could jump over the side, swim for it, until Kiev could pick us up." Foreigners and exiles were only permitted to set foot on the floating city of Issila at the trading platforms, so that was where they waited, the fresh salt-tempered wind pulling at their hair and clothes, the sun warm and bright.

@Subterranean: "Balfour and Meriwether in The Vampire of Kabul" by Daniel Abraham.

"And yet, also I feel the nostalgia of old hunts, old games, old enemies now lost to history, and feel again not the rush of conflict but its echo. And recall the unparalleled eyes of a most singular woman I once knew…"

Serial Fiction
@Paizo: "The Box - Chapter One: Win Some, Lose Some" by Bill Ward. Fantasy.

"Most Chelaxians assume every Varisian’s a thief. In Kostin’s case, they’d be right."

@More Red Ink: "Exo-Skeleton Town (Part 1 of 4)" by Jeffrey Ford. Fantasy.

"An hour ago I came out of Spid's Smoke House and saw Clark Gable scoring a couple balls of dung off an Aphid twice his size."

Audio Fiction
@StarShipSofa: Episode #205 "The Gurnard" by Neal Asher and "Speed of Dreams" by Will Ludwigsen.

@Internet Archive: The LibriVox "The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, Raven Edition, Volume 1"
Includes "The Unparalleled Adventures of One Hans Pfaal," "The Gold-Bug," "Four Beasts in One - The Homo-Cameleopard," "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," "The Mystery of Marie Roget," "The Balloon-Hoax," "Manuscript Found in a Bottle," and " The Oval Portrait."

Midweek Links

2011-09-28T16:41:00.001-05:00

Still short of time but some great free fiction and audio links today including a story by Ursula K. Le Guin.

@Cosmos: "Endangered species" by Joel Richards.

"They're offering a million pounds to send a hunting party back in time... another million if they return with a head."

@Lightspeed: "The Island of the Immortals" by Ursula K. Le Guin.

"Somebody asked me if I’d heard that there were immortal people on the Yendian Plane, and somebody else told me that there were, so when I got there, I asked about them."

Now Posted: Untied Shoelaces of the Mind - Issue 5. SF/Fantasy/Horror flash.

Audio
@Beam Me Up: Episode #280 "After Hours at the Black hole" by C.J. Wolf and "Tale for all the World" by Devin Miller

@Drama Pod: "Image of the Gods" by Alan Edward Nourse.

@Drama Pod: "The Last Evolution" by John Campbell Jr. read by Winfred Henson.

"An evolution involving man and machine.

@Drama Pod: "The Big Fix" by George Oliver Smith.

"The hero of this story needs to fix a race but there is just one problem, everyone can read minds and that makes it tricky."

@Dunesteef: "Death And Michelle Jenkins" by Christopher Munroe.

Michelle’s mother and father aren’t quite sure about their daughter’s most recent choice in her love life. Sure, the kid with the Mohawk and the sternum piercing was not what they’d hoped for, but now she’s going out with The Grim Reaper?

@LibriVox: "Montezuma’s Castle and Other Weird Tales" by Charles B. Cory.

"This is a collection of weird tales inspired from the natural history expeditions of the author"

@Lightspeed: "The Island of the Immortals" by Ursula K. Le Guin, read by Gabrielle De Cuir.
See above.

@PodCastle: "Middle Aged Weirdo in a Cadillac" by George R. Galuschak, read by Norm Sherman.

She raises her head and looks at him: middle-aged weirdo in a Cadillac. Tom Cruise shades; charcoal suit; porkpie hat; looks about 40, like her dad. Probably smokes; a hint of ash about him.

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The Starter Episode 33" by Scott Sigler.

The tension between Quentin and Ju has finally come to a head. Ju's purposefully detrimental antics on the field are hurting the Krakens in more ways than one: the standings, the team unity, and the their ability to excel.

@Cthulhu: "The Damned, part 3" Horror.

Monday/Tuesday

2011-09-27T07:24:00.003-05:00

Just a start, will add more tomorrow.

@AEG: "One Path, Many Truths" by Yoon Ha Lee. Fantasy.

"from Story Team newcomer Yoon Ha Lee, who regales us with tales of those mysterious tattooed monks, the ise zumi of the Dragon Clan!"

@Fantasy Magazine: "Three Damnations: A Fugue" by James Alan Gardner.

"I woke naked in the garden. Nothing grew there—not even weeds. Just withered stalks that looked ages old. Maybe dating back to when things were still okay. The darkness was beginning to brighten. I always came to, just before dawn."

@Subterranean: "Antiquities and Tangibles" by Tim Pratt.

