Read by Ben Phillips

In lieu of an excerpt, we shall regale you with some correspondence between the author and Pseudopod’s chief editor.

From Mike Norris’s cover letter: I learned of an extraordinary occupation, wherein an ordinary Joe, toting only a bible and a pistol, could legally cross the southern border under the licenses of the U.S. physicians that accompanied him to perform free roadside surgical procedures right in the back of his van. I managed to track down one of these medical coyotes, and I wrangled an interview out of him, explaining that I was a writer interested in publishing a story about his fascinating mission. That much was true … If I’m to be damned for a story I’ve written, “El Dentisto que Corta” will be my one-way ticket to Hell.

Ben’s response: Dear Mike, Thank you for sending us “El Dentisto que Corta”. Yes, I’m pretty sure you are going to hell for writing it, and we’re probably going to join you because we’re going to produce it. …


Happy Friday the 13th, everyone.

Order now from PodDisc.com

No polos or coffee mugs yet. Maybe next time. Thanks very much for all your continued patience and support, from all of us at Escape Artists!

What We Want

Pseudopod is a genre magazine in audio form. We’re looking for horror: dark, weird fiction. We run the spectrum from grim realism or crime drama, to magic-realism, to blatantly supernatural dark fantasy. We publish highly literary stories reminiscent of Poe or Lovecraft as well as vulgar shock-value pulp fiction. We don’t split hairs about genre definitions, and we do not observe any taboos about what kind of content can appear in our stories. Originality demands that you’re better off avoiding vampires, zombies, and other recognizable horror tropes unless you have put a very unique spin on them. What matters most is that the stories are dark and compelling.

Since we’re an audio magazine, our audience can’t skim past the boring parts, so stories with beautiful language at the expense of plot don’t translate well. We’re looking for fiction with strong pacing, well-defined characters, engaging dialogue, and clear action. It can be beautiful too, if you’ve got all those other bases covered.

Dark humor is just fine, and we run it on occasion; but we are more interested in tragedy than comedy, and comedy is better received the more sick and morbid it is. Above all, we want stories that make us think, that stick with us, that make us catch ourselves checking the locks a second time before bed.

More tips here.

Length

We’re primarily interested in two lengths of fiction, which we’ve somewhat arbitrarily dubbed “short fiction” and “flash fiction”.

Short Fiction: This is the heart of our weekly podcast. We want short stories between about 2,000 and 6,000 words; we are quite hesitant to produce stories any longer than that, although we may occasionally consider exceptional stories as long as 7,500 words. Anything longer than that will not be considered at all. (You are almost certainly better off cutting it down to 6,000 or less, even if it has been published previously at a greater length. The longer a story is, the more brilliant it needs to be to sustain audience interest in audio, and Pseudopod stories in particular tend to be no longer than 5,000 words as a rule.) We currently pay $100 for short fiction at this length.

Flash Fiction: We sometimes podcast short five-to-ten minute “bonus” pieces between our weekly main episodes. For this we’re looking at fiction under 1,500 words, with a sweet spot between 500 and 1000 words. Yes, that’s really really short. That’s the point. Our flash pieces are frequently quirkier and more experimental than our weekly features. We pay $20 for flash fiction.

If you have a story between 1,500 and 2,000 words, we’ll make a judgment call, based on whether we think the story would work better as a featured story or a bonus. But most of the time we’ll buy it as flash fiction.

Multiple and Simultaneous Submissions

We do not accept multiple submissions. Please, one story at a time! Unless you’re specifically told otherwise, this is the rule at every fiction market.

We do consider simultaneous submissions (a story sent to us as well as one or more other markets at the same time), but we appreciate being advised that the story is under consideration elsewhere. In the event it is accepted by us as well as the other market(s), you’ll just need to let the editor know in response to your acceptance letter what other market(s) are slated to publish it and when. That gives us the chance to mention the fact in the intro to the story. We will also try to delay publication so as not to “scoop” the other market(s) before the publication date over there, but it will be up to you to communicate with the other market(s) to find out whether they insist on this or not. Unless you tell us so, we will consider delaying publication to be optional on our part. (In our experience, since we use audio format most other markets don’t seem to care one way or the other, and even appreciate it if we go live with it around the same time or sooner because it acts as publicity for them. But you never know, and should always check. For our part, though, we have no strong preference either way.)

