Posts Tagged ‘Reprint’

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Escape Pod 876: Like Stars Daring to Shine

Like Stars Daring to Shine was first published by Fireside Magazine, July 2022.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 31:08 — 43.2MB)

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Like Stars Daring to Shine

By Somto Ihezue

When the boy opens his housing unit’s steel door and the incandescent lights pour into his face, he does not blink away. “Little suns” — this is what everyone calls them. The massive disks hover in the atmosphere, spilling streams of radiant light to the ground. The boy stares into the trees, mere meters from the door, and the forest encaving the unit stares back. A breeze finds him, whistling through the trees and into his dungarees. Threadbare with a Batman logo printed on them, the over-alls belonged to his mother when she was a child. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 871: The Contrary Gardener (Part 2 of 2)

The Contrary Gardener originally appeared in Eclipse Online, October 2012 and has been reprinted in:

  • Science Fiction: The Best of the Year 2013, ed. Rich Horton, Prime Books, 2014.
  • The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year, ed. Jonathan Strahan, Night Shade Books, 2014.
  • Telling the Map: Stories (Small Beer Press collection, 2017)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 39:49 — 55.1MB)

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The Contrary Gardener (Part 2 of 2)

By Christopher Rowe

(Continued from Part 1)

Even in the ‘Ville, even in a family of master cultivators, tickets were not easy to come by, so it was not unusual that Kay Lynne had never been to the Derby. What was unusual was her absolute lack of desire to attend the race.

Kay Lynne genuinely hoped that her instinctive and absolute despisal of the Derby and all its attendant celebrations was born of some logical or at least reasonable quirk of her own personality. But she suspected it was simply because her father loved it so.

“You managed to get two tickets this year?” she asked him, and was surprised that her voice was so steady and calm.

“Just this one,” he replied, turning his back on her before she could hand the ticket back. “I decided this year would be a good one for you to go instead. There’s a good card, top to bottom.” (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 870: The Contrary Gardener (Part 1 of 2)

The Contrary Gardener originally appeared in Eclipse Online, October 2012 and has been reprinted in:

  • Science Fiction: The Best of the Year 2013, ed. Rich Horton, Prime Books, 2014.
  • The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year, ed. Jonathan Strahan, Night Shade Books, 2014.
  • Telling the Map: Stories (Small Beer Press collection, 2017)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 25:17 — 35.2MB)

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The Contrary Gardener (Part 1 of 2)

By Christopher Rowe

Kay Lynne wandered up and down the aisles of the seed library dug out beneath the county extension office. Some of the rows were marked with glowing orange off-limits fungus, warning the unwary away from spores and thistles that required special equipment to handle, which Kay Lynne didn’t have, and special permission to access, which she would never have, if her father had anything to say about it, and he did.

It was the last Friday before the first Saturday in May, the day before Derby Day and so a week from planting day, and Kay Lynne had few ideas and less time for her Victory Garden planning. Last year she had grown a half dozen varieties of tomatoes, three for eating and three for blood transfusions, but she didn’t like to repeat herself. Given that she tended to mumble when she talked, not liking to repeat herself made Kay Lynne a quiet gardener. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 862: The Pill (Part 2 of 2)

The Pill originally appeared in the collection Big Girl with PM Press, part of the Outspoken Author series.

Discussion of dieting, disordered eating, and anti-fat bias.

Also, disturbing imagery.

And swearing.

And sexy times.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 39:06 — 54.2MB)

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The Pill (Part 2 of 2)

By Meg Elison

(Continued from Part 1)

The Pill sold like nothing had ever sold before. The original, the generic, the knockoffs, the different versions approved in Europe and Asia that met their standards and got rammed through their testing. There was at last a cure for the obesity epidemic. Fat people really were an endangered species. And everybody was so, so glad.

One in ten kept dying. The average never improved, not in any corner of the globe. There were memorials for the famous and semi-famous folks who took the gamble and lost. A congressman here and a comedian there. But everyone was so proud of them that they had died trying to better themselves that all the obituaries and eulogies had this weird, wistful tone to them. As if it was the next best thing to being thin. At least they didn’t have to live that fat life any more.

And every time it was on the news, we sat in silence and didn’t talk about Dad. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 861: The Pill (Part 1 of 2)

The Pill originally appeared in the collection Big Girl with PM Press, part of the Outspoken Author series.

Discussion of dieting, disordered eating, and anti-fat bias.

Also, disturbing imagery.

And swearing.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 37:40 — 52.2MB)

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The Pill (Part 1 of 2)

By Meg Elison

My mother took the Pill before anybody even knew about it. She was always signing up for those studies at the university, saying she was doing it because she was bored. I think she did it because they would ask her questions about herself and listen carefully when she answered. Nobody else did that.

She had done it for lots of trials; sleep studies and allergy meds. She tried signing up when they tested the first 3D printed IUDs, but they told her she was too old. I remember her raging about that for days, and later when everybody in that study got fibroids she was really smug about it. She never suggested I do it instead; she knew I wasn’t fucking anybody. How embarrassing that my own mother didn’t even believe I was cute enough to get a date at sixteen. I tried not to care. And I’m glad now I didn’t get fibroids. I never wanted to be a lab rat, anyway. Especially when the most popular studies (and the ones Mom really went all-out for) were the diet ones. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 859: Pen Pal (Part 2 of 2)

Pen Pal was originally published in Vintage Worlds (2018).