"And yet…happiness…it’s a bit abstract, isn’t it? As the front door says, I deal in antiquities and tangibles. Which is not to say I can’t cope with more aspirational requests–if you asked for the aforementioned wealth or power, or for youth, or beauty, or inspiration, I have items that can grant all those wishes"

Now Posted: Aphelion: The Webzine of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Sept. 2011. Featuring fiction by Jack Dowden, Rusty Keele, Susan Stec, Richard Tornello, Melissa Pryor, Matthew Acheson, Errett Williams, Robin Lipinski, Mike Wilson, Kaye Branch, and Julie Travis.

Serial Fiction
@Kat and Mouse: "Into The Woods- Part One" by Abner Senires.

"Mouse and I had just walked into our shared flat above the Red Dog bar at 20:30 and flipped on the lights, when my phone chirped."

Friday Freebies

2011-09-23T09:35:00.001-05:00

@Daily Science Fiction: "The Ritual of Names in Prague in the Last Days of the New Empire" by Bernie Mojzes.
@Ray Gun Revival" "Flawed Tool" by Steven H. Newton.

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "Paradigm Shift #9" by Misa Buckley. Urban Fantasy.
@Author's Site: "Deluge (Part 85)" by Brian Keene. Horror.

Audio
@Escape Pod: "The Faithful Soldier, Prompted" by Saladin Ahmed, read by Rajan Khanna.
@Pseudopod: "Killing Merwin Remis" by Jason Helmandollar, read by Big Anklevich.

Serial Audio
@The Classic Tales Podcast: "Anthem, Part 2 of 2" by Ayn Rand, read by B.J. Harrison.

Great Freebies and Happy Hobbit Day!

2011-09-22T08:44:00.001-05:00

Some more awesome free genre items today. Another great issue of the bi-weekly eZine Beneath Ceaseless Skies, a new story up at Tor.com, a new issue of the always impressive StarShipSofa, the continuation of Amber E. Scott's story at Paizo, and a couple of audio versions of classic SF stories at The Drama Pod.

Today's illustration is from "The Night Children"

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "Butterfly" by Garth Upshaw. Fantasy.

The train jerked forward the instant I boarded. Steam chuffed, and wheels scraped metal rails. I stumbled against the guard, a beefy, middle-aged halfbreed. She wrinkled her nose and checked me off a list. “Maia Carson. Sit down.”

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The Magick" by Kristina C. Mottla.

“Once a Magick visibly manifests its skills, said Magick must be immediately transported, as community property, to the nearest Hith Auction House in order to establish control over its nascent iniquity pre-sale.”

@Tor: "The Night Children" by Alexander Gordon Smith. Horror.

"There are worse things hiding in the snow than soldiers"

Serial Fiction
@Paizo: "The Seventh Execution - Chapter Three: The Fettered Freed " by Amber E. Scott. Fantasy.

"The moon was a yellow bruise in the sky as I hurried through the streets of Edme. Sweat poured off me as if I raced through a furnace. I ran without seeing, navigating the streets by long practice. I felt I had left part of myself back at home, as if I had lost a limb."

Audio Fiction
@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "Gone Sleeping" by Heather Clitheroe. Fantasy.

"Well, what was I supposed to do? I wished harder. I couldn't just stop."

@The Drama Pod: "Youth" by Issac Asimov. Science Fiction.

"Red and Slim found the two strange little animals the morning after they heard the thunder sounds. They knew that they could never show their new pets to their parents."

@The Drama Pod: "The Burning Bridge" by Poul Anderson. Science Fiction.

"A starship captain has to make a terrible choice. Should they go on or should they turn back?"

@StarShipSofa: Episode #204 "Dolly" by Elizabeth Bear and "Secret Identity" by Paul Cornell.

Holiday
Happy Hobbit Day! Today (Sept. 22) is the birthday of both Frodo and Bilbo Baggins today so do something appropriate to celebrate. Start one of the books, watch one of the movies, raise a toast, or whatever you think is best.

Part 2

2011-09-20T20:03:00.001-05:00

A trio of cool free eZines and a lengthy PodCastle episode featuring a story by Peter S. Beagle.

Now Posted: Ideomancer Speculative Fiction Vol. 10 Issue 3

"Convent Geometry" - Georgina Bruce
"Broken" - Ian Donald Keeling
"Jacob and the Jane Riches" - Jen Volant

Now Posted: Mirror Dance Autumn 2011 with fiction by K. R. Hager, Paul L. Matthews, Stefan Milicevic, Madeline Dyer, and Mike Phillips.

Now Posted: Sorcerous Signals Sep - Nov '11 Issue

"Faery Lands Forlorn" - Frederick Hilary.
"Necromancing the Stone" - R.S. Pyne
"Perfect Present" - DAT Anghelatos
"Serpent's Heart" - Donald Jacob Uitvlugt
"Songs of Frogs" - Laura J. Underwood
"Soul Shard" - Robert William Shmigelsky
"When Cats Are Away" - James S Dorr
"Worthy" - TJ Dipple

Audio Fiction
@PodCastle: "El Regalo" by Peter S. Beagle, read by Emily Smith.

