Good Freebies

Another collection of great free fiction from many sources! Be sure to check them all out and save them however you like - many won't be available forever.  And check out Regan Wolfrom's SF Signal post for good, accurate free links despite the occasionally crack inspired claims at the beginning of his posts.

 [art from "Stargazer" - linked below]




Fiction
• At Amazon:  "Speculative Fiction The Ultimate Collection" by David K Scholes [Kindle Edition].
     "A collection of some 23 speculative fiction short stories including science fiction, alternate history, science fantasy and an alternate reality story."

• At Author's Site: "Shadows on the Moon" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. Urban Fantasy.
     "They say anything can happen in New York, but I don’t think most of the people who say that take it as literally as the folks in this delicate little fantasy."

• At Author's Site: "Gnome on Girl on Gnome: A Love Story – Part 1 of 2" by Regan Wolfrom.
     "Despite her best intentions, Marguerite Frunklin had never been in love before. She’d been in lust, as had all the girls back home in Ohio when they’d first found out James Franco was studying for a PhD in English, but love was something magical and mysterious to her. It was something she’d been forced to cobble together in her mind with a soulful blend of romantic passages from Twilight and Fifty Shades of Gray"

• At Daily Science Fiction: "Puppet Man" by Cate Gardner.
     "Walter's wife needed a hobby. In Walter's opinion, it was more of a want than a need, but he didn't dare argue the point. When Maeve needed something, she had to have it. After all, it was how they'd become a couple. She paced the living room, fingers working themselves into knots."

• At Nightmare: "Feminine Endings" by Neil Gaiman. Horror.
      "Let us begin this letter, this prelude to an encounter, formally, as a declaration, in the old-fashioned way: I love you. You do not know me (although you have seen me, smiled at me, placed coins in the palm of my hand). I know you (although not so well as I would like. I want to be there when your eyes flutter open in the morning, and you see me, and you smile. Surely this would be paradise enough?)."

• At Paizo: "Stargazer - Chapter Three: Blood and Information"  by Chris A. Jackson. Fantasy.
     "Katapesh being Katapesh, however, this particular temple was far from the humble hermitages and shrines one might find on a distant coast or otherwise uninhabited island. The head priest wore fine robes, and looked as if it had been some time since he last slept out under the open sky. He sat at a beautiful wooden table next to the reflecting pool, and looked none too pleased at being interrupted."

• At Tor.com: "Super Bass" by Kai Ashante Wilson. Fantasy.
     "Gian returns to Sea-john from the Kingdom's wars certain that he has skills beyond killing, death and destruction. He needs to prove to himself that love is just as strong, if not stronger, than his hate. The Summer King gives him this opportunity."

Flash Fiction

• At Beware the Hairy Mango: "Newtreesean" by Matthew Sanborn Smith. Audio. Weird.
• At Beware the Hairy Mango: "Computer Porn" by Matthew Sanborn Smith. Audio. Weird.
• At Daily Science Fiction: "Airship Hope" by Laurel Amberdine. 
• At Flashes in the Dark: "The Beginning" by Dave Dormer.
• At Flashes in the Dark: "The Eleventh Hour" by Michael A. Kechula. Horror.
• At Nature: "An Alien Named Tim" by Michael Haynes. Science Fiction.
• At Quantum Muse: "Cold" by Harris Tobias.
• At 365 Tomorrows: "The Seven Year Scream" by Aldous Mercer. Science Fiction.
• At 365 Tomorrows: "Home Is Where the Heart Is" by Roger Hammons. Science Fiction.

Audio Fiction
• At Clarkesworld: "The Banquet of the Lords of Night" by Liz Williams.
     "The growing rain blurs the lamps of the Isle de Saint Luce so that they look like dandelion clocks, their down blown away on the wind. The light makes de Rais squint and peer, but the parcel warms his breast, in spite of the rain. Heat seeps through him like the taste of honey."

• At LibriVox: "Time Crime" by H. Beam Piper. Science Fiction.
     "The Paratime Police had a real headache this time! Tracing one man in a population of millions is easy--compared to finding one gang hiding out on one of billions of probability lines!"

