Fantasy and Dark Fiction and Audio, and Classic SF - All Free

Some great free fantasy and dark fiction today as three of the premiere sites (Tor, ChiZine, and Beneath Ceaseless Skies) have new stuff. Classic SF, Flash Fiction and Poetry, and some cool audio (fantasy, dark, and wuxia). And now cool Comics.

Illustration for "Shannon’s Law" by Cory Doctorow, also added since the partial posting earlier.








@Tor.com: "The Iron Shirts" by Michael F. Flynn.
"To the battles of 13th-century Ireland come new warriors...from across the Western Sea."



Also at Tor.com: "Shannon’s Law" by Cory Doctorow.
"When the Way opened again, the day I turned seventeen, I didn’t hesitate. I packed everything I could carry—every scratched phone, every half-assembled laptop, every stick of memory, and every Game Boy I could fit in a duffel bag."


@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: Issue #68 featuring fantasy fiction:
"The Finest Spectacle Anywhere" by Genevieve Valentine.
"I could hardly keep from laughing at the rubes that panicked and then applauded three times as loud as they would have if it had all been perfect. Elena and the others had Boss's copper bones—what could happen to them that couldn't be mended?"

and "Buzzard's Final Bow" by Jason S. Ridler.
"They ran through the tumbles and bumps, grips and leaps, Buzzard tossing and turning with Razor as she barely noticed, thrashing about to make it look real."

@ChiZine.com: The Chiaroscuro: Volume 47, Week 5 featuring Dark fiction.
"Dogs Want to Eat You" by Ralph Robert Moore.
"Upstairs, in the bedroom, flat on his back, paralyzed, James heard, from below, his wife’s moans, her final scream."

"Fortune" by Shira Lipkin.
"A man, shuffling and reshuffling a deck of oversized cards . . . one leg extended, one folded, a mirror of Vegas Vic above him. He was talking to himself—no, singing, with the buzz and hiss of neon drowning him out almost completely."

"The Performer" by Philip Nutman.
"None of this came as a surprise: he had suggesting remaking Cammell & Roeg’s PERFORMANCE as a joke just to piss off the suits at Warners, who’d paid him $3 million for a two picture deal after his remake of Disney’s 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA had grossed $190 M domestically."

"Dirty Money" by S. E. Ward.
"Quick-change, one hand to the next, liquid far from its source. A bill, a suck; money, money, money. Pop the cap. Drink it down. Ooze, jet, scarlet, spray. Wait for the shudder of someone else’s sight to pass."

"The Spider House Rules" by Rain Graves.
"They had a club like important boys do, and there were secret words, secret things to keep in boxes like a candle and matches, secret handshakes, and secret things to do. It was important to be secret; no girls allowed."

and "Last of His Kind" by Sandra McDonald.
"Those of you who still explore graveyards and scour old records might as well hang up your wooden stakes, or use them to mark seedlings in vegetable gardens, or burn them in fires; the vampiri are gone, finito, they no longer swoop through the sky or glide before mirrors which do not show their reflections."

Classic SF
@The Internet Archive: "The Lost Machine" by John Beynon Harris (John Wyndham), from Amazing Stories (April 1932 ) [via Marooned - Science Fiction & Fantasy books on Mars].
"Psychologists -- and others -- are greatly concerned about the effects -- possible and assured -- of machines and the machine age, on human life and endeavor. But who has ever stopped to consider the possible reactions -- or thoughts -- of the advanced machine of the future?"

@Project Gutenberg: Four Philip K Dick science fiction stories have been updated with additional e-book options.

• The Crystal Crypt
  
• Mr. Spaceship
  
• Second Variety
  
• The Variable Man
  

Serial Fiction
@Paizo.com: "Two Pieces of Tarnished Silver" by Erik Mona, Chapter Three: Beyond the Demon Lens.
"For a long moment Korm Calladan felt only a pleasant warmth. Gone were the fears of starvation, the thrill of combat in the cramped underdeck of the Queen's Lament, the suspicion of the Lady Iranez and her imposing crew."







@Dark Fiction Magazine: Issue 7: "Sacred Fire" [via Free SF Reader].
"Dark Fiction Magazine is a monthly, short fiction podcast magazine, bringing [. . .] the very best that horror, fantasy, and science-fiction has to offer."

