Archive for Podcasts

Escape Pod 311: The Faithful Soldier, Prompted

First appeared in Apex Magazine

Rated appropriate for 15 and older due to language

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 24:10 — 16.7MB)

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Show Notes

Special thanks to Hugo award winning Starship Sofa for allowing us to use Rajan Khanna’s narration that originally ran November 17, 2010.

The Faithful Soldier, Prompted

By Saladin Ahmed

If I die on this piece-of-shit road, Lubna’s chances die with me. Ali leveled his shotgun at the growling tiger. In the name of God, who needs no credit rating, let me live! Even when he’d been a soldier, Ali hadn’t been very religious. But facing death brought the old invocations to mind. The sway of culture, educated Lubna would have called it. If she were here. If she could speak.

The creature stood still on the split cement, watching Ali. Nanohanced tigers had been more or less wiped out in the great hunts before the Global Credit Crusade, or so Ali had heard. I guess this is the shit end of “more or less.” More proof, as if he needed it, that traveling the Old Cairo Road on foot was as good as asking to die.

He almost thought he could hear the creature’s targeting system whir, but of course he couldn’t any more than the tiger could read the vestigial OS prompt that flashed across Ali’s supposedly deactivated retscreens.

God willing, Faithful Soldier, you will report for uniform inspection at 0500 hours.

Ali ignored the out-of-date message, kept his gun trained on the creature.

The tiger crouched to spring.

Ali squeezed the trigger, shouted “God is greater than credit!”

(Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 310: Flash Extravaganza

Escape Pod 310: Flash Extravaganza is an Escape Pod original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 24:06 — 22.3MB)

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Jenna’s Clocks

By T. F. Davenport

Narrated by Jean Hilde-Fulghum

Wetware Woes

By J. J. DeBenedictis

Narrated by Mur Lafferty

End of the World or Not, I Still Have Feelings

By Daniel Morris

Narrated by Barry Haworth

The Best Cover Band in the Universe

By Andrew Fazzari

Narrated by John Anealio

Honorable Mention for the Escape Pod 2010 Flash Contest!

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Escape Pod 309: The Insurance Agent

First appeared in Interzone, 2010

Rated inappropriate for seventeen and younger due to language and violence

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 36:35 — 25.2MB)

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The Insurance Agent

By Lavie Tidhar

The bar was packed and everyone was watching the Nixon-Reagan match. The fighters were reflected off the bar’s grainy wood countertop and the tables’ gleaming surfaces and seemed to melt as they flickered down the legs of the scattered chairs. The bar was called the Godhead, which had a lot to do with why I was there. It was a bit of an unfair fight as Reagan was young, pre-presidency, circa-World War Two, while Nixon was heavy-set, older: people were exchanging odds and betting with the bar’s internal gaming system and the general opinion seemed to be that though Reagan was in better shape Nixon was meaner.

I wasn’t there for the match.

The Godhead was on Pulau Sepanggar, one of the satellite islands off Borneo, hence nominally under Malaysian federal authority but in practice in a free zone that had stronger ties to the Brunei Sultanate. It was a convenient place to meet, providing easy access to the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and, of course, Singapore, which resented the island’s role as a growing business centre yet found it useful at the same time.

She wore a smart business suit and a smart communication system that looked like what it was, which was a custom-made gold bracelet on her left arm. She wore smart shades and I was taking a bet that she wasn’t watching the fight. She was drinking a generic Cola but there was nothing generic about her. I slid into a chair beside her and waited for her shades to turn transparent and notice me.

‘Drink, Mr. Turner?’

(Continue Reading…)

The Soundproof Escape Pod #11

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You can download the ePub version here.

Greetings dear listeners!

I just returned from WorldCon where I met several listeners, thanks to everyone who came by to say hi! I was able to solicit stories from some pros and talk to some authors about their upcoming work – we’ve got an original piece from James Patrick Kelly coming up that I’m utterly thrilled about. But more on that another month…

The Hugo awards were given out on Saturday, August 20, and the ceremony was a blast. Jay Lake and Ken Scholes brought their clever rapport to the stage and gave a good show with minimal hiccups (to my eyes, anyway. On Jay’s blog he talks about how frantic it was when script pages went missing, etc.) Extra special congrats to Mary Robinette Kowal, who took the prize for Best Short Story (remember you can find “For Want of a Nail” at https://escapepod.org/2011/06/09/ep296-for-want-of-a-nail/ ) and Clarkesworld, the Best Semi-Pro winner that allowed us to use Kate Baker’s fantastic narrations in our Hugo month! You can see the other winners at Escape Pod’s home page.

