PseudoPod

• Author : Jon Padgett
• Narrator : Jon Padgett
• Host : Alasdair Stuart
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

“20 Simple Steps to Ventriloquism” first appeared in the 2013 Shirley Jackson Award winning anthology, THE GRIMSCRIBE PUPPETS

“When I was a child, my first ventriloquist dummy came with a pamphlet entitled “7 SIMPLE STEPS TO VENTRILOQUISM.” Though the following ventriloquist story went through a tremendous number of transmutations from its inception two decades ago (when it was first conceived), that pamphlet from my past proved to be the key to what “20 Simple Steps to Ventriloquism” would finally become. Practice the first seven steps enough, and you may one day be able to throw your voice with the best of the showbiz ventriloquists out there. Practice the rest of the steps at your own risk.”

This is the link for the Faculty of Horror podcast.

Steven Saus’ Pseudopod Story The Burning Servant is at the link under the name (natch) and his twitter account is as well.

JR Blackwell’S Author Portrait Kickstarter can be found here and his twitter feed is here.

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“Being a ventriloquist is a lot of fun. Anyone from eight to eighty can learn the basic techniques of this craft with a little practice. If you really want to know about ventriloquism and what it can do for you, just follow these 20 easy steps, and one day you’ll find out just how much fun a ventriloquist can have.

STEP 1

“How to hold your mouth”

Always practice in front of a mirror. Close your mouth in a natural, relaxed way and part your lips slightly. Stare at your mouth closely in this position until you can see nothing else, as if your mouth were hovering in the midst of nothingness.”

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The post Pseudopod 433: 20 Simple Steps To Ventriloquism appeared first on PseudoPod.

• Author : Arthur Staaz
• Narrator : Branan Edgens
• Host : Alasdair Stuart
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

Pseudopod 432: The Influence Of Thomas Glittio is a PseudoPod original.

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“He felt it immediately. A current that flowed into his body through his eyes as they scanned the page and out through his fingertips as they tapped the keyboard. He was alive, powerful. One might even say meaningful. But certainly not Glittio.

The room around him faded to a shimmering darkness. Objects lost their distinctness, as did he himself. He could not have told you at that point where he ended and the keyboard began, let alone how it was different from the desk upon which it sat or the floor beneath the desk. Even the act of scanning the words in the frayed paperback on his desk called into question for him whether the book was a separate thing from his eyes. All melded together.

The nebulous quality of his perceptions was contrasted by the clarity of his mind. It is as if I am he, he thought. Indeed, he could not tell for certain. And yet these thoughts did not act as a distraction from the task at hand but only served to further focus his mind. No longer just a student in the act of transcribing an author’s work, he in a sense became the author.”

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The post Pseudopod 432: The Influence Of Thomas Glittio appeared first on PseudoPod.

• Author : David Tallerman
• Narrator : Roberto Suarez
• Host : Alasdair Stuart
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

Pseudopod 431: Twitcher is a PseudoPod original.

“Twitcher” is a slang term for a bird watcher – something I only discovered, serendipitously, straight after I’d finished the story under a different title.

“Lester turned the focus dial the barest fraction, looked wistfully at the nest one last time and lay the binoculars down. The Plummers would wait. They’d have to. The parents were healthy, the eggs undamaged. They had plenty of food nearby, and that was more than he could say himself. They could manage on their own for a few hours.

No one knew they were there; he hadn’t told, not Margie, not anyone. It was him and them and God, no other players at this table. So they could get by for a few hours while he sorted himself out with the few things he’d need to last the crucial coming days.”

The post Pseudopod 431: Twitcher appeared first on PseudoPod.

• Author : Eric Esser
• Narrator : Andrew Clarke
• Host : Alasdair Stuart
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

“Thing In The Bucket” was first published in Fictionvale #1 which came out in November 2013.

“The setting is inspired by southwestern Shropshire, and the period by the Elizabethan era. The story concept came from playing around the ideas of the Four Humours and spontaneous generation, although of course the generation I ultimately went with wasn’t really spontaneous.”

“‘Are you all right?’ he said.

She whispered, ‘I am bleeding.’

Pritcher dealt in the art of the bleed, so it was unsurprising she had come to him. ‘Can you show me?’

‘From inside.’ She pressed her belly, then brushed at her petticoat.

Pritcher considered Sarah’s young age and air of shame, and then smiled. ‘You mean it is worse than usual? Or at the wrong time?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The time of month you bleed.’

She stared at him blankly. Was it possible she did not know? Her parents had died some years before, so she’d been raised by the barkeep, Elias Grubbs. He was well-meaning, but not the brightest man, and a widower without daughters of his own. Such subjects were not spoken of in Drumby Hole between young girls; the vicar taught them not to succumb to the corruption of flesh, to focus on God when it tempted them.

Surely someone must have taken an interest. That older barmaid, perhaps. ‘Has Lizzy never mentioned the curse?’