• At LibriVox: Astounding Stories 01, January 1930
      "In January of 1930 a new magazine with a flashy color cover appeared on newsstands, Astounding Stories of Super-Science. Filled with stories of adventure, sometimes with only a tinge of science, this magazine was to host and nurture many science fiction giants like Murray Leinster and Ray Cummings and would help inspire many of the writers of the 'Golden Age of Science Fiction.'"

• At 19 Nocturne Boulevard: "Scream Queen" Horror.
      "Tiffany Romaine, an aging star of direct to video horror, finds things to not be what they seem at the horror convention 'Schlock-O-Con!'"

• At PodCastle: "Oracle Gretel" by Julia Rios. Fantasy.
     "Gretel was in love with her boss. Ms. L. Thorne spoke in short, clipped sentences, and when she smiled, which was rare, it looked like the curved edge of a wicked blade."

• At StarShipSofa: "Mitigation" by Tobias Buckell & Karl Schroeder. Science Fiction.
     No Description

Other Genres

• Audio at Every Photo Tells: "Obscurities – Part 03" by Mick Bordet.
• Audio at Forgotten Classics: "The Mouse in the Mountain, chapters 7-8" by Norbert Davis. Noir.
• Fiction at The New Yorker: "The Dark Arts" by Ben Marcus.

Part Two

A ton of great freebies for part two of today's links. More later if possible. (Photo for Selected Shorts in audio fiction below)










Fiction
• At AE: "First Date" by David Tallerman. Science Fiction.
     "How many nights has Johnny walked by the House of Mirrors? How many times has he glanced at its drab plastic facade and wondered? He was never scared to come, but they take the rules seriously in the House, it’s all legit, and if your biomet says you’re under twenty-one they won’t so much as look at you. So Johnny waited — not with patience, but with determination stubborn as faith. And now it’s time. Tonight he can do more than look."

• At Author's Site: "Craters" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. Science Fiction.
     "What they don’t tell you when you sign up is that the work takes a certain amount of trust. The driver, head covered by a half-assed turban, smiles a little too much, and when he yes-ma’ams you and no ma’ams you, you can be lulled into thinking he actually works for you."

• At The Colored Lens: "Blessings by the Shade" by S. L. Nickerson. Alternative History. Mythic Fantasy.
     "They still tell stories about the day I was born, of how a lilac comet streaked across the stars and the volcano ceased spitting fires to the heavens. They call it omens but I call it a conspiracy of convenience. This is what made me High Priestess, because I am blessed."

• At Cosmos: "Angels Call in Strange Disguise" by Christopher K. Miller.
     "The clown’s presence means that you are, in all probability, going to die tonight. There’s not much your sailfone hasn’t told you. They don’t send these clowns to just anyone."

• At Daily Science Fiction: "The Tying of Tongues" by Kristi DeMeester. 
     "When the hooded woman came to our village, her bloodied skirts trailing behind her, the old mothers whispered behind chapped hands, and the animals found their holes and hid."

• At L5R: "The Sparrow’s Fate - Part 1" by Robert Denton. Fantasy.
     "When Moshi Rukia awoke on the third and final day of her visit to the Suzume Hills, she looked out her window to find the valley covered in a thick layer of snow. She knew winter came quickly in the valley, she just didn’t know it would be this quickly."

• At Lightspeed: "The Sense of the Circle" by Angélica Gorodischer. Science Fiction.
      "Have you seen those houses on Oroño Boulevard, especially the ones that face east, those dry, cold, serious, heavy houses, with grilles but without gardens, maybe at the most a tile patio paved like the sidewalk? In one of those houses lives Ciro Vázquez Leiva, Cirito."

• At Lightspeed: "The Dream Detective" by Lisa Tuttle. Fantasy.
      "In the beginning, I was not attracted to her at all. Quite the opposite. I don’t know if it was intentional on her part, and honestly, I’m not the sort of dick who always judges women on how hot they are, but if there’s any situation in which a person’s attractiveness matters, I think everybody would agree it’s a blind date."

