The Functional Nerds Podcast

This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome Michael Nayak, author of SYMBIOTE.

About SYMBIOTE: As World War III rages, the scientists in Antarctica are thankful for the isolation – until a group of Chinese scientists arrive at the American research base. In their truck is a dead body, the first murder in Antarctica. The potential for a geopolitical firestorm is great, and, with no clear jurisdiction, the Americans don’t know what to do. But they soon realize the Chinese scientists have brought far more with them than the body…

Within seventy-two hours, thirteen others lie dead in the snow, murdered in acts of madness and superhuman strength.An extremophile parasite from the truck, triggered by severe cold, is spreading by touch. It is learning from them. Evolving. It triggers violent tendencies in the winter crew, and, more insidiously, the beginnings of a strange symbiotic telepathy.

Exhausted by suspicion and fear, with rescue impossible for months, the desperate crew members turn on each other. A small group of survivors try to resist the siren call of the growing hive mind and stay alive long enough to solve the mystery of the symbiotic microbe’s origins. But the symbiote is more than a disease – it is a biological weapon that can change the balance of power in a time of war.

The survivors cannot let anyone infected make it to the summer season, when planes will arrive to take them – and potentially the symbiote – back to civilization.

About Michael Nayak: Michael Nayak was born in Los Angeles and now lives in Washington, DC. By day, he is Doctor/Major Nayak, working for DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency). Michael is a former Antarctic researcher, space shuttle engineer. He is a USAF Test Pilot School graduate, Rotary National Award for Space Achievement recipient, and has 1,000+ hours of flight time in 40+ aircraft. His real-world experience in the science and intelligence communities adds next-level authentic details and a touch of hyper-realism to his work.

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2025 Patrick Hester

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This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome Kat Kourbeti and Michael Ireland from Strange Horizons to talk about the new podcast project celebrating 25 years of the magazine: S.H.@25.

S.H.@25 Links:

About Strange Horizons: Strange Horizons is a weekly magazine of and about speculative fiction. We publish fiction, poetry, reviews, essays, interviews, roundtable discussions, and art.

About Kat Kourbeti: Kat is a queer Greek/Serbian SFF writer, film critic, and podcaster based in London, UK. Her (very gay) novel-in-progress about a secret society of Swedish superheroes was shortlisted for the London Writers Awards in 2019, and she was a juror for the Best Non-Fiction category in the 2020 British Fantasy Awards. She organises Spectrum, the largest critique group for SFF writers in the UK, and her day job is in theatre. You can find her on all social media as @darthjuno.

About Michael Ireland: Michael Ireland is the Podcast Producer for Strange Horizons. Based near Glasgow, Scotland, he is also the co-creator and director of the acclaimed audio drama The Secret of St Kilda. As a disabled creator, he has also worked in television, short films and documentaries. He only has four cats at present and would be easily convinced to adopt more. @mickallister on Bluesky and @MichaelStKilda on other Social Media.

Links:

© 2025 Patrick Hester

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This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome Jack Campbell, author of Destiny’s Way Book 2 of The Doomed Earth Duology.

About Destiny’s Way: Lieutenant Selene Genji is hurled into the past to try and save a world that doesn’t want her in this action-packed adventure from New York Times bestselling author Jack Campbell.

Earth was destroyed on June 12, 2180. Lieutenant Selene Genji watched it happen. And only she can prevent it.

Thrown forty years into the past, into a time before the Universal War began, Genji can only guess what to do to change the events that led to the death of all humanity. She has no way of knowing the long-term impacts of her actions and can only depend on her instincts.

But many of the people Genji’s trying to save want her dead. Her creation was an experiment: a fusing of human and alien DNA. To them, she’s a monster who can’t be trusted, a tool of the aliens who have just made first contact.

Fortunately, she has an unshakable ally in Lieutenant Kayl Owen, who has risked everything to help her mission. Declared a traitor to humanity by Earth Guard, Owen is determined to help Genji save the Earth.

Even if he dies trying.