How We Want It

Example:

From: Edgar Allen Poe
Date: Dec 13, 1889
Subject: Submission: The Pit and the Pendulum
To: submit@pseudopod.org

Dear Pseudopod:

I would like to submit my horror story "The Pit and the Pendulum" for
your podcast.  My work has appeared in numerous online and print venues
including _The Norton Anthology of Literature_, the Project Gutenberg
Web site (http://www.gutenberg.org), and _The Simpsons Halloween
Special_.   This particular work is in the public domain since it was first
published over a century ago, and all rights are available.  It has 
previously been adapted into a shockingly strange movie by Roger 
Corman.  Thank you for your time and consideration.


Edgar Poe
poeman@gmail.com


6200 Words
The Pit and the Pendulum
By Edgar Allen Poe

I was sick -- sick unto death with that long agony; and when they at
length unbound me, and I was permitted to sit, I felt that my senses
were leaving me. The sentence -- the dread sentence of death -- was the
last of distinct accentuation which reached my ears. After that, the
sound of the inquisitorial voices seemed merged in one dreamy
indeterminate hum.  It conveyed to my soul the idea of _revolution_ --
perhaps from its association in fancy with the burr of a mill-wheel.
This only for a brief period; for presently I heard no more.  [. . .]

We accept stories in plain text pasted into the body of an email, sent to the address submit@pseudopod.org. We don’t want Word files, PDF files, scanned images of a book, or sound files of you reading the story. Messages with any such attachments will probably get bounced. We will accept messages that are HTML formatted, but if you know how to turn it off, we greatly prefer plain text. Send it from the email address at which you want us to correspond with you!

Please be sure to include the title of the story on the Subject: line of the message. Most of our workflow involves bouncing your email message from one folder to another, and we use the email subject to identify the story. A subject like “story submission” doesn’t tell us anything we don’t already know.

In the body of the message, we want:

1. Your name. (Your real name. The story can have a different byline, and we’ll credit that byline in public, but we need to know who’s legally offering us this story and to whom the check should be written.)
2. A cover statement briefly giving us your publication credits (your top five or six publications at most), and in particular telling us whether this story has been published before or adapted into audio. If there’s anything we need to know about available rights, tell us that too. If the full text of the story is available online, that’s great — let us know what the URL is so we can link to it.
3. The word count of the story, rounded to the nearest hundred words. Don’t go nuts over which word count method to use, or whether to round up or down. We pay flat rate; we really don’t care. We just want a ballpark.
4. The title of the story.
5. The story’s byline.
6. The text of the story. Use single spacing, with blank lines between paragraphs and _underscores_ or *asterisks* (or whatever) for emphasis.

Once again, that address is submit@pseudopod.org. Any stories sent to any other address will be trashed, most likely without a response.

(The rest of these guidelines are basically just legalese.)

By sending us your story you understand and agree that:

• You are the original creator of the work submitted to us;
• You are the copyright holder of the work;
• You are not prohibited by any prior agreement from the transfer of non-exclusive electronic and audio rights to the work;
• All information in the contact and cover sections of your email is accurate and truthful;
• You accept sole responsibility for any false statements or encumbrances upon rights not disclosed to us.

If we buy your story we’ll send you a contract, and you’ll be bound to all of the above.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering whether you have audio rights to your stories: unless you’re doing work-for-hire for a game company, all reputable speculative fiction magazines of which we’re aware acquire serial print rights, often with non-exclusive electronic or anthology options. Some online markets may insist on electronic exclusivity for a certain period of time, and if so, you can’t publish it with us until after that period ends. However, we know of no regular short fiction market that contracts for exclusive audio rights. That doesn’t mean it can’t happen; always check your contracts.

What We Do With It

Once you’ve sent us your story, we will review it and respond to you via email in about two months. If it takes longer than that, please query.

If we decide we’d like it for our podcast, we’ll send you a contract as a PDF file in email. You will sign it and send it back to us either via email (after scanning it), fax, or postal mail. Then we’ll pay you via check or PayPal, whichever you indicated on the last page of the contract, and we’ll start producing.