Awards always serve to split people. While people covet awards, they still manage to convince themselves that the system is rigged, or undeserving works win, or people band behind their friends to skew the voting. I’ve read flat-out boring Hugo winners. I’ve wondered why fantastic stories didn’t make even a nomination. I’ve seen fandom get frothing at the mouth angry over things like websites and podcasts edging into their territory (SF fans afraid of technology and the future. Mind boggling….)

This year the business part of WorldCon featured people that were so mad at last year’s Starship Sofa win (and nomination this year, not to mention the excellent Writing Excuses got a nod for Best Related Work) that they decided to create a new category called Best FanCast. While this does show that they are accepting that the podcast is a medium that will not go away, it’s somewhat sad that some people are now asking “are there enough podcasts to qualify?”

Head, meet desk.

What really worries me is that all podcasts will be pushed into Best Fancast just because of the medium. Escape Pod publishes stories and is a paying market (qualifying for Best Semi-pro Zine). Starship Sofa publishes stories and nonfic commentary/essays and qualifies (or qualified) for Best Fanzine. James Patrick Kelly’s podcast novella Burn is a Nebula winner. Writing Excuses talks about writing and the SF craft, and it’s done entirely by pro writers. Would all of these be pushed into the same category because of the podcast element? Why not put Blackout/All Clear, Asimov’s, and Chicks Dig Time Lords in the same category because they’re all on paper?

I’m not a strong arguer, I admit. It’s not in my nature. But I believe I’m going to have to hit the business meetings next year in order to speak up for podcasts, else we’ll all be shoved to the kids’ table, the one with the rickety leg, just because of our medium instead of our content.

See you in Chicago next year, and at DragonCon this weekend!

—Mur

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Escape Pod 308: Kill Me

First appeared in Helix, 2007

Rated inappropriate for seventeen and younger due to language and violence

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 47:37 — 32.8MB)

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Show Notes

Note- we do not have the ebook rights, but you can read it at Transcriptase!

Kill Me

by Vylar Kaftan

I’m sitting cross-legged on a rock in west Texas, somewhere north of El Paso, bleeding into the dirt. The pose feels like a meditation. I’m fascinated with the knife mark on my left thigh, a shallow slash from hip to knee. It’s surrounded by bruise clusters that look like flowers of broken skin. In the silent desert, I hear only the soft clicking of the car cooling down. Then his urine splashes against the rock behind me, and I hear his zipper when he’s done. The night breeze is icy on my back, drying the blood into clots. He did me well, I admit, glancing up at the full desert moon. If my body survived–which it wouldn’t–I would be scarred, possibly disfigured. The welts on my back throb like electricity, and everything–the moon, the desert, the wind–is alive with me.

He walks in front of me. I look up at the man who brought me all the way from Denver. He looks like a black dog, matted and angry, and growls like one too. My eyes travel to the cluster of thick hair springing from his shirt neck. He folds his arms over his chest.

“The night’s almost over,” I remind him.

He scowls. “Get in the trunk.”

I hesitate–he paid me to do the shy-girl act, a popular one–and he grabs my arm. He hauls me over the rear bumper into the trunk of his ’33 Axis. He slaps me once across the face–not as hard as I expected–and crumples me into the tight compartment. He slams the trunk closed, catching my hair in the door. I try to pull free, but it’s no use. I don’t think he meant that part, but he doesn’t seem to notice the long trail of hair hanging out of the trunk. The car door opens and the ignition starts. I tug on my hair once more and then relax, concentrating on where I hurt, where my body throbs with pain.

As many times as I’ve done this, I still try to experience it all. Because it’s not every day you experience death. Only every three months.

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Escape Pod 307: Soulmates

First appeared in September, 2009 Asimov’s

Rated appropriate for teens and up due to language, alcohol dependence, and discussing death of loved ones

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:00:48 — 41.8MB)

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Soulmates

By Mike Resnick and Lezli Robyn

Have you ever killed someone you love – I mean, really love?

I did.

I did it as surely as if I’d fired a bullet into her brain, and the fact that it was perfectly legal, that everyone at the hospital told me I’d done a humane thing by giving them permission to pull the plug, didn’t make me feel any better. I’d lived with Kathy for twenty-six years, been married to her for all but the first ten months. We’d been through a lot together: two miscarriages, a bankruptcy, a trial separation twelve years ago – and then the car crash. They said she’d be a vegetable, that she’d never think or walk or even move again. I let her hang on for almost two months, until the insurance started running out, and then I killed her.

(Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 306: Radio Nowhere

Originally appeared in Campus Chills Oct 2009

Rated Inappropriate for the younger ones, due to language

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 58:33 — 40.3MB)

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Radio Nowhere

By Douglas Smith

On the anniversary of the worst night of his life, Liam stood outside the darkened control room of the campus radio station. Over the speakers, the Tragically Hip’s “Boots and Hearts” was just winding down. Behind the glass in the studio, Ziggy’s small triangular face glowed like some night angel, lit from below by her laptop screen. She looked up, her eyes finding Liam’s in the darkness. Smiling, she wrinkled her nose at him. His own smile slid away, falling into the dark place inside him, the place that was always darker on this night.