"Xenos Beach" by Graham Joyce, read by Danny Davies.
"The Winter King" by Liz Williams, read by Kim Lakin-Smith.
"Who Slays The Gyant, Wounds The Beast" by Mark Chadbourn, read by Marty Perrett.
"Paying For Rain" by Jaine Fenn, read by Emma Newman.

@Beneath Ceaseless Skies: "The Fairy Gaol" by Heather Fawcett, from Issue #66 (Apr. 7, 2011).
"I will fashion a dagger worthy of his jeweled throat."

@Kung Fu Action Theater: Kung Fu Action Tales, Episode Four - "The Inuyama Rebellion, Part 1- The Two Samurai"
"Knowing that the declaration of independence will surely bring the deaths of her sons, the clan lord’s wife, Lady Murasaki, has secretly dispatched two of the clan’s samurai -the elder Jiro and his apprentice Masato- to Kurokawa lands in an effort to rescue the boys"







@Every Day Fiction: "His Mother's Son" by JR Hume. SF.
@Flashes in the Dark: "La Muerte" by Cynthia (cina) Pelayo.
@365 tomorrows: "The Vendetta" by Patricia Stewart.
@Weirdyear: "Snowflakes" by Ian Chung.
@Eschatology: "The Icicle" by Rick McQuiston.
@Daily Science Fiction: "Vacuum Decay" by Ramon Rozas.
@ChiZine: [Dark Poetry]

• Mississippi Twilight by Chad Hensley
• Moon Ship Sailing by Robin Mayhall
• Bluebeard by Joanne Merriam
• Comet Flyby by John Park
• Lucan in Averno by Sonya Taaffe

Classic Comics

• @The Horrors of It All: "Demon from the Deep!" (1952). Horror
• @Crosseyed Cyclops!: The Green Planet #1 (1962). SciFi. and many issues of Ghostly Tales.
• @Ditko Comics: "Stranger In The House" (1957) and "Free" (1957). Horror.
• @Fantasy-Ink: "Has-Been" (1955) SciFi.
• @Secret Sanctum of Captain Video: The adaptaion of Dr. Who and the Daleks part 1 and part 2.

Online Comic
Escape From Terra "is a continuing story set in the late 21st Century. and concerns humanity's advance both through outer space and social evolution. People living in the frontier are liberated from traditional power structures and free to develop new customs and rules as may suit them -- although the United World government on Terra (Earth) is envious of colonial success and anxious to establish its grip on human lives and wealth as far as it can." Looks interesting.

Fiction Magazines, H. G. Wells, Comics, and More

A ton of free reading today. Three magazines have their latest issues online, Beneath Ceaseless Skies (a long time favorite) and two I haven't linked to before. Schrodinger's Mouse "Tomorrow's best science fiction today" and LingerFiction, which publishes "stories within the confines of fantasy, science-fiction and horror." Both new magazines were found via Kristine Ong Muslim's website. Also chapter one of a new Erik Mona story, classic genre fiction, flash fiction, and a boatload of comics. Today's illustration is for "Batmen of Luna" in the comics Section below.







Beneath Ceaseless Skies has its 67th issue online with:
"Memories of Her" by Greg Linklater.
"My hand is seamed with quartz and gravel. It used to have folds of skin a witch could trace. No fingernails now, only the squares I scratched with a rusty blade for some reason I’ve long since forgotten."


"Dancing the Warrior" Part 3 by Marie Brennan.
"Kerestel decided quickly enough that he wouldn’t tell anybody—but he didn’t have to. Silverfires were trained to notice things, after all. Marwen spotted it the next morning, and before breakfast was over the uproar had begun."

And audio fiction "Love, Resurrected" by Cat Rambo from Issue #65.
"Three years after her death, she still labored in his service."


Schrodinger's Mouse has its Spring 2011 issue online with fiction and poetry.
"In Service of a Greater Cause" by Alex Shvartsman.
"Her head held high and her hand squeezing a small silver cross pendant, Susan Pennell walked into the den of evil."

"SnapBack" by John F. D. Taff.
"Personnel Report: Two agents present situations where input is necessary. Possible termination of grid access and extraction of agents may be necessary. Highlights below. Detailed report will be filed per Protocol 7 indices."