During the production process we may contact you with questions about the story, its background, or pronunciations. We hope and expect that you’ll be available to help us, as a good performance makes all of us look good. Unfortunately, as everything we do is on a somewhat fluid schedule, we usually can’t give you an accurate timetable of when your story will appear in the podcast.

What the World Does With It

The audio files Pseudopod produces are released under a Creative Commons license. Specifically, we use the Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 license. Briefly, this means that the entire world has permission to distribute the podcast for free, provided they give credit for it, don’t try to make money off of it, and don’t change it in any way. Transcribing it, extracting portions from it beyond fair use, and mashing it up are all prohibited. This license applies only to our audio performance of your work, for which we’ve contracted and paid you. It does not apply to your story itself; you retain your copyright and all rights to any other use of the story.

We’ve had some questions about this from the writing community, so we’d like to make our reasoning clear. We know that Creative Commons licensing is scary to many writers, and it’s certainly a radical break from traditional rights that expire after a period of time. Our take is this: when we create a podcast, we are putting an MP3 file on the Web. That MP3 file is going to get downloaded and copied onto thousands of hard drives, CDs, iPods, and other portable devices across the world. That’s the point. We want people to listen to it. But once you’ve done that, you can’t take that file back. There is no way to delete the file everywhere it exists. There are some highly fallible ways to lock things down, but DRM sucks, and even if we believed in it it’s too complicated for us to implement.

So from a purely practical perspective, we can’t make our content expire. And we can’t stop people from copying our files, nor should we. Given that reality, why not give our listeners the full legal right to do what’s totally natural for an audio file (copy it, share it with people, and listen to it whenever they want), but make equally clear to them what they can’t do (share the story outside the podcast, or alter it in any way at all)? That’s our reason for the Creative Commons license. We’re not trying to plant a philosophical flag in the ground here; we’re just trying to reflect reality.

We hope you’ll agree with our reasons and choose to share your story with us. If you don’t, then we’re deeply sorry, but we feel it’s better that you know this now, before you make the decision to submit.

Any questions?

If you have questions, comments, suggestions, or criticism (but not stories) send them to our staff at editor@pseudopod.org. We’ll do our best to get back to you within a few days.

Thanks very much for your time, and we look forward to reading — and hopefully speaking — what you’ve got!

Read by Cayenne Chris Conroy of Teknikal Diffikulties

After he pitched his nylon tent in a nearby juniper grove at the base of the hill, he slept until moonrise. Then, under the pale light, he unfolded his steel trench-shovel and walked uphill toward the cemetery, looking for love.

Dondo squatted over his haunches beside the grave, holding his hands over the sandy earth like he was warming himself beside a campfire. He pinched sand from the base of the tombstone, tasted it, then spat to the north. Here was love. He dug.

Read by BJ Harrison of The Classic Tales

As if reading Montresor’s thoughts, Luchesi reached down toward his feet; his hand came back proffering a long-necked bottle. “Here,” he spoke in a conspiratorial whisper, after shooting a look towards the palazzo’s attendant-less hallway. “Medoc — what I just happen to have handy with me, you understand. But it should serve as a worthy substitute.”

Vestiges of his nightmare shrouded Montresor’s thoughts. Dry-mouthed, he attempted to swallow nonetheless. “You must have misheard me, I’m sure.”

Read by Ian Stuart

A woman carrying a tray of drinks emerged from the kitchen. She was tall and spare and the loose clothing she wore only accentuated the impression. Sarah noted with alarm the condition of her hands, all knobbed joints and cracked skin. Setting the tray down, the woman looked at each of them, her head bobbing birdlike on a thin neck.

“Would you like a drink?” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

Read by Cayenne Chris Conroy of Teknikal Diffikulties

Passing the hall, he heard a sigh emanate through their locked bedroom door. That was a good sign. It was an indication Linda was still breathing, at least, and probably still able to speak. The morning after an appointment, she was always so sore, so exhausted. Often, she’d sleep well into the afternoon. Sighs, coughs, little Linda-noises, they were the beacons that guided Lewis through a haze of uncertainty that filled those hours before she’d allow him to view the balance of her attributes.