Sarah shook her head. ‘I’m cursed?’ Her voice trembled.”

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• Authors : Charlotte Nash, Natalia Theodoridou and Jeff Bowles
• Narrators : Ron Jon and Misty Dawn 
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

Pseudopod 429: Flash On The Borderlands XXIV: Femmes Fatales is a PseudoPod original.

“I met a lady in the meads, Full beautiful—a faery’s child, Her hair was long, her foot was light, And her eyes were wild.” La Belle Dame sans Merci, John Keats

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“The Lady With The Lantern” by Charlotte Nash

The lady with the lantern is a nautical folktale. This borrows the name, but re-imagines a very different spectre.

“The mine called Callum in his tenth year. One morning, he was walking to school with the other boys; a pair of new shoes, a boiled sweet in his cheek. The next, he found a pick in his soft hand, and his feet followed his father’s to the cold, dark portal.”

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“The Bleeding Game” by Natalia Theodoridou.

Your reader – Sean Sorrentino – makes his first appearance on PSEUDOPOD with this tale.

“She died two weeks ago. I found her again yesterday. She must have been around twenty when I first saw her again.

It’s not that I wanted to die–I didn’t, not really. I just needed to feel something, anything. I grabbed the x-acto knife and sliced. It was little more than a deep scratch really, just below the elbow. The sound of ripping flesh surprised me–I didn’t know we did that when you cut us open, wasn’t expecting to hear anything–but otherwise it felt good. A little pain, to make sure I was alive. Then a rush of adrenaline on seeing the blood well up, hot and red and mine. And then a flash of neon and that sound, like a record skipping, something being ripped apart, and she was there, or rather I was then.”

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“Making Paint As A Means Of Impermanence” by Jeff Bowles.

“Remember the first time you painted me all over your dead wife? Remember how we danced and danced, on into the night, under the leaves of the tall, ghostly aspen trees? Remember how you made love to her just as the sun rose, and though it was autumn, and though she’d been dead hours already, you somehow thought things could stay that way forever?

I think knowing you is just like knowing God.”

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The post Pseudopod 429: Flash On The Borderlands XXIV: Femmes Fatales appeared first on PseudoPod.

• Author : Eugie Foster
• Narrator : Tina Connolly
• Host : Alasdair Stuart
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

“When It Ends, He Catches Her” was originally published in Daily Science Fiction in September 2014.

Many thanks to Matthew Foster for sharing this story with us and you.

Music in the outro is “Cylinder Nine” by Chris Zabriskie, from the Free Music Archive.

When It Ends, He Catches Her by Eugie Foster

 

The dim shadows were kinder to the theater’s dilapidation. A single candle to aid the dirty sheen of the moon through the rent beams of the ancient roof, easier to overlook the worn and warped floorboards, the tattered curtains, the mildew-ridden walls. Easier as well to overlook the dingy skirt with its hem all ragged, once purest white and fine, and her shoes, almost fallen to pieces, the toes cracked and painstakingly re-wrapped with hoarded strips of linen. Once, not long ago, Aisa wouldn’t have given this place a first glance, would never have deigned to be seen here in this most ruinous of venues. But times changed. Everything changed.

Aisa pirouetted on one long leg, arms circling her body like gently folded wings. Her muscles gathered and uncoiled in a graceful leap, suspending her in the air with limbs outflung, until gravity summoned her back down. The stained, wooden boards creaked beneath her, but she didn’t hear them. She heard only the music in her head, the familiar stanzas from countless rehearsals and performances of Snowbird’s Lament. She could hum the complex orchestral score by rote, just as she knew every step by heart.

Act II, scene III: the finale. It was supposed to be a duet, her as Makira, the warlord’s cursed daughter, and Balege as Ono, her doomed lover, in a frenzied last dance of tragedy undone, hope restored, rebirth. But when the Magistrate had closed down the last theaters, Balege had disappeared in the resultant riots and protests.

The post Pseudopod 428: When It Ends, He Catches Her appeared first on PseudoPod.

• Author : Kelly Link
• Narrator : Anson Mount
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

“Carnation, Lily, Rose” first appeared in Fence, Vol. 1, No. 2 Fall/Winter in 1998.

To find out more about Women In Horror month, please visit WomenInHorrorMonth.com.

Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose by Kelly Link

We were going to name the baby Beatrice. I just remembered that. We were going to name her after your aunt, the one that doesn’t like me. Didn’t like me. Did she come to the funeral?

I’ve been here for three days, and I’m trying to pretend that it’s just a vacation, like when we went to that island in that country. Santorini? Great Britain? The one with all the cliffs. The one with the hotel with the bunkbeds, and little squares of pink toilet paper, like handkerchiefs. It had seashells in the window too, didn’t it, that were transparent like bottle glass? They smelled like bleach? It was a very nice island. No trees. You said that when you died, you hoped heaven would be an island like that. And now I’m dead, and here I am.