About Jack Campbell: Jack Campbell is the pen name of John G. Hemry, a retired U.S. Navy officer. His father (LCDR Jack M. Hemry, USN ret.) is a mustang (an officer who was promoted through the enlisted ranks), so John grew up living everywhere from Pensacola, Florida to San Diego, California, including an especially memorable few year on Midway Island.

John graduated from Lyons High School in Lyons, Kansas in 1974, then attended the U.S. Naval Academy (Class of ’78), where he was labeled “the un-Midshipman” by his roommates.

John speaks the remnants of Russian painstakingly pounded into him by Professor Vladimir Tolstoy (yes, he was related to that Tolstoy).

He lives in Maryland with a wife who is too good for him and three great kids. The two eldest children are diagnosed as autistic but are slowly improving with therapies, education and medications.

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2025 Patrick Hester

The post Episode 648-With Jack Campbell appeared first on The Functional Nerds.

This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome Lauren J. A. Bear, author of MOTHER OF ROME.

About MOTHER OF ROME: The names Romulus and Remus may be immortalized in map and stone and chronicle, but their mother exists only as a preface to her sons’ journey, the princess turned oath-breaking priestess, condemned to death alongside her children.

But she did not die; she survived. And so does her story.

Beautiful, royal, rich: Rhea has it all—until her father loses his kingdom in a treacherous coup, and she is sent to the order of the Vestal Virgins to ensure she will never produce an heir.

Except when mortals scheme, gods laugh.

Rhea becomes pregnant, and human society turns against her. Abandoned, ostracized, and facing the gravest punishment, Rhea forges a dangerous deal with the divine, one that will forever change the trajectory of her life…and her beloved land.

To save her sons and reclaim their birthright, Rhea must summon nature’s mightiest force – a mother’s love – and fight.

All roads may lead to Rome, but they began with Rhea Silvia.

About Lauren J. A. Bear: Lauren J.A. Bear is a reader and writer, an educator, a troublemaker, and a fierce mama bear.

Lauren was born in Boston and raised in Long Beach, CA. After studying English at UCLA and Education at LMU, she taught middle-school Humanities for over a decade — and survived! She is a teaching fellow for the Holocaust Center for Humanity, and lives in Seattle with her husband and three young children. She likes crossword puzzles and being on or near the water without getting wet.

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2025 Patrick Hester

The post Episode 647-With Lauren J. A. Bear appeared first on The Functional Nerds.

This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome Katherine Villyard, author of IMMORTAL GIFTS.

About IMMORTAL GIFTS: Prussia, 1841. Abraham only ever wanted to play violin. Hiding his Jewish status so he can study at the prestigious Berlin Academy of Music, the eager young man is delighted to find a patron who believes in him. But he’s mortified when his new friend turns him into a vampire… and Abraham earns the fury of an ancient antisemite who vows to see him permanently dead.

Fleeing the hate-mongering fiend across the decades, the sensitive violinist at last settles in twenty-first-century New Jersey with a mortal woman. But when he discovers his relentless tormentor has tracked him down yet again, Abraham despairs he’ll never find true happiness.

With everyone he’s ever loved at risk, can he escape the rage of a ruthless bigot?

About Katherine Villyard: Katherine Villyard was born in Dallas, Texas. Her father was civilian support for the military, so she moved every two years and attended four different high schools. The most exotic one to US readers will probably be Kaiserslautern American High School in Germany, but her favorite was Arts Magnet High School at Booker T. Washington in Dallas, where she studied theater. She also went through a phase where she wore a lot of white dresses and sat in windowsills writing (bad) poetry; what she called her “Emily Dickinson phase.”

Katherine is a former Microsoft MVP in Enterprise Security and Cloud and Datacenter Management, a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association, a member of the Horror Writers Association, and the President of Broad Universe. She has a tendency to develop nerdy fascinations and research binge. Previous topics include Pueblo pottery, Navajo weaving, Pre-Columbian art, Frida Kahlo, Percy and Mary Shelley, and Eleanor of Aquitaine. Her work has appeared in Escape Pod, Electric Velocipede, and Fantastic Stories of the Imagination.

When she’s not writing, working, or research binging, she’s probably spoiling cats or playing The Sims.

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2024 Patrick Hester

The post Episode 646-With Katherine Villyard appeared first on The Functional Nerds.