Linda’s appointments were just part of the deal. She’d made that clear before they ever tied the knot. “They’ll come for me,” she’d told him, “from time to time.”

Marilyn Monroe lies naked and dying.

I am her death.

Read by Phil Rossi

He had been trained, as all of us had, to assemble his rifle by touch - but to our dismay, we discovered that Private Sperling could do it in near-silence. He pushed the parts together with delicate care underneath the stiff, thin sheets of his bunk bed, the click of pins and bolts so muffled that none of us heard a thing in the cramped confines of our modular shelter.

We didn’t know the Decharai had made contact with him.

Read by Jaron Cohen

Every night since I was seven years old he’s swooped down at me out of the darkness of sleep: a pale, skeletal boy with thin arms thrust out like wings, eyes like white domes in black craters, mouth open as he screams acceleration.

His name is Wren.

Read by Alasdair Stuart

“Now paint in little white eye sockets.” Colin told Briony. “And teeth at the bottom.” He’d already had her draw India-ink crossbones under the big black mole.

(Colin hoped he and the Doctor would still be laughing two hours from now, but wasn’t going to bother Briony with gloomy possibilities. At least his mole had smooth edges and was still all one color.)

Read by Ben Phillips

“When I was your age, I ran away from school all the time. The tribal police would gather all us kids up from the hogans and the cabins, haul us to the boarding schools, cut our hair, tell us not to talk Navajo, feed us flour with bugs in it. All that crap you hear about now in documentaries. I ran away to my auntie’s house near Canyon de Chelly. She was a seer and a hand trembler. The Navajos around there, if they couldn’t sleep or they were sick, they sent a runner to my auntie and she came with her rock crystal and her corn pollen and went over their home until her hand trembled like she was holding on to an electric fence. And she saw things. Visions no one else could see. The sort of visions you’re seeing now. The things that cause sickness. Death. Things that have to be dealt with. Things that have to be sung and prayed over, so the person can be healthy again.”

Read by David Moore

It was nine p.m. when Jesus Christ tried to get into Drake’s Bar and Grill with no ID. Jimmy stood up from wrestling a new keg of Yuengling into position. He spotted Jesus and had to smile. In his 30 years of owning Drake’s, Jimmy had seen the local frat kids do a lot of laughable things, but they weren’t usually intentional, and more rarely still – were they clever. This, he had to admit, was both.

Jimmy came from behind the bar and worked his way through the Saturday night Carson Street crowd until he was within talking distance of Pete, and Christ’s entourage.

Read by Donna Lynch

Before she finished her cutting I stood behind her, and circled her arms with my arms. As she sliced a carrot, I shoved at her hand. The knife slid into her wrist, and she swore. Blood dripped onto the neat pile of chopped beans.

Nunury’s eyes widened, ready to cry. I’d never yelled at her when we were alive. “I’m sorry,” I said, gathering her in my arms. “You know I’d never hurt you.”

Read by Ben Phillips

The following has been transcribed from a journal, the owner of which has since passed away. In accordance with his last wishes, it has not been altered from its original manuscript, save where deemed necessary for page formatting.

There are memories I bear which erupt from the formless black of dreams. I still awaken at night crying out for safety and, finding myself alone, I hide in sheets, attempting to assuage a cold shivering that refuses to leave my bones. I have given my account to countless others in desperation, but still I know not restful sleep. I pray that in this inked telling I may concretely free myself from this memory, though I admit any faith I once had has long since left me, abandoned me in that lake those eleven years ago, never to return. Korta Ves.

Read by Cayenne Chris Conroy

Eddie had the little .22 semi-automatic that we used for shooting rabbit and squirrel, and I had Daddy’s .30-06. It was his favorite deer gun, and he would have tanned my hide if he knew I had it. That day wasn’t the first time we’d come down to the creek to shoot. We didn’t do it all the time, because sometimes the guns cracked so loud that our neighbor across the creek, Mr. Davenport, would hear and call up Momma. Most times, we shot on the bank of the creek, setting up dirty beer bottles – leftovers from teenage parties. It was our land, and we kept it fenced, but a fence never did mean much to a kid of any age.