• At Weird Fiction Review: "The Love of Beauty" by K.J. Bishop.
     "Near the middle of the night, Seaming dithered in front of the brick arch – formerly a minor gate in the old city wall and now a decoration in a lane. If there existed a main entrance to the Ravels, it was that arch. It stood only half a furlong from the glitz of Cake Street, but the short distance marked a change of register from the demimonde to the underworld proper."

• At The WiFiles: "God’s Great Acrimony" by D. C. Golightly. Speculative Fiction.
     "I will always savor the taste of blood. Even though I starve myself of its nourishment for strictly selfish reasons I can’t help but crave the bitter embrace of its crimson flavor."

Flash Fiction

• At Daily Science Fiction: "Skipping Stones" by Devin Miller.
• At Every Day Fiction: "A Day Before All of Those Nights" by Sarah Crysl Akhtar. Fantasy. 
• At Quantum Muse: "The Collider" by Harris Tobias.
• At Strange Horizons: "Origin" by Heather Sommer. Speculative Poem. Audio.
• At 365 Tomorrows: "Extremophile" by Aaron Koelker. Science Fiction.
• At 365 Tomorrows: "The End of the Extinction" by Isla Kay. Science Fiction.
• At 365 Tomorrows: "Ascensual" by Daniel Martin Fairbairn. Science Fiction.

Audio Fiction
• At Author's Site: "The MVP Episode #24" by Scott Sigler. Science Fiction. Football.
   No description.

• At Beam Me Up: "Part 4 of Know How Can Do" by Michael Blumlein.
    "Of course we'll wait. How silly of me to think otherwise. Science begins wit h observation, and Sheila Downey is a scientist. We'll watch and wait together, al l three of us, the woman who made me what I am, the worm that isn't there, and me."

• At Clarkesworld: "86, 87, 88, 89" by Genevieve Valentine.
    "You are part of a vital effort to recover evidence of terrorist activity preceding the Raids, and on a larger scale, to preserve the heritage of a historic neighborhood of New York City."

• At Cthulhu: "House on the Borderland, parts 20 and 21" by William Hope Hodgson.  Horror.
     No description

• At Fantastic Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs: "Episode 08 - The Beasts of Tarzan" Adventure.
     "Tarzan has fallen into Rokoff’s trap. Pursuing the Russian, Tarzan has left his comrades behind to forge ahead. He comes to a tribe of cannibals who report that Rokoff is a day ahead of them"

• At LibriVox: "Jewels of Gwahlur" by Robert E. Howard. Fantasy.
     "Conan The Barbarian is after fabulous treasure in this exciting story. But he finds himself in more difficulties than he had counted on. Crafty and powerful human opponents seek to skin him alive, bestial mutations seek to rip his arms off, denizens of the deep want to devour him whole and scantily clad dusky beauties try to waylay him at every step."

• At Lightspeed: "The Sense of the Circle" by Angélica Gorodischer. Science Fiction.
     Described Above.

• At Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences: "Lost Waters" by Kreg Steppe.
     "Daniel Pleasant, agent of the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences, is assigned to the United States of America to track down some missing items from the Archives. Pleasant is partnered up with a clankerton from the Office of the Supernatural and Metaphysical (O.S.M.) Elijah Paxton, and together the two set off to track the missing Archive items, their power rumoured to be able to bend time and space itself."

• At Protecting Project Pulp: "Adventure’s Heart" by Albert Dorrington. Adventure.
      "A curiously carved throne of sandalwood stood at the far end of the chamber, its highly polished sides glinting with innumerable pearls inset. Above the throne gleamed a naked skull." - First published in Top-Notch, May 1, 1922.

• At Slected Shorts: "Expect the Unexpected"
     "Guest host Neil Gaiman presents tales with surprises. Jane Yolen’s “The Babysitter” is a contemporary Gothic with a twist; James Thurber’s classic “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” introduces a milquetoast with attitude; Ray Bradbury’s “The Pedestrian” anticipated our media driven lives; and Thurber’s “The Wood Duck” seems to have nine lives."

• At Toasted Cake: "Don't Look Down" by Anatoly Belilovsky.
     "A whistling in my ears: wind. It's called wind. I'm flying, flying in the wind, under the blue that's called the sky, toward the brown that's called the ground. I feel it push my hands, my legs, my face. I feel a weight against my back."