Some cursing, suggestion of violence, and death.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 41:25 — 57.4MB)

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(Continued from Part 1)

Pen Pal

By Grant Canterbury

 

August 8, 2005

Meliari Thulissia

General Delivery

Tharsis Station

 

Dear Thu,

 

Well I officially graduated from high school! And I have been itching to get out into the world for a long time but right now honestly I am not liking the look of it. We had been planning to go to Disneyworld after graduation but we did Disneyland again instead. That was fine actually. Mom and Dad decided Florida was not such a great idea because gulguthroi. And I had to agree with them. It has gotten really bad. They have chameleon skin and they hide in shallow water which is everywhere down there, and they are basically eating up all of the wildlife in the Everglades. And also people. And especially folks who used to own skipperjacks, it seems. Apparently the deep soulful looks that made them popular at pet stores were more like, um, imprinting on future prey. And their big raspy tentacles also work okay at opening doors in the middle of the night. There are like thousands of people who have disappeared. Oh yeah, they made it illegal to own skipperjacks, of course. And so a bunch of pet stores, crooked or dumb, went and dumped theirs in the nearest creek. Christ. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 858: Pen Pal (Part 1 of 2)

Pen Pal was originally published in Vintage Worlds (2018).

Some cursing and suggestion of violence.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 34:20 — 47.6MB)

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Pen Pal

By Grant Canterbury

December Third, 1996

 

Meliari Thulissia

General Delivery

Tharsis Station

 

Dear Meliari,

Hello!!  My name is Mary and I am nine years old.  I got your name for a pen pal and they said you were the first pen pal on Mars.  This is the first time I have written a letter to Mars to.   So I will tell you about me and how things are here in Oregon.  And if you can tell me about yourself and what Mars is like that would be great!  I am interested in mars but I have never been there yet.  There is a book in the library that has pictures, I like the one with the little boats and orange trees on the grand canal.  I mean the trees are orange not that they have oragnes.  Here our trees are green except in fall.  Right now they have lost their leaves. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 854: Pickled Roots and Peeled Shoots and a Bowl of Farflower Tea

Pickled Roots and Peeled Shoots and a Bowl of Farflower Tea originally appeared in Galactic Stew, Zombies Need Brains, 2020.

Brief descriptions of violence and bodily harm.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 48:05 — 66.5MB)

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Pickled Roots and Peeled Shoots and a Bowl of Farflower Tea

By Chaz Brenchley

 

there’s rue for you, and here’s some for me

 

Just that morning, she’d had a novice shave her head for her. He was a promising lad – no, more than promising, he was a promise halfway to being realised already – but still ridiculously young, all awkwardness and angles, nervous of his own body let alone anybody else’s. Let alone hers.

Of course he’d cut her. She’d felt the cold bite of the blade and then its sudden absence as he snatched his hands away, his suppressed cry of self-recrimination, the tentative pressure of a cloth to stem the bleeding. She raised a hand and laid it over his, pressing firmly, teaching him not to be shy. Not with her body, not with her blood. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 852: The Pieces That Bind

The Pieces that Bind first appeared in On The Premises, issue 35.

Death and loss.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 33:29 — 46.5MB)

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The Pieces that Bind

By Carol Scheina

The first thing Georgia knew for certain was that the woman rummaging through the canned beans and peas in the pantry was not her grandma, even though she looked exactly like her, right down to the nasty black cigar in hand.

Except that Georgia had just plucked the cigar out of Gran’s hand, for it was 2 p.m. and time for the older woman’s afternoon siesta. In the other room, Georgia could hear the television cheerfully offering a miracle knife that could be hers for just three easy payments. The teen glanced through the doorway, and yes, indeed, right in front of the television was Gran, resting in her chair like rising yeast, filling every nook with her body’s slow breathing.

Gran often fell asleep to the sound of infomercials with her lit cigar dangling loosely between her fingers, ready to set the house on fire. Georgia imagined the smoke snatching their lives away with a puff, so she was always on the alert for falling cigars. The one in the teen’s hand still felt warm.

In the kitchen, the not-Gran turned and puffed her cigar, sending out plumes of smoke smelling heavily like laundry detergent. Eyes locked on Georgia.

The second thing Georgia knew for certain was that not-Gran was an alien. (Continue Reading…)

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Escape Pod 848: An Incident on Ishtar

An Incident on Ishtar originally appeared in Analog Science Fiction and Fact in March 2018.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 54:27 — 75.2MB)

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An Incident on Ishtar

By Brian Trent

Her family tried very hard to never use the word “crazy” with her. So therefore, they didn’t say it was crazy that she was applying for a Venusian post as Tier 3 Balloon Specialist.

She tried explaining her reasons to them:

I have valuable skill-sets for the Ishtar colony.

They countered: you don’t do well with people.

Her response: there are only 612 people throughout Ishtar’s nine modular habitats. There are 2.1 million people here in San Antonio.

Venus is hell, Mom interjected, and you’re afraid of heights, Melissa! Do you hear yourself?

Venus is hell below the clouds but I’ll be living above them, sweeping along with the transterminator currents on oxygen-filled aerostat balloons that provide both breathable air and the lifting gases required. Statistically it will be safer. No chance of making another Terrible Mistake.

The smiling masks of her family fell away. Older sister Diane exploded at her. Is that what this is about? Are you out of your mind? You—

Melissa didn’t hear the rest. She marched out of her parent’s house and took the nearest PDT to the local office of ExtraPlanetary Colony Careers.

Why do you want to go to Venus? the interviewer asked her.

I have valuable skill-sets for the Ishtar colony, she replied.

They were quick to agree. (Continue Reading…)

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