When we got to the ghost house, Eddie didn’t want to go any further. He didn’t start fussing, but he started dragging his feet, covering his Keds with dust. I wasn’t in the mood to fight with him, so I just kept walking. Faced with being alone in the woods, or with his big brother at the ghost house, Eddie came on along. I wonder, sometimes, if he knew something. If he had some sort of feeling about what was going to happen. It’s the kind of thing that can drive you crazy. If you let it.

Read by Ian Stuart

I’ve ‘ad loadsa bad jobs in my day, but this ‘un’s the worst by a mile. Trompin’ aroun’ in the boneyards at midnight, diggin’ up dead folks wi’ a wooden spade, breakin’ open the caskets wi’ a mattock, an’ haulin’ ‘em up an’ out by the heads. Christ.

‘E’s the boss, is Wolfe. Been at the game a long time, compared ta me, an’ ‘e ain’t like ta let me forget it. Big fella, shaped like a barrel, face all red an’ puffy from too much drink. “Ya’d drink too, ya’d seen what I seen,” ‘e always tells me, as if I don’t drink.

Read by Jaron Cohen

Every July Dad would put me on the Greyhound, wave a hearty goodbye, and shout, “House’ll be hollow without you!” Then I’d clamber up on the seat to hoist my bag onto the rack and listen as he pounded the horn in his rusty old pick-up. This year that parting call sounded more forlorn than ever. To my early-adolescent mind, Dad was becoming increasingly odd and worryingly isolated. Lately, I’d woken at night to hear him talking to Mom. The next day he would confess to me how much he still missed her.

“This year…” I told myself. “This year I aim to catch me a Hay Devil.”

Read by David Moore

I won’t go into the details surrounding my dismissal from a well-known East Coast brokerage firm. other than to say I inadvertently let slip some information of a rather sensitive nature and, when it came down to drawing the line, the firm was more interested in maintaining their reputation than my livelihood.

Of course they were. But I didn’t exactly walk away empty-handed. They were all very civilized. There were no black marks on my resume; hell, they even found me another job. At a much smaller firm in Seattle.

And that’s where I met Mira, who this tale is really about.

Links mentioned: Closing music by Hopeful Machines, a side project of Ego Likeness
Promo for Crescent, by Phil Rossi, rushing Amazon charts on July 9, 2009

Read by Elie Hirschman

“So much stays behind when a man dies,” Bestlonic says. “You could rebuild Finch from what we have left of him.”

We talk mainly about the “Biter” series. It doesn’t take much to get Bestlonic raving about these stories. The most cited story in the series, the eponymous “Biter,” tells the tale of a man who finds a note in his jacket pocket that prompts him to eat his own extremities, methodically avoiding blood loss and undue trauma in the process. The story is nearly 30,000 words long, surprisingly little of which is gruesome depictions of auto-cannibalism. The bulk of the text concentrates on the “unthinkable horror” written on that slip of paper. Finch never states outright what that might be, presumably because it would cause the readership to imitate the hero’s compulsive mutilation. He merely reveals that the phrase is twelve words long, and we should be very careful what we read.

There are two accepted procedures for performing ocular excision. One involves suturing the eyelids shut prior to dissection and removal of the skin and soft tissues around and within the orbit. In the second method the eyelids are sutured open before the eye is dissected out. Given my patient’s particular circumstances, I was instructed to use the first method. This method has an added appeal for me; although the second method is less bloody, it involves performing the operation with the eye open — and I dislike being watched while I work.

Read by Ben Phillips

Even a god has human needs, if he resides in a living body. He must breathe the purest air possible. He must consume fresh food, and sleep on good bedding. And he must excrete. Some priests say that this is not truly the god’s need, since it results from the mortal body he occupies. I say this need is as important to a god as any man, because even gods create things they wish to be rid of.

In this incarnation, Aki prefers a mid-morning session. We meet in our chamber–a narrow aisle, with gold-leaf handholds on each side. I attend him with my box of soft cloths, jintilla oil, and incense. He dismisses his other attendants with a wave. They drift behind tall stone pillars fifty paces away, giving him privacy.

Full text available online at Transcriptase

…along with many other fine stories.

Read by Claudia Smith

It was exactly what Marian was looking for–a home of her own, an address to prove she existed. She looked around feeling someone behind her. Gareth entered the lounge carrying a packing case. He spoke over the top of it.

