Posts Tagged ‘gods’

sea cave, dark, with an obscured swimmer

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Cast of Wonders 635: What the God Mouth Wants

Cast of Wonders 635: What the God Mouth Wants is a Cast of Wonders original.

Homophobia, body horror, risk of drowning

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 28:10 — 38.7MB)

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What the God-Mouth Wants

by Ryan Cole

They call it a homecoming: when your own severed tongue finds its way back into your mouth; when it slides all slippery and wet onto the stump that your parents cut out when you were six years old; when it gives you the power, the freedom to say what your lips never could. All in exchange for a decade of silence.

Dallas doesn’t care. Tongueless for years, he’s ready to be whole again no matter the cost. Better to say what the God-Mouth wants than not be able to say anything at all. (Continue Reading…)

infinity space

Cast of Wonders 493: One Day in Infinity

Cast of Wonders 493: One Day in Infinity is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 20:31 — 20.3MB)

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One Day in Infinity

by Beth Goder

Walrus reaches her hands down into a supermarket in Oregon, willing the roof translucent. Time is frozen like the fish sticks in aisle seven. She weaves her hands through shoppers, careful not to nudge the boy bouncing in the cart or the old man in front of the cake mixes. She breathes in the smell of cucumbers, a loamy quality that speaks of the ground they came from.

First, she removes salmonella from a carton of eggs, sucking out disease until only a swirl of white and yolk remains. She caresses the fish in the display case to tell them they are loved. Next, she sees if anyone is going to die. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 345: Pocosin (Staff Picks 2018)

Previously published in Cast of Wonders 298 for April 1, 2018

Content warning: Some profanity

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 38:42 — 35.9MB)

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Show Notes

Every year in January, Cast of Wonders highlights some of our favorite episodes from the previous year. It’s a great chance for us to take a bit of a breather, and let you, our listeners, catch up on any missed back episodes with new commentary from a different member of the crew.

Today’s episode is hosted by assistant editor Alexis Goble.

Pocosin

by Ursula Vernon

This is the place of the carnivores, the pool ringed with sundews and the fat funnels of the pitcher plants.

This is the place where the ground never dries out and the loblolly pines grow stunted, where the soil is poor and the plants turn to other means of feeding themselves.

This is the place where the hairstreak butterflies flow sleekly through the air and you can hear insect feet drumming inside the bowl of the pitcher plants.

This is the place where the old god came to die. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 344: The Temple of the Whale (Staff Picks 2018)

Originally published in Cast of Wonders 304 for June 5, 2018

Content Warning: Parental grief

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:20 — 30.1MB)

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Show Notes

Every year in January, Cast of Wonders highlights some of our favorite episodes from the previous year. It’s a great chance for us to take a bit of a breather, and let you, our listeners, catch up on any missed back episodes with new commentary from a different member of the crew.

Today’s episode is hosted by associate editor Alicia Caporaso.

The Temple of the Whale

by K.B. Sluss

Late in the morning I find Terren in our palm tree shelter, packing his few possessions: his bone knife; a collection of coral carved into various whale poses; a square of cloth he uses as a blanket on rare, cool evenings; a flask of water; a day’s supply of food, enough to carry him until he reaches the village. His intent to leave me is clear. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 304: The Temple of the Whale

Cast of Wonders 304: The Temple of the Whale is a Cast of Wonders original.

Content Warning: Parental grief

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 31:26 — 30.2MB)

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The Temple of the Whale

by K.B. Sluss

Late in the morning I find Terren in our palm tree shelter, packing his few possessions: his bone knife; a collection of coral carved into various whale poses; a square of cloth he uses as a blanket on rare, cool evenings; a flask of water; a day’s supply of food, enough to carry him until he reaches the village. His intent to leave me is clear.

I rub away budding tears and cough to clear the warble trapped in my throat. Stiffening my spine, I square my shoulders, a defense against the urge to melt into quivering lump. “I see you’ve made up your mind.”

Terren rearranges things in his satchel to keep his hands busy, to keep his attention occupied. A poor pretext to keep from having to face me. “I have.”

“And you’re set on going now? It can’t wait another day?”

“Safaro wants to leave tomorrow, at first light.”

Safaro is a peddler, a tinker who regularly visits the village at the other end of the tombolo connecting our small tied island. He has seduced my son with exotic trinkets and tales of travel and adventure in the big, grand world thriving beyond our self-imposed cloister. Terrren is almost eighteen. How can I expect him to resist?
(Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 298: Pocosin

Originally published in Apex Magazine (January 2015)

Content warning: some scattered profanity

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 38:35 — 35.6MB)

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Show Notes

From the author: Pocosins are a type of raised peat wetland found almost exclusively in the Carolinas. The name derives from an Eastern Algonquian word meaning “swamp on a hill.” They are a rare and unique ecosystem, today widely threatened by development.

Pocosin

by Ursula Vernon

This is the place of the carnivores, the pool ringed with sundews and the fat funnels of the pitcher plants.

This is the place where the ground never dries out and the loblolly pines grow stunted, where the soil is poor and the plants turn to other means of feeding themselves.

This is the place where the hairstreak butterflies flow sleekly through the air and you can hear insect feet drumming inside the bowl of the pitcher plants.

This is the place where the old god came to die. (Continue Reading…)

Genres:

Cast of Wonders 86: Ieia

“Ieia” originally appeared in the Winter 2012 issue of Tales of the Talisman, edited by David Lee Summers

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 26:11 — 24.0MB)

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Ieia

by S. L. Bickley

Even after seven years living out in the country, Palfi didn’t know how to sense the seasons. But she knew the autumn equinox had not come yet, for she’d had no visitors in a week or so. People always came flocking when the seasons turned.

Autumn and its pilgrims could stay away forever, for all she cared. She didn’t need donations: she already had plenty of shelfbread, and plenty of wine, and a good store of donated silver which she had few opportunities to spend. And the only things a visitor might give her, apart from bread and wine and silver, were irritation and trouble.

She sat at her devotions nonetheless — partly because someone was sure to arrive the moment she abandoned her façade, and partly because the grove was a pleasant place, and Ieia, the goddess statue, was better company than most real people.
(Continue Reading…)