"Jane's Head" by Vincent Scarsella.
"Dearest Jane, I have your head. It's frozen, of course, preserved the past three years in a stainless steel box filled with liquid nitrogen"

"Almost Nighttime" by Kristine Ong Muslim.
"Like the loneliest kettle in the world, / it totters on creaky joints and pours"

"Inner Circles" by Pat Tompkins.
"a moon to planet / as Io to Jupiter"


The April issue of LingerFiction is online with:


"The Hiders" by Heather Fowler.
"We hid because it lowered our chances for selection. All knew of the agreement accepted with the Kharal years ago, and, at each interval, on the appointed day, until the act had been completed so that we might recommence our regular activities"

"The Tare in the Garden" by George W. Latimer, Jr.
"Evan scanned the surroundings. No other weeds had sprung up. It was not a stray from the wild flowers in the naturalized sections of the garden. It was unlike anything he had ever seen."

"Snow in July" by Rick McQuiston.
"There were far stranger things that took precedence in his weary mind. Like the fact that even though the power was not out, the air conditioning still would not work, as well as his ceiling fan, desk fan, and even his refrigerator. "

"Othertongues" by Elizabeth Barrette.
"In the breathless dark between stars, / there is no air to carry sound."

"A Universe Inside You" by Marina Lee Sable.
"You awake one morning / to find your sight turned inward,"


Serial Fiction:
@Paizo.com: "Two Pieces of Tarnished Silver" Chapter One by Erik Mona.
"According to the navigator, the Queen's Lament had been less than a week from Quantium when the winds died, and the long voyage from distant Vudra had left them but a few days of provisions when the sails went slack and the ship fell still."

Classic SF/Fantasy:
@Hairy Green Eyeball 3: "Armageddon - 2419 A.D." by Philip Francis Nowlan, from Amazing Stories (Aug. 1928). - The first Buck Rogers story in JPG Scans.
"They had all they needed for their magnificently luxurious and degraded scheme of civilization within the walls of the fifteen cities of sparkling glass they had flung skyward on the sites of ancient American centers, into the bowels oh the earth underneath them, and with relatively small surrounding areas of agriculture."

@Project Gutenberg: The Sea Lady by H. G. Wells (1902). Mermaid fantasy/social satire.
"Such previous landings of mermaids as have left a record, have all a flavour of doubt. Even the very circumstantial account of that Bruges Sea Lady, who was so clever at fancy work, gives occasion to the sceptic. I must confess that I was absolutely incredulous of such things until a year ago." [via Triplanetary]







@365 tomorrows: "Remember O’ahu" by Roi R. Czechvala.
@Weird Year: "Golde’s Mine" by Troy Manning.
@Weird Year: "Dr. Pants" by Colleen Chen.
@Eschatology: "The Created" by Timothy Remp.
@Eschatology: "Nova" by Joe Jablonski.
@Eschatology: "Searching, Hiding, Leaving" by James Bloomer.
@The New Flesh: "What's Knocking At My Door" by Michael Pelc.
@The New Flesh: "Cookie" by James Steele.
@Daily Science Fiction: "Selfless" by Kenneth S Kao.







@The Horrors of It All: "Sinister Return of the Priestess of Baal" from Baffling Mysteries #11 (Horror - Nov. 1952)






@The Warrior's Comic Book Den: "The Jungle" illustrated by Al Williamson, from Eerie (Horror - Nov. 1966).

@Parishi's Vision: Flash Gordon in "The Floating City" IJC #102 (Sci-Fi).

@Pappys Golden Age Comics Blogzine: "Ghost pirates of Skull Valley" from Ranger Comics #54 (Horror).

@The Comic Book Catacombs: Voodah in "Drums of the Tyrant Priestess"from Crown Comics #6 (Adventure - Summer 1946).

@Diversions of the Groovy Kind: Starlord in "Less Than Human" (Sci-Fi).

@Digital Comics Museum: Target Comics V2 #4 and V2 #12 (Both with Spacehawk and other adventure comics) (1941/1942).

@Ditko Comics: "The Thing From Below" from Out of This World #5 [Monster 1957].

@Atomic Kommie Comics: "BatMen of Luna" from Spacebusters #2 (Sci-Fi).

Other Coolness
@Golden Age Comic Book Stories: [Art] Edgar Rice Burroughs galleries of cover and interior art. The Venus Series, Pellucidar Series, and The Mars Series.