“Nothing that soapy water and a paintbrush can’t fix.”

Read by Kris Johnson

The needle touched skin, vibrated with the small hum of a person in deep concentration.

The needle approached again, penetrated.

Read by Wilson Fowlie

Willett’s thin, angular face, with the stubble-shrouded cleft in his chin, remains handsome, or would have without the fleshy puckers where his eyes once were. But it’s as if those scars can see, because he turns to you.

You’re finally here, he says. His voice sounds choked with grit.

Do you know where Denise is?

He laughs. It’s a bark tinged with hysteria. Yes. Yes. Lenahan has her. He put us both deep under but he only kept what he wanted from me. Denise, he kept all of her. He planned to all along.

Who’s Lenahan?

Maybe, maybe – and now he’s struggling to speak, as though someone just told him an incredible joke and he’s still gasping for breath — maybe if you ask nice he’ll bring her back. He wanted me to tell you if you asked. He told me to.

Who is he?

And Willett tells you.



This week’s episode sponsored by Audible.com, who offers Pseudopod listeners a free audiobook download of their choice from Audible’s selection of over 60,000 titles.

Read by Cayenne Chris Conroy

Rachel comes in the through the garage door in the kitchen. She’s carrying a large green ceramic flower pot. Inside the pot is the weirdest flower I have ever seen. Its stem is thick and curvy like a jungle vine. It’s about seven inches tall and has little white bumps, like tiny blisters, all along the stem. The head of the flower is furry and yellow with large red and black petals, wavy and erect, just the way a kid would draw them. There are several layers of petals and their pattern is mesmerizing: black-red-black-red on one layer, then the next would interchange to red-black-red-black, et cetera. As she carries the flower into the house the petals give the illusion of spinning, like little wheels turning inside larger ones.

“I guess…”

Read by Bob Eccles

When Michael was just a kid, Uncle Evan made a movie of Grandfather. He used an old eight-millimeter camera that wound up with a key and had three narrow lenses that rotated on a plate. Michael remembered holding the camera. It was supposedly light-weight for its time, but in his six-year-old hands, it seemed like it weighed a ton. Uncle Evan had told him to be careful with it; the camera was a precision instrument, and it needed to be in good working order if the movie was going to be of any scientific value.

And so was Grandfather..

Read by BJ Harrison of The Classic Tales podcast

Hiram knew his father, Jonah, could not refuse the Looking Men on the night they asked him to help kill William the Reeve.

But the friar had died that night when the Black Hand had laid itself upon him.

“Jordan, when are you going to settle down, get married and have us some children?”

By J.R.
Read by Ben Phillips

Beth, my most recent girlfriend, said I look like a hanged man when I walk because I always stare down at my feet.

Thinking About Polar Bears

By Mike Battista
Read by Matt Arnold

I wake up exhausted. I hadn’t slept well. My heart still beats quickly; the aftermath of vaguely remembered dreams.

Exit Exam, Section III: Survival Skills, Question #7

By David Erik Nelson
Read by Alasdair Stuart

7a) You are a werewolf. You kill and eat people. You are a vicious animal.

Theme music as usual: “Bloodletting on the Kiss” by Anders Manga
Additional music in this episode: rare rendition of “LabRatB” by Harmaline



This week’s episode sponsored by Audible.com, who offers Pseudopod listeners a free audiobook download of their choice from Audible’s selection of over 60,000 titles.

Read by George Hrab

My muscles tighten. My teeth clench. My irritable bowel is seriously pissed off.

Memories vibrate. They fall and crack open.

I was able to catch Wildclaw Theatre’s production of “The Dreams in the Witch House” and was greatly entertained. I haven’t seen “Revenants” yet but I notice it is getting quite promising reviews.

-Ben Phillips

Read by Alasdair Stuart

Niall is the worst of us. He’s meaner, more vicious, more crazy. He hates everyone: Jamaicans, Asians, queers…. Chances are he hates me as well. His Dad had been a violent waste-of-DNA and Niall intends to make us all pay. He doesn’t care about anything…and yet, only last Saturday, when we met up as usual, I found him anxious and attentive to every stranger on the street.

“Maybe…I don’t know.”