“You can’t kill him,” Mr. Luke said. “Your mother wouldn’t like it.” After some consideration, he added, “I’d be rather annoyed myself.”

Tuesday Freebies Part One

2011-09-20T10:21:00.000-05:00

Some good free fiction, and it's only part 1.

@Daily Science Fiction: "Beauty, Deconstructed" by Adam Colsto.
@Electric Velocipede: "A Taste for Flowers" by Jay Caselberg
@Kasma Science Fiction: "The Floating Otherworld" by Tom Doyle.
@Lightspeed: "Thief of Futures" by D. Thomas Minton.

"For a man who has stolen so many futures, you seem to have no future yourself." He lets this painfully accurate assessment seize hold; then he says matter-of-factly, "Is this what you want for your daughter?"

@Philippine Genre Stories: "A Night On Antioch Lane" by Vincent Michael Simbulan.
@Strange Horizons: "A Box of Thunder" by Lewis Shiner.

"Everyone here," Alex said, "is supposed to have signed the compact that pledged us to nonviolence." He felt like an imposter, piling lies on top of the blatant violation of his own code that was already in progress. "We knew there would be a test sooner or later. This is it."

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "The Journals of Doctor Mormeck’s Avatar–Entry #14" by Jeff VanderMeer.

Monday

2011-09-19T08:44:00.002-05:00

Some cool freebies for Monday morning. Illustration for the LibriVox audiobook "The Big Time"

@Fantasy Magazine: "The Nymph’s Child" by Carrie Vaughn.

"She’d sail off the edge of the world with him. She very nearly had, that time through the Iron Teeth. This was simply another journey, and it would be over soon. Rope around her neck, a moment of fear, then nothing."

@AE: "The Visible Spectrum" by Julian Mortimer Smith. SF.
@AEG: "The First Lesson" by Robert Denton. Fantasy.
@Daily Science Fiction: "Requiem Duet, Concerto for Flute and Voodoo" by Eugie Foster.
@Subterranean Press: "Antiquities and Tangibles" by Tim Pratt.

@Smashwords:

"Gone Green" by A.L. Brown.
"Did You Ever See A Shadow Move?" by James Pratt.
"Anomaly" by Peter Cawdron.
"The Bomb: A Jason Oler story." by David Willoughby.
"The Warden Threat" by David Morrese.
"The Meta Corps - Dream of the Youth" by Toby Gard.
"Whichever Way The Wind Blows" by Jericho Ambrose.
"Little King Henry" by Richard Raley.
"Miracle, Texas" by DeAnna Knippling.
"First Bite: The Wicked Queen's Tale" by Laura Briggs.

Audio Fiction
@LibriVox: "The Big Time" by Fritz Leiber, read by Karen Savage.

"You can't know there's a war on—for the Snakes coil and Spiders weave to keep you from knowing it's being fought over your live and dead body!"

@Antipodean SF: "AntiSF Radio Show 159 Gamma"

Serial Audio
@Author's Site: "The Starter - Episode #32" by Scott Sigler. Science Fiction / Football.
@Beam Me Up: "Part 2 -of Arvies" by Adam-Troy Castro, read by Paul Cole. Science Fiction.
@Cast Macabre: "From Around Here (pt 3)" by Tim Pratt, read by Graeme Dunlop. Horror.

Fiday Links

2011-09-16T09:04:00.003-05:00

A few for Friday.

Now Posted: Absent Willow Review Sept. 15 2011

"The Shadow of Light and Dark" by A.J. French.
"Tick Tock" by Pamela J. Jessen.
"Eidolon Named Fright" by Wendy Rogers.
"These Bones" by Anna Sykora.
"The Machine" by Joseph Romel.
"The Butterfly Tree" by Freya Pickard.
"Chain Gang" by Christopher Mari.
"The Last Day" by Patrick Shand.
"Dear Diary" by Dawn Napier.
"The Fishes" by Corinna Sara Bechko.
"Heads Number One" by T. Eric Bakutis.
"Talking to the Moon" by Chris Castle.

@Baen.com: "Honorverse Tech Bu9" by David Weber.
@Daily Science Fiction: "Requiem Duet, Concerto for Flute and Voodoo" by Eugie Foster.

Serial Fiction
@Author's Site: "Paradigm Shift #8" by Misa Buckley.

Audio Fiction
@Escape Pod: "Flash Extravaganza"
@Pseudopod: "Looker" by David Nickle, read by Steve Cropper. Horror.

Serial Audio
@Classic Tales Podcast: "Anthem, Part 1 of 2" by Ayn Rand, read by B. J. Harrison.