LIGHTSPEED MAGAZINE - Science Fiction and Fantasy Story Podcast (Sci-Fi | Audiobook

Latest Episodes:

Kristina Ten | The Noon Witch Goes to Sound Planet Nov 24, 2022

Show notes

The Noon Witch is not a cat person. She likes the color purple, hates police procedurals, loves breakfast foods, thinks scented bath products and anchovy pizza are gross. Hates platform shoes. Hates walnuts in brownies. Used to like the electropop group all the girls at school like, until they used too much synth on their latest album, so now she hates them too. The Noon Witch isn’t an overcritical person. She’s just at that difficult age when you’re desperate to figure out who you are, so you lean too much on your likes and dislikes to try to cobble together what you think should be your personality. | Copyright 2022 by Kristina Ten. Narrated by Justine Eyre.

Tania Fordwalker | Beyond the Shore Nov 03, 2022

Show notes

Nobody noticed the first few. They walked. One by one, in the beginning. Isolated instances. On every continent, mid-meal, mid-shower, mid-work, mid-fuck, right out the door of a pulled-up car in the middle of a freeway---ordinary people turned their backs on their ordinary lives and walked. They walked, shedding their hair in clumps along the way, sloughing their skin in translucent sheets to reveal pale grey beneath. On bleeding feet they walked down highways and lanes and trails, unerringly taking the path of least resistance to the nearest coast. They crossed the sand. The sea cooled their aching calves. Still, they walked. | Copyright 2022 by Tania Fordwalker. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki.

Debbie Urbanski | The Dirty Golden Yellow House Oct 27, 2022

Show notes

On the first floor of a Colonial-style house constructed last century out of planks of old growth cedar, a monster is dragging a woman’s husband from room to room. The specific path this monster takes will be evident the next morning from the gashes in the wood floors and the splattering of the husband’s innards upon the plaster walls. Blood on the ceiling. The woman herself is hiding in the upstairs bedroom in her closet, face buried in the nylon hems of her patterned dresses, hands to her ears, a washcloth between her teeth so she can bite down hard on something that isn’t her tongue. | Copyright 2022 by Debbie Urbanski. Narrated by Roxanne Hernandez.

Gene Doucette | Primordial Soup and Salad Oct 06, 2022

Show notes

Wallace Englund, captain of the United Space Fleet vessel Caroline, stared out his private office window at the only view he’d had for nearly four years---outer space, in all its dull glory---and wondered why he couldn’t get a decent cheeseburger. Behind him were the last three attempts at a burger made by the ship’s food replicator. The first looked okay until Wallace bit into it and discovered a soft, gelatinous interior that still tasted like a cheeseburger but whose texture made it impossible to ingest. The second was visibly worse: the left side of the burger looked like brown gravy, and not in a good way. | Copyright 2022 by Gene Doucette. Narrated by Paul Boehmer.

Martin Cahill | Her Five Farewells Sep 29, 2022

Show notes

When the Asphodel Queen decides she’ll die to save our people from her ex-husband’s tyranny, she commands me to build her a coffin, the very first in our world’s history. Her ageless face of ivory and emerald is water on a windless day; her stillness betrays nothing of her decision. As the Senate screams in sorrow, I am held by her imperial glare, the enormity of my task sinking in like sunlight on skin. “Me, Your Majesty? I’m but a humble craftsman.” Her voice rises above the growing din, as panic races through data-vines and across the crystal-network. | Copyright 2022 by Martin Cahill. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki.

MKRNYILGLD | The CRISPR Cookbook: A Guide to Biohacking Your Own Abortion in a Post-Roe World Sep 08, 2022

Show notes

If you’re reading this---on some godforsaken imageboard, or dog-eared book page, or in encrypted base pairs sequenced off 3D-printed oligos---you’re probably grappling with a pretty tough decision right now. Breathe. I’m not judging you. I know how it goes. You tried your best but nothing’s infallible, or you slipped up one night, or he just straight-up went, your biological clock’s ticking, and hacked your birth control, knowing once it happens you won’t have a choice. The second his sperm enters your egg, he’s done, back to his star-studded career cranking out Science and Cell papers. | Copyright 2022 by MKRNYILGLD. Narrated by Judy Young.

Tobi Ogundiran | The Clockmaker and His Daughter Aug 25, 2022

Show notes

Gaza looked down at the city of Nyss, surveying his creation. He thought it was perfect. Well, almost. In the city centre stood several griots spinning a tale to a captive audience, their camels and brightly-coloured caravans sheltering in the shade of palm trees. The griots should be dusty---after all they had travelled some distance, spent several months weathering the harsh terrain of the desert. As it was they looked too pristine. | Copyright 2022 by Tobi Ogundiran. Narrated by Mirron Willis.

Adam-Troy Castro | My Future Self, Refused Aug 04, 2022

Show notes

This much was clear. At some point in my future, I would have access to a time machine. This was a ridiculous sentence and a tragically irrelevant concern while my wife Judi was on the floor and possibly dying, but there it was: nonsense, in the presence of death. This was the central tragic absurdity of the day. My future self had materialized in the corner of the room, as solid as a blow to the face, and it was not even my most important concern. | Copyright 2022 by Adam-Troy Castro. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki.

Micah Dean Hicks | Hungry as the Mirror Bright Jul 28, 2022

Show notes

She was born a low and needful thing. Hatched down in the tannin dark, dead leaf pillowed, gnashing her mouth in the loam. Burrowing deep where shed buttons and broken boot laces lay. Alone and babbling, prowling for worm-meat and snail-slick in the wet ground rot. Fattened on maggot and grub, she hardened white and lay sarcophagal. Then a second birth, splitting free and strange in new skin. | Copyright 2022 by Micah Dean Hicks. Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki.

Peter Watts | Critical Mass Jul 07, 2022

Show notes

Leo Gregory is losing altitude. He coasts on the thermals of a legacy fading behind him: a documentary here, a retrospective there, some greatest-hits collection down in the corner for the dilettantes. Oh, the work has lost none of its grandeur: his buildings remain timeless, his objets d’art still serve up facets upon layers from each new angle. | Copyright 2022 by Peter Watts. Narrated by Paul Boehmer.