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If you enjoy our show, please recommend us to other fans of audio fiction. You are our PR department! Blog about us. Link to or redistribute our sexy 1-minute promo mp3. Or, link to one of our banners:

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If you want to advertise to an audience of several thousand horror fans, one of the best possible ways to do it is to sponsor programming on Pseudopod. If you like, you can even advertise locally, targeting limited geographical areas using Wizzard Media’s targeted ad insertion technology. For example, in October of 2008, people who downloaded our show in southern California got to hear about Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios.

For current rates and more information, email ben@escapeartists.net.

Spread the pod’s foul seed via BitTorrent!

Our fans create, update, and seed torrents of past episodes, which we greatly appreciate since we currently lack suitable time and resources to handle this ourselves. There is one torrent that I know of on MiniNova. Please seed it if you can so it can spawn and be happy. Let me know (editor@pseudopod.org) if you create an updated one, and I will endeavor to link to it as well.

Volunteer to narrate

Do you know someone with an iron stomach and a talent for bringing to life what’s on the page, who can create high-quality voice recordings as digital audio files and upload them to a specified location by a specified deadline? We can always use more volunteer narrators to add variety to our sound. In particular at the moment, we’d like to do more justice to stories taking place in Ireland, Scotland, Australia, New Zealand, and many other places around the world. An interested potential narrator should drop a line to editor@pseudopod.org with a link to a dramatic reading — or, just ask and we will mail you our favorite challenging sample text so you can really show off your interpretive talent.

Read by Jenna Sharpe (who incidentally also voices Naija in Aquaria)

The man in the doorway was backlit by the low hanging sun, and when he told her about Ray it didn’t seem real. “Dead?” “Yes ma’am, I’m afraid so.” Fatima gripped the front of her blouse and twisted. She steadied herself against the door jam, and when she spoke it was a whisper, “Imkonsiz…” The detective frowned, as he was not learned in Uzbek, “I’m sorry?” “I say, is impossible.” Everything about her was fragile and too thin — her wrists, her neck, even the skin on her face, which was translucent in the morning light. “I wish you were right about that, ma’am.”



This week’s episode sponsored by Audible.com, who offers you a free audiobook download of your choice from their selection of over 40,000 titles.

Read by Phil Rossi whose novel, Crescent Station is published this June.

Most of Cotton’s memories were gone. Like the name of the ship he had served on. Like the name of his commanding officer. His daughters’ names, which husband went with which daughter, which grandchildren came from which marriage, which fiancé held hands with which granddaughter. That had mostly melted away. His head felt like an icebox, like someone had opened the door, maybe just to grab a beer or to check the expiration date on the milk, and let all the cold air out, filled it up with thick stagnant heat. Alzheimer’s was a muggy goddamned country, the airless stomach of a huge beast that takes its sweet time digesting old useless machinery like him.

Read by Leann Mabry

The doctors come and ask me questions, but they always ask the wrong questions, so I’m stuck. I can give them the wrong answers or no answer at all. I try to explain, try to teach them what the right question is, but they never listen.

“How are you, today, Carolyn?” they ask. And, “Did you have the nightmares again last night?” And occasionally, “Ready for your medication?” The last question I don’t mind as much. The round blue pills give delicious sleep — sleep without dreams. They just make it harder to sleep without them. But the purple pills, the ones with the jagged edges, they make me numb, detached, and that frightens me.



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Read by Matthew Wayne Selznick

As rain began to speckle the partitioned windows of the station, an ancient engine groaned into view. Villers soon found himself squeezed into a dingy and narrow car of questionable vintage. Making his way to a window seat, he noted his fellow travelers were exclusively of the lower classes. Peasant women, shapelessly hunched within their shawls. Dark men who drank from bottles concealed in their coats and ate pieces of bread right from the loaf, breaking off the chunks with large, uneven teeth. Scampering children who seemed to belong to no one, or at least recognized no one’s authority.

In his suit and vest, Villers was uncomfortably aware of his relative affluence. He checked his watch chain to make sure it was securely fastened, shifted his billfold so that it was lodged deeply within his breast pocket. As Sophie had once warned him amidst the rumpled sheets of their conjugal bed, “Some people will steal the gold out of your teeth if you give them half a chance!”