This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome Cerece Rennie Murphy, author of In the Garden of Light and Shadow.

About In the Garden of Light and Shadow: 4000 years ago, a rebellion in the Ever brought angels to live among us.

At first, they were worshiped as gods.

But that was not enough.

And in their hunger for power,

Evil claimed their hearts

and made them demons.

Lilavois St. James rose to fight them.

As a member of the Sisters of Light, she swore an oath to use the magic of the moon to battle the demons and defend humankind.

Until one day, she met a demon and fell in love.

And I was born.

About Cerece Rennie Murphy: Cerece Rennie Murphy is the national bestselling and award-winning author of ten novels, children’s books, and short stories. She is also the founder of Virtuous Con, an online science fiction and comic culture convention that celebrates the excellence of BIPOC creators in speculative fiction, across the mediums of fiction, comics, film, and visual arts.

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2024 Patrick Hester

The post Episode 645-With Cerece Rennie Murphy appeared first on The Functional Nerds.

In a very special JUST US episode of the podcast this week, Patrick and Tracy are talking about cats, Dungeons & Dragons, Patreon, coffee, Star Wars coffee mugs, working out, black Friday, smart tvs, peopling, weddings, San Diego ComiCon, conventions, Denver’s Pop Culture Con, the holidays and gift giving, kids, family, spreadsheets, pivot tables, gift cards, restaurant menus, holiday music, Mariah Carey, The Wall Street Journal’s news podcast, Spotify, the Table of Ultimate Gaming kickstarter (2018), Pathfinder 2E, the Glass Cannon podcast, Hasbro, Philips Hue smart light bulbs and strips, and so much more…

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2024 Patrick Hester

The post Episode 644-Just Us and the Holidays appeared first on The Functional Nerds.

This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome R.S.A. Garcia, author of The Nightward.

About The Nightward: For 500 years Gaiea’s Hand has stood as a ward against the Dark. The Age of Chaos is a faded memory. The Goddess has left Gailand and given her Blessing to the Queens to rule in her stead.

Princess Viella of the court of Hamber is the Spirit of Gaiea, presumptive heir to the throne and budding wielder of magic. And yet she’s still a child—not yet ten years old—and a day spent evading her teachers and her dutiful bodyguard, Luka, is much more satisfying than learning about telepathy, illusions, and other spells, or obeying even her mother, the Queen.

There is time enough…until there isn’t.

For the night the Queen hosts the Ceremony to confirm Viella as the next Hand of Gaiea, everything changes for her—in the most horrific way imaginable: the assassination of Viella’s mother.

Now Viella is Queen.

Luka, despite resenting his position as royal babysitter, does not hesitate. He rushes his charge from the Court and vows to keep her safe. Yet he is unsure how to help a burgeoning Hand of Gaiea, let alone contend with his place as a man in a matriarchal world and the secret that is burning inside him.

Together, they are on the run from darkness in a world where the lines between magic and technology are blurring and it’s up to a child and her protector to bring clarity and light back to the Queendom.

About R.S.A. Garcia: R.S.A. is a Nebula and Sturgeon Award winning writer of speculative fiction. She is also the winner of the Machine Intelligence Foundation for Rights and Ethics’ 2023 Media Award, and a Locus, Ignyte and Eugie Foster Award finalist.

Her Amazon Bestselling science fiction mystery, Lex Talionis, received a starred review from Publishers Weekly and the Silver Medal for Best Scifi/Fantasy/Horror Ebook from the Independent Publishers Awards (2015).

She has published short fiction in venues such as Clarkesworld Magazine, Uncanny Magazine, Escape Pod, Strange Horizons, The Sunday Morning Transport, and Internazionale Magazine.

Her stories have been long-listed for the British Science Fiction Awards, translated into several languages, and included in a number of anthologies, including the critically acclaimed The Best of World SF, The Best Science Fiction of the Year, The Year’s Best Fantasy, and The Apex Book of World SF.

Her sci-fantasy duology, beginning with The Nightward, is forthcoming from Harper Voyager US, October, 2024.

She lives in Trinidad and Tobago with an extended family and too many cats.