Other Genres

• Audio at The Way of the Buffalo: "The Chase" by Ken Liu. Surreal. Flash.
• Audio at Crime City Central: "Oedipus Shrugged" by Copper Smith.
• Audio at Every Day Fiction: "Twist Twist Shake" by E.M.Pearson. Suspense. Flash.
• Fiction at The New Yorker: "The Judge’s Will" by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala.
• Flash Fiction at Every Day Fiction: "Love Is All Around" by Raine.

Poe and Mo' Freebies

More good freebies.There are quite a few horror stories today, including PRI - Selected Shorts reading a couple of classic Poe stories. Enjoy. More as soon as possible.

[Art from "Horrors of the 13th Stroke" in Comics below]




Fiction
At Black Gate: “A Phoenix in Darkness” — Part IIBy Donald S. Crankshaw. Fantasy.
       "And now the Domini in the guise of journeymen were back. He wondered how they had found him while he was on patrol. He wanted to avoid them, but that did not seem possible with the two of them walking straight toward him."

At WiFiles: "The Downfall" by D. Robert Grixti. Speculative Fiction.
     "Here is a middle aged man. He is standing in front of a large mirror in an unkempt washroom. His greying hair is dishevelled, as if he has just climbed out of bed, and a five o’ clock shadow darkens the bottom half of his face."

At Strange Horizons: "Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad" by M. R. James. Horror. 1904.
     ""I suppose you will be getting away pretty soon, now Full Term is over, Professor," said a person not in the story to the Professor of Ontography, soon after they had sat down next to each other at a feast in the hospitable hall of St James's College."

Flash Fiction

• At Daily Science Fiction: "Don't Look Down" by Anatoly Belilovsky.
• At Quantum Muse: "The Midnight Slasher Creep" by Gordon Rowlinson.

Audio Fiction
At Author's Site: The MVP episode 3 by Scott Sigler. Science Fiction. Football.
      "Quentin and the Krakens square off against the Prawatt in "the game," a hard-hitting, lethal contest that has it roots all the way back to Old Earth"

At Ever Dayday Fiction: "It Could Be Us" by Alexander Burns. Flash. Science Fiction.
     "The dissident pointed us to a cafe downtown. I took officers in plain clothes, but we were recognized. A few people took off on bicycles, shading their faces. No matter. The block was sealed and they would be picked up at the perimeter."

At LibriVox: Short Ghost and Horror Story Collection Vol. 018
     "A collection of twenty stories featuring ghoulies, ghosties, long-leggedy beasties and things that go bump in the night. Expect shivers up your spine, the stench of human flesh, and the occasional touch of wonder."

At PRI: Selected Shorts - Tales of Terror from Edgar Allan Poe.
      Best-selling fantasy writer Neil Gaiman joins SHORTS literary commentator Hannah Tinti for a celebration of that master of the macabre, Edgar Allan Poe. The program features two Poe classics, “The Tell-Tale Heart" and “The Black Cat,”

At Toasted Cake:  "Dyscrasia" by Gord Sellar.
     "You can't finish med school and still be weirded out by corpses. It's impossible. You're used to the cold, the stiffness, the lifeless stare: they're familiar, even comfortable. But sometimes older, deeper instincts kick in. Sometimes you meet their eyes, or touch their icy skin, and shiver"

Comics

• At Atomic Kommie Comics:  "Invasion from the Abyss" Science Fiction. 1951.
• At Crime & Punishment: "Vampires & Werewolves from Pluto" Sci-Fi. Horror. 1940.
• At The Horrors of It All: "Ghouls Rush In / Beneath the Grave" Horror.  1952/1954.
• At Pappy's: "Doorway to Death / Assignment Horror." Horror. 1954.
• At Pappy's: "The Thing From the Lake / Horrors of the 13th Stroke" Horror. 1952/1953.
• At Seduction of the Innocent: "Vengeful Curse" Horror. 1953.