Ziggy turned back to the mike as the song ended. “I’m closing with a request from an old friend, to an old friend. This one’s for Jackie, from Liam. A hurtin’ song, cuz he’s still hurtin’. Fifteen years ago tonight…” She looked at him through the glass.

Fifteen years. He closed his eyes. Fifteen years, and it still hurt this much.

Escape Pod 305: Midnight Blue

First appeared in Asimov’s

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 52:20 — 36.0MB)

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Midnight Blue

By Will McIntosh

He’d never seen a burgundy before.  Kim held it in her lap, tapped it with her finger.  She was probably tapping it to bring attention to it, and Jeff didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of asking to see it, but he really wanted to see it.  Burgundy (Kim had insisted on calling it burgundy red when she showed it at show and tell) was a rare one.  Not as rare as a hot pink Flyer or a viridian Better Looking, but still rare.

A bus roared up, spitting black smoke.  It was the seven bus–the Linden Court bus, not his.  Kids rushed to line up in front of the big yellow doors as the bus hissed to a stop.  A second-grader squealed, shoved a bigger kid with her Partridge Family lunch box because he’d stepped on her foot.  All the younger kids seemed to have Partridge Family lunch boxes this year.

“What did you say it did when you’ve got all three pieces of the charm together?”  Jeff asked Kim.  He said it casually, like he was just making conversation until his bus came.

“It relaxes time,” Kim said.  “When you’re bored you can make time pass quickly, and when you’re having fun you can make time stretch out.”

Jeff nodded, tried to look just interested enough to be polite, but no more.  What must that be like, to make the hour at church fly by?  Or make the school day (except for lunch and recess) pass in an eyeblink?  Jeff wondered how fast or slow you could move things along.  Could you make it seem like you were eating an ice cream sandwich for six hours?  That would be sparkling fine.

“Want to see it?” Kim asked.

“Okay,” Jeff said, holding out his hands too eagerly before he remembered himself.  Kim handed it to him, looking pleased with herself, the dimples on her round face getting a little deeper.

It was smooth as marble, perfectly round, big as a grapefruit and heavy as a bowling ball.  It made Jeff’s heart hammer to hold it.  The rich red, which hinted at purple while still being certainly red, was so beautiful it seemed impossible, so vivid it made his blue shirt seem like a Polaroid photo left in the sun too long.

“Imagine finding this in the wild?  Pushing over a dead tree and seeing it sitting there under the root?” Jeff said.

(Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 304: Union Dues: Sidekicks in Stockholm

Escape Pod 304: Union Dues: Sidekicks in Stockholm is an Escape Pod original.

Rated appropriate for older teens and up for language and disturbing imagery

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 44:00 — 30.4MB)

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Union Dues: Sidekicks in Stockholm

By Jeffrey R. DeRego

Five of them at least, with submachine guns, body armor, and more dynamite than I’ve seen outside a Tom and Jerry cartoon. They all sound the same thanks to some digital vocal thing built into their black suits. They all look the same with black ski masks underneath a mesh sort of fencing helmet, black everything else right to the boots, and all about the same size, like someone took a picture of a terrorist and photocopied it.

This whole drama seems like it began a million years ago by now. I was scheduled to come here and open a convention of business leaders and up-and-coming corporate types. My speech, Good Corporate Citizenship, with examples of how The Union gives back to the communities it serves, is a two year old piece worked up and updated by Marketing and Promotions to accommodate a new administration in Washington, and some new economic stuff that I don’t really understand. I’d delivered only half of the text before these guys burst through the door.
(Continue Reading…)

The Soundproof Escape Pod #10

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Hey folks—

Short editor’s note this month to make sure this goes out reasonably on time to all you faithful listeners. Er, readers.

Last month saw a bit of mopping-up action on the various nominees with Stone Wall Truth, which got nominated in the novella category for the Nebula, and the space-piratical Leech Run.

But most importantly, we hit Episode 300 of the podcast that Steve built with Tim Pratt’s We Go Back. Who Escape Pod goes pretty far back with. His stories are episodes 8, 31 (with Greg van Eekhout), 67, 105, 142, 190, 239, 251 and 276. He’s probably far and away the Escape Pod fan favorite, and Impossible Dreams is still the story I usually recommend as the entry point for new Escape Pod listeners.

It’s been a little over a year since Mur took over and I snuck in through an open side Escape Pod airlock (for closed values of open). We’re still adrift in space, same as it ever was, floating along scanning for the next story, and eventually a planet to set down on. Like many fiction journeys, the path laid out at the beginning is not the path you end up going down, because that would be boring.

Until the next,

—Bill

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