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2024 Patrick Hester

The post Episode 643-With R.S.A. Garcia appeared first on The Functional Nerds.

This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome Mike Chen, author of Marvel: What If . . . Marc Spector Was Host to Venom? (A Moon Knight & Venom Story).

About Marvel: What If . . . Marc Spector Was Host to Venom? (A Moon Knight & Venom Story): Marc Spector is used to voices in his head. He’s used to waking up disoriented, unsure what his alters, Jake and Steven, might have been up to. He’s used to having an Egyptian god command him as Moon Knight, his avatar of justice and revenge. What he’s not used to: staring into the face of a literal out-of-body doppelgänger.

Another Marc crash-landed from an alternate reality, begging for help? Yeah, that is a new one, even for him.

But before he can really process anything beyond Khonshu’s incessant alarm bells, it becomes clear this other Marc didn’t travel solo. Some kind of alien—a symbiote named Venom—casts off its current host and begins to merge with Marc, forcing Khonshu away from his chosen champion and claiming Moon Knight for its own. The formerly stark white suit that struck fear into the hearts of criminals now looms as a jet-black shadow over friends and foes alike. Marc’s lethal prowess, fueled by Venom’s penchant for violence, carves a trail of chaos as they comb through the vigilante’s torturous past.

Yet a sliver of hope remains: Finally free of Venom’s control, the other Jake and Steven regain consciousness to find themselves in a strange reality, without their Marc but with a strange bird-like god insisting that “they will do.” Desperate, lost, and running out of time, the pair make a deal: become Khonshu’s new avatar to track Venom’s path of destruction, save this universe, and just maybe figure out a way back to their own.

About Mike Chen: Mike Chen is the New York Times bestselling author of Star Wars: Brotherhood, Here and Now and Then, A Quantum Love Story, and other novels, as well as Star Trek: Deep Space Nine comics. He has covered geek culture for sites such as Nerdist and The Mary Sue, and in a different life, he’s covered the NHL. A member of SFWA, Mike lives in the Bay Area with his wife, daughter, and many rescue animals. Follow him on Twitter, Bluesky, and Instagram: @mikechenwriter

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2024 Patrick Hester

The post Episode 642-With Mike Chen appeared first on The Functional Nerds.

This week, Patrick and Tracy welcome Curtis C. Chen, author of TRUE BLUE KANGAROO.

About TRUE BLUE KANGAROO: Welcome to the spacefaring future, where humanity travels between planets with ease and has abused that power to establish outposts in some questionable places.

Take Venus, for example: a sister world to Mother Earth, similar in size and gravity, it’s also known for having a toxic atmosphere and hellish landscape at ground level. But climate-controlled habitat domes stay in eternal sunlight and offer vacationers endless good times while floating through blue skies above the clouds of deadly acid.

Meanwhile, hidden down inside those poisonous clouds are other floating habitats, so-called “blue sites”—government-controlled secret prisons where inmates are incarcerated with no oversight and no hope of escape.

And why, pray tell, would secret agent Kangaroo, with his pocket superpower and bleeding-edge biotech implants, need to infiltrate such a secure facility? Might it be to rescue another spy who’s gone radio silent? Or perhaps to extract a high value asset who claims to have been wrongly imprisoned therein? Possibly both?

It’s six of one, half a dozen of the other. Questions are a burden to others, and answers a prison for oneself.

What do you want? Information? That would be telling.

About Curtis C. Chen: Once a Silicon Valley software engineer, Curtis C. Chen (???) now writes stories near Portland, Oregon. He’s the author of the KANGAROO series of funny science fiction spy thrillers and has written for the Realm original podcasts Echo Park, Ninth Step Murders, and Machina. Curtis’ shorter works have appeared in Playboy Magazine; the ENNIE Award-winning Kobold Guide to Roleplaying; The Year’s Best Fantasy, Volume 2; Aliens vs. Predators: Ultimate Prey; and elsewhere. His homebrew cat feeding robot was displayed in the “Worlds Beyond Here” exhibit at Seattle’s Wing Luke Museum.

This week’s picks:

Links:

© 2024 Patrick Hester

The post Episode 641-With Curtis C. Chen appeared first on The Functional Nerds.