Other Genres

• Audio at Crime City Central: "Work In Progress" by Scott Nicholson. Mystery.
• Audio at Tales of Old: "Mutiny" by Gary Ives. Historical Fiction. World War I.
• Flash Fiction at Every Day Fiction: "The Pumpkin Master" by Gretchen Bassier.

Tons of Free Fantasy, Science Fiction, and Dark Fiction.

Wow, there are a lot of freebies today! First up fiction. Dave is too embarrassed to show his face today after realizing he had been forgetting to link ChiZine since he had returned from his long hiatus. So there are many, free professional dark fiction stories today. There's a Ken Liu story at On the Premises, as well as other good ones (don't miss the cartoons). And many more fiction items, including serials and classic SF.

There are many free audio stories today, which beats the heck out of listening to crappy radio on a long drive. There's flash fiction and poetry, several cool gaming items (all with pictures this one time), and finally a movie. One of the strangest sword and sandals movies ever (though the lizardmen are cool, much better looking than humans.)

This week's QuasarDragon presents will be delayed (until next week) due to the larger size of the story and OCR providing less help than usual.

One last thing. Please tell Dave his is completely wrong with his movie reviews yesterday or I, Lt. Bob, will loose a bad bet.







@ChiZine: Dark Fiction available until July 1, 2011.

• Before and After by Sunil Sadanand
• Holy Mackerels by Ursula Pflug
• I, Cthulhu by Neil Gaiman
• Lament by Tom Piccirilli
• The Girl with the Halo by Matthew Sanborn Smith
• W.W.P.D by Patricia Lee Macomber
• A Bride’s Head, Revisited by Joel Arnold
• Champion of Lost Causes by Scott Emerson Bull
• Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee around a Pomegranate by Stephen M. Wilson
• The Insides by Richard Larson
• Protection by Stewart O'Nan
• Summer of Love by Livia Llewellyn
• The Swordsman by Michael R. Colangelo
• Reflections on the Critical Process by Mike Carey
• Your Essential Unsung Hero by Nancy Kilpatrick
• Marion’s Knot by Lee Thomas
• Noogle Knock by Robert Swartwood
• Requiem by Brian Hodge
• Ten Steps by Richard Thomas
• Chanting the Violet Dog Down: A Tale of Noreela by Tim Lebbon
• Payback by P. D. Cacek
• A Little Glimpse by Steve Eller
• Things I No Longer Like about God by Tarl Roger Kudrick
• Three Legged Bird by Vylar Kaftan
• A Whispered Apocalypse by Simon Logan

On the Premises has its 13th issue up featuring a mixture of Genre and Mainstream stories. (And cartoons!)
"The Visit" by Ken Liu.
"Four hundred fifty-three probes arrived that night."

"Neighbor from Heaven" by Edoardo Albert.
"'You are going to hell and there is nothing I can do to stop it,' he said."

"Inside Out" by Debra Purdy Kong.
“The cops don’t care, she doesn’t take anything major, and she talks to herself a lot. What a nut job.”

"A Brick Wall" by Neil James Hudson.
"After I first came here, I thought I could hear someone behind the wall."

"What Do You Want?" by Rona Yohalem.
"When she hangs up, her heart beats so rapidly, she’s afraid she’ll collapse. Maybe it’s a mistake."

"A Dead Profession" by Frank Dutkiewicz.
“No one’s died in over eighty years, Paul. What if he’s not the first? What if they can’t find out what happened? What if…?”

and "Mornings with AJ and Jen" by Thomas Cannon.
"'Do you know why I picked your show?' the gunman asked."

@Daily Science Fiction: "The Ambiguity Clock" by Lavie Tidhar,
"Bangkok, eleven o'clock at night: Soi Cowboy a street of loud music, loud laughs, pheromone generators pumping their wares into the atmosphere, truflesh dolls dancing, men walking with glazed eyes and happy smiles--all but for the two who were following him."



@Analog Science Fiction and Fact: "Phantom Sense" by Richard A. Lovett & Mark Niemann-Ross. (2010).
"I’ve never understood how it could be stalking if all you’re trying to do is keep her safe. I just want to be a good father. Make up for all those years of being AWOL because CI-MEMS is a full-time job. You can’t be a father and CI-MEMS."


