Posts Tagged ‘rachel swirsky’

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Escape Pod 743: Flash From the Vault

Paul Bunyan and the Photocopier first appeared on Escape Pod on June 24, 2006.

Beachcomber first appeared in Baen’s Universe, October 2008, and on Escape Pod on March 23, 2009.

Semi-Autonomous or ‘For Whom The Warranty Tolls’ first appeared on Escape Pod on April 27, 2009.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 31:57 — 44.3MB)

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Flash From the Vault

Hello and welcome to Escape Pod Summer School, where we post some of our favorite episodes from the vault with a new perspective. I’m your assistant editor and teacher for this class, Benjamin C. Kinney, and I’ve got three flash episodes from long, long ago. We bring you “Paul Bunyan and the Photocopier” by Larry Hammer, “Beachcomber” by Mike Resnick, and “Semi-Autonomous: or, For Whom the Warranty Tolls” by Jim Kling. (Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 458: If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love

This story has been previously published in Apex Magazine.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 15:20 — 10.6MB)

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If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love

by Rachel Swirsky

If you were a dinosaur, my love, then you would be a T-Rex. You’d be a small one, only five feet, ten inches, the same height as human-you. You’d be fragile-boned and you’d walk with as delicate and polite a gait as you could manage on massive talons. Your eyes would gaze gently from beneath your bony brow-ridge.

If you were a T-Rex, then I would become a zookeeper so that I could spend all my time with you. I’d bring you raw chickens and live goats. I’d watch the gore shining on your teeth. I’d make my bed on the floor of your cage, in the moist dirt, cushioned by leaves. When you couldn’t sleep, I’d sing you lullabies.

If I sang you lullabies, I’d soon notice how quickly you picked up music. You’d harmonize with me, your rough, vibrating voice a strange counterpoint to mine. When you thought I was asleep, you’d cry unrequited love songs into the night.

If you sang unrequited love songs, I’d take you on tour. We’d go to Broadway. You’d stand onstage, talons digging into the floorboards. Audiences would weep at the melancholic beauty of your singing.

(Continue Reading…)

Escape Pod 250: Eros, Philia, Agape

Originally published in: Tor.com

Rated PG for marital strife and implied child abuse.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:09:53 — 48.1MB)

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Show Notes

Show Notes:

  • This is a long one, we’re bringing occasional novelettes to Escape Pod now, and what better to launch the effort than a Hugo nominee?

Next week… Escape Pod looks at an alternate history with alternate aliens.

Eros, Philia, Agape

By Rachel Swirsky

The objects belonged to them both, but Adriana waved her hand bitterly when Lucian began packing. “Take whatever you want,” she said, snapping her book shut. She waited by the door, watching Lucian with sad and angry eyes.

Their daughter, Rose, followed Lucian around the house. “Are you going to take that, Daddy? Do you want that?” Wordlessly, Lucian held her hand. He guided her up the stairs and across the uneven floorboards where she sometimes tripped. Rose stopped by the picture window in the master bedroom, staring past the palm fronds and swimming pools, out to the vivid cerulean swath of the ocean. Lucian relished the hot, tender feel of Rose’s hand. I love you, he would have whispered, but he’d surrendered the ability to speak.

Escape Pod 221: Little Ambushes

Escape Pod 221: Little Ambushes is an Escape Pod original.

Rated PG-13 for some adult situations and coarse language.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 20:20 — 14.0MB)

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Little Ambushes

By Joanne Merriam

Practically the first thing she did when she took in the alien was to give him a new name. He looked at her outstretched hand long enough to annoy her, and then grasped it with his four opposable fingers and hung on limply until she wrenched her hand out of his moist and over-jointed grip.

She said, “I’m Sarah,” and he said his name, or what she assumed was his name, in return, rolling the syllables around in his mouth like so many rough pebbles. His name was too long, something like Shperidth with extra grunting noises in the middle, like a car backfiring very far away. She tried to repeat it and couldn’t, while he stood on her doorstep sweating and folding his fingers around each other. She frowned at him.