This is an island too, I think. There is a beach, and down on the beach is a mailbox where I am going to post this letter. Other than the beach, the mailbox, there is the building in which I sit and write this letter. It seems to be a perfectly pleasant resort hotel with no other guests, no receptionist, no host, no events coordinator, no bellboy. Just me. There is a television set, very old-fashioned, in the hotel lobby. I fiddled the antenna for a long time, but never got a picture. Just static. I tried to make images, people out of the static. It looked like they were waving at me.

The post Pseudopod 427: ARTEMIS RISING Women In Horror Showcase: Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose appeared first on PseudoPod.

• Author : Shannon Connor Winward
• Narrator : Tatiana Grey
• Host : Nicole Suddeth
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

“The Devil Inside” first appeared in SOMEONE WICKED: A WRITTEN REMAINS ANTHOLOGY by Smart Rhino Publications.

“I did actually have a baby this past summer, but she is not possessed or evil – so far as I know.”

To find out more about Women In Horror month, please visit WomenInHorrorMonth.com.

The Devil Inside

by Shannon Connor Winward

 

‘What do you mean by that, Rebecca?’ the doctor queried. ‘What did no one tell you?’

Becca studied the drops of rain on the window, little falling jewels of light.

She felt evil, just saying it. ‘I read all the books. They warn you about everything that can go wrong. Preeclampsia. Preemies. Feeding problems. But no one tells you what to do when you don’t love your baby. Like it’s … unthinkable.’

Her words hung for a time, as Dr. Marsh scribbled on his pad. ‘It’s quite common. Many women experience post-partum depression …’

‘I’m not depressed, I just don’t love him.’

‘Why is that, do you think?’

Why? Because he didn’t love her back? Because he cried? All the time, always, screeching until his little voice cracked. Because Becca couldn’t cry?

‘I just don’t feel it,’ she murmured.

The post Pseudopod 426: ARTEMIS RISING Women In Horror Showcase: The Devil Inside appeared first on PseudoPod.

• Author : Nina Kiriki Hoffman
• Narrator : The Word Whore
• Host : Mur Lafferty
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

“Works Of Art” was originally published in Pulphouse in 1988, and reprinted in The Year’s Best Horror Stories: Series XVII.

Works Of Art

by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

Cerveza’s call came four days later.

‘Can we meet you for tea somewhere?’ Sally asked. I watched her face as she listened to his reply. Her blue eyes narrowed, then widened, tear-bright.

‘No, I—’ she said. A pause. She bit her lower lip. ‘You don’t understand. Your art cries out to be preserved.’

She waited. She squeezed her eyes shut and tears spilled out. When she opened her eyes, she stared at the ceiling, twisting the phone’s coiled cord around her wrist and pulled it tight. ‘Denial,’ she whispered. ‘Very well.’ She hung up the phone as though it were an egg and might crack if mishandled.

‘Oh, Lucy,’ she whispered.

I went to her and offered what comfort I could.

When her sobs slowed, she said, ‘He’s coming tomorrow morning, with an ax.’

The post Pseudopod 425: ARTEMIS RISING Women In Horror Showcase: Works Of Art appeared first on PseudoPod.

• Author : Sharon Dodge
• Narrator : Kim Lakin-Smith
• Host : Marguerite Kenner
• Audio Producer : Graeme Dunlop
• Discuss on Forums

Pseudopod 424: ARTEMIS RISING Women In Horror Showcase: The Godsmaid Clara And Her Many Smiles is a PseudoPod original.

To find out more about Women In Horror month, please visit WomenInHorrorMonth.com.

“‘Godsmaid,’ I say, and the butler’s eyes immediately glaze over. That’s pretty much always the case. It’s remarkable how little attention they pay me, how consciously their eyes slide over me as soon as I’ve announced my profession. Too dirty and gross, too much something no one wants to think about. Not unless you have monsters crawling all over the floor, anyhow. Of all people, the butler should know me, should appreciate me, but he’s new; I haven’t been here often, but often enough to have known his previous incarnation.

‘We have no need of one at present,’ he said. ‘Thank you for your offer, madame.’

‘I have an appointment, sir. His Lordship requested me,’ I say, and this time he actually looks me in the eyes.

‘Does he need you now?’ he asks dumbly, and I just smile at him, my polite society smile that says I’ve said what I must, and after a minute he sort of nods at me and leads me in.

I could walk the way myself—there are servants’ stairs that I’ve used before, and they’re quicker besides—but truthfully I get tired of being dismissed to the servants’ entryway, and the gentleman who made the appointment assured me I could use the front. Nevermind I am a servant. Not many people can do what I do. Well, not many people would care to, but even so.

A few of the other servants raise their eyebrows as I pass down the hallways, but nothing more than that. At least one of them recognizes me, from the way he quickly looks away. I do murmur, “It’s not catching, you know,” and the butler turns around to me, frowning, but I just smile and he keeps walking. The man I was actually talking to swiftly trods away from us.”

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