@Asimov's Science Fiction: "The Day the Wires Came Down" by Alexander Jablokov. On title page here or right click to save PDF.
"Mother had gone home with a mechanical device for chopping tree roots out of drainage pipes and left her offspring to their mission. Arabella should have been getting home herself, to prepare for her going-away party, but instead she persuaded her mother that Andrew couldn’t handle finding Father an appropriate birthday present on his own."

Serial Fiction
@Ray Gun Revival: Thieves’ Honor Episode 14: Head Games, Part 1 – Keanan Brand.
“Aye, ma’am, that may be, but you’re in a colonial military facility. With a hospital. If they set you free so easily after such a grave accusation, that means there’s an implant to track you for the rest of your life. Is that the kind of freedom you want, ma’am?”

@White Wolf Publishing: "Silent Knife, part 3" David Nurnberg
"In Ariadne’s room—her cell—it was always night. She didn’t need the lamp on her desk, didn’t even know if the bulb still worked. Years ago, she had wanted it as a reminder of her old life. Now, it was only a piece of jetsam she hadn’t yet gotten around to disposing of."




Classic SF
@F&SF: "12:01 P.M." by Richard A. Lupoff, from F&SF (Dec. 1973).
"What frustration, Castleman thought, if he ever did succeed in making Rosenbluth realize that the strange phenomenon he had theorized was an actuality, had taken place, and was recurring at one-hour intervals."







@Munseys and Project Gutenberg: "One Way" by Miriam Allen deFord, from Galaxy Science Fiction (March 1965).
"I thought of every way to save Hal from the Lydna Project and failed ... but the women didn't!"













@Pseudopod: Episode #229 "Man Eat Man" by Mike Irwin.
“The Dumpster Kid is already recounting the tally behind Uncle Sam to make sure that there’s no foul play. When they finish the first vote, he puffs out his chest and in a slightly deeper voice says, ‘Now all those against.’ Again the two go competitively counting heads.



@Escape Pod: Episode #290 "Tom the Universe" by Larry Hodges, read by Mat Weller.
"I permeate this universe, which I’ve named Tom, and guard against its destruction. If someone had done that for the universe I came from, then Mary, my sweet Mary, would still be alive, and I wouldn’t have killed her and everyone else when I accidentally destroyed that universe."


@SFFaudio: Podcast #105 with a complete and unabridged reading of the action/adventure classic The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell, narrated by William Coon.
"A tempest tossed hunter crawls ashore on a mysterious island only to find his way to a creepy castle inhabited by a Russian Count named Zaroff."


@The Internet Archive: Strange Adventure (1945) or right click here to download a zip of the whole collection.
"Strange Adventure aired in 1945 and was a collection of short adventure stories lasting not much longer than 3:30 minutes told by host, Pat McGeehan." The perfect length to mix with songs on your iPod or MP3 player.

@Misfits Audio: Star Rabbit Tracks episode #5 "Who Are You? written by N.J. Rainford, performed by a full cast. SF humor/parody.
"Things aren’t always as they appear- as the Crew of the Jackalope are about to find out!"


@BrokenSea Audio Productions: Maudelayne Series 3 Episode 12: "Seven Years." (Earlier episodes here)
"The beautiful naiad love of Atherton returns, but is trapped inside a mirror. Can he free her without paying the ultimate price?"





@AntipodeanSF: AntipodeanSF Pilot Episode.
"features "Ninja Nemesis" by Crisetta MacLeod, "Zero" by Shaun A. Saunders, and "An Accident Going Somewhere To Happen" by Shaun A. Saunders."