“I can’t say that,” she said.

Genres:

Escape Pod 213: A Monkey Will Never Get Rid of Its Black Hands

Escape Pod 213: A Monkey Will Never Get Rid of Its Black Hands is an Escape Pod original.

Rated R for amputation fads.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 50:40 — 34.8MB)

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A Monkey Will Never Get Rid of Its Black Hands

By Rachel Swirsky

Papa and Uncle Fomba told me if I didn’t join the army, they’d kill me. They didn’t. They cut off my hands.

This was after U.S. forces marched on Syria, but before we invaded Lebanon. On every city block, posters of Uncle Sam entreated every Tom, Duc, and Haroun to get blown up in the name of freedom. Papa and Fomba gave me two weeks to enlist. I ran for Canada instead. They caught me.

Genres:

Escape Pod Flash: Semi-Autonomous or ‘For Whom The Warranty Tolls

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 6:31 — 4.5MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG and now available in a wide variety of colours!

Semi-Autonomous or ‘For Whom The Warranty Tolls

By Jim Kling

Hello, you have reached Jim’s semi-autonomous answering machine. Leave a message and I will have him return your call.

Hello, you have reached Jim’s semi-autonomous answering machine. He will be hosting his birthday party on Saturday night. If you plan to attend, press ‘one’ and then speak your name. I will add you to the guest list. Otherwise, leave a message and I will make sure he receives it.

Hello, you have reached Jim’s semi-autonomous answering machine. My records indicate that you have previously RSVP’d for the Saturday night party. Please indicate your alcohol preference. For beer, press ‘one.’ For wine, press ‘two.’ For mixed drinks, press ‘three.’ If you prefer non-alcoholic beverages, press ‘four.’ This information will be used for ordering purposes only, transmitted through my wireless connection to Jim’s refrigerator, which in turn is linked to an online grocery. For more information about AutonomInc’s SmartAppliance line, please view our web site at www.autonominc.com. “AutonomInc: We give a whole new meaning to housework!” If you have a message for Jim, please leave it now.

Escape Pod Flash Fiction Contest, Honorable Mention: Hello, I Love You

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 3:11 — 2.9MB)

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By Katherine Sparrow.
Read by Rachel Swirsky.
All stories by Katherine Sparrow
All stories read by Rachel Swirsky

“Junk DNA? I’ll junk your DNA!” Sofia glared at Zorg.

“Apologies. It is only, don’t you find it interesting? Most of it is unused–“

“Junk? You supercilious aliens come to Earth to rein snottiness on us lowly humans? How sublime. I suppose your DNA is full of Porsches?”

Rated PG.

Escape Pod 176: How The World Became Quiet: A Post-Human Creation Myth

Escape Pod 176: How The World Became Quiet: A Post-Human Creation Myth is an Escape Pod original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 31:07 — 21.4MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG. Contains war, invasion, exodus, mass extinction, religious revival, and a lot of mud.

Referenced Sites:
Resonance FM
Reality Break Podcast

How The World Became Quiet: A Post-Human Creation Myth

By Rachel Swirsky

Humans laid the foundation for the sixth apocalypse in much the same way they’d triggered the previous ones. Having recovered their ambition after the Apocalypse of Serotonin and rebuilt their populations after the Apocalypse of Grease, they once again embarked on their species’ long term goal to wreak as much havoc as possible on the environment through carelessness and boredom. This time, the trees protested. They devoured buildings, whipped wind into hurricanes between their branches, tangled men into their roots and devoured them as mulch. In retaliation, men chopped down trees, fire-bombed jungles, and released genetically engineered insects to devour tender shoots.

The pitched battle decimated civilians on both sides, but eventually — though infested and rootless — the trees overwhelmed their opposition. Mankind was forced to send its battered representatives to a sacred grove in the middle of the world’s oldest forest and beg for a treaty.

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