@Flashes in the Dark: "Night" by David Kernot.
@365 tomorrows: "Unleaded" by Garrett Harriman.
@ChiZine: [Dark Poetry]

• He Says "Please" so Nicely by Annie Boyle
• Some Secret Symphony by Donna Burgess
• Tea Party Vamp by Marge Simon
• The Dead Gather at Your Feet by Kiel Stuart
• Louis in the Morning by Phoebe Wray
• a promise fulfilled by Brian Rosenberger
• Beachhead by Marge Simon & Michael Fosburg
• Beware of Attics by Andrea Blythe
• Glass, Redux by Robyn Herrington
• Mr. Poe’s Last Express by Ed Lynskey
• ms & mr frankenstein by Phyllis Gottlieb
• The Surrender by Rain Graves w/Artwork by Daniele Serra
• Their Shades Are Legend by Bruce Boston
• After Pompeii by Jennifer Jerome
• Experts on Mortality by R. G. Evans
• Fingernails by P. S. Cottier
• Judas Noose Tavern by Charles Clifford Brooks III
• Young Miss Frankenstein Regrets by Camille Alexa
• Beneath the Stars, in the Earth by Nancy O. Greene
• Children’s Crusade by Donna Farley
• If Only People Weren’t Made Out of Meat by James S. Dorr
• Midnight Grocery Shopping in the Icelandic Sagas by Hugh Thomas
• My Skull, the Garage by Bethany Powell

@The Internet Archive: Vulcan, Son of Jupiter (1961).
Bizarre, dubbed Italian sword and sandals film with two rival gods (Vulcan and Mars) stripped of their powers and sent to Earth. There Vulcan faces Mars and his Thracian allies as well as lizardmen.















@Powers and Perils: The complete 1983 fantasy RPG and (all?) supplements available in PDF scans of the original books as well as re-edited versions (go with the scans). Not a great game, but an interesting look at a different type of "old school" RPG.
"Welcome to adventure! You are about to enter the world of Powers and Perils, a completely new fantasy role-playing system, that breaks from the old standards to create an environment of unlimited, exciting adventure."

I'm not certain how legit this site is, but since it's apparently been up 15 years, it's probably OK.

@Suffer Shack: "The Challenge of Asmodeus" 4E adventure for level 30 characters. More free 4E adventures here.
"It was three earthen years after Obad-Hai’s death, before any proper link was known to the infernal hells. Asmodeus, in his scheming, offered up the archdevil Levistus to take the fall."

Other Cool Gaming Items
@The Land of NOD: [Supervillains] "Kardiak and Psychedelic for Mystery Men!"
A "drop of blood worked its way through the machinery until it touched a tiny silver pentagram hidden deep within, and Kardiak was released"


@Ancient Vaults & Eldritch Secrets: [New Magic Item] "Blood Charm of Klauso" and "Leap Locket of the Elements"
“A red mist!” lamented Koram. “It fogs all I see!”

@Big Ball of No Fun: [New Monsters] "Water Leaper" and "Xiuhcoatl" (statless)
Then he saw it, or rather, them. A half dozen frog eyes floated barely above the surface of the water."

@Sea of Stars: [New Magic Items] "Wepwawet’s Arrows" and "Xanthos’ Manger"
"It flew true, finding its mark in the neck of the enemy scout who fell silently. The hunter quickly closed to make sure the scout was dead. With another prayer to guide the spirit to the lands of the dead, he pulled the arrow free."

@Zalchis: [New Monsters] "Xilmpa" and "Walmakash"
"Xilmpa are huge, hulking, brutish crocodilian warrior-amazons with a taste for uranium."


@A Field Guide To Doomsday: [New Monsters] "Brawlrus" and "Scrawler" (Mutant Future / Gamma World)
"There is anecdotal evidence that brawlruses may be evolving intelligence"

@No Signal: [New Monster] "Bonnacon" Medieval monster (Encounter Critical.)
"Its horns are curved inward, and useless for defense, so the bonnacon uses its dung as a weapon."

@Rather Gamey: "Dead Simple Lock & Trap Mini-game"
"Each lock has a certain amount of cards that determine it's difficulty. A 2d4 roll could easily be used to determine the number of cards, but any amount could be used."




@A Character for Every Game: [Map] "Erdea Manor – the Depths"
"And here, in the depths (in the great cave of area 61) we have further stairs down into the lowest level of Erdea Manor – the Catacombs."

@DriveThruRPG: "Mutants & Masterminds Threat Report #17: Talona"
From Green Ronin.
"The Threat Report is formatted as an update from AEGIS, the American Elite Government Intervention Service, the government agency in the World of Freedom tasked with handling super-powered menaces."




That's all for now.