Posts Tagged ‘Marguerite Kenner’

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Cast of Wonders 655: The Carmel B Crazies

Image by Christopher Keough from Pixabay

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:52 — 38.3MB)

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The Carmel B Crazies

by Rick Kennet

On the day she turned seventeen Cy De Gerch peered through a window into rusty red desert and saw her future squatting darkly in its launch cradle.

She’d been discharged from hospital an hour before and had made her quick way to Styx City Starport. Standing now at the window into Launch Cradle 3, her bag slung over the shoulder of her new Martian Star Corps tunic, she gazed through the glass like a kid outside a toy store. Utopia Plain, her new toy, smooth, black, ellipsoid, seemed to squat in its cradle amid a patch of the red desert of Mars. Recently repaired after a battle with Xenoid warships at Rigel, the starship’s liquid lines were unbroken but for the pressure tunnel extruded from her forward hatch. A thing of space, it seemed to sit impatient to lift into the pink-brown sky and the void beyond.

All her fears and excitements came flooding back – a feeling of elation at this new beginning aboard her first ship; a scary feeling too of coming adrift, separated from her family on Phobos and the surrogate family of her space cadet section, training days ended.

Inspecting herself in the window’s reflection, Cy adjusted her tunic sporting its new lieutenant’s bars and ran a hand through her short dark hair, wondering if she’d surprise her new captain with her age. She thought that she might. She was the first of her breed – a product of the Gartino genetics experiment – to qualify for active service. It all depended on what Captain Ralph Brown was like. Would he understand and appreciate her as a purpose-built person, trained and schooled seventeen years for this purpose? Or would there be suspicion and mistrust?
(Continue Reading…)

a sword hilt with dragon embellishments reflected on a mirrored surface

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Cast of Wonders 643: So You Want to Kiss Your Nemesis?

First published in Lightspeed in April 2023

Image by Bruno from Pixabay

 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 11:09 — 15.3MB)

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So You Want to Kiss Your Nemesis?

by John Wiswell

The next girl through the door was Robin’s prototypical customer.

She trotted in with her chin up, her posture so rigid she definitely had back problems. Her dress jacket was the color of newly hatched cardinals, and it was doubtless self-tailored, the material wearing out at the seams. Likely she was one of those academy girls who was paying their own way—so she was definitely shopping for a blade. (Continue Reading…)

books viewed from vertically above, in black and white

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Cast of Wonders 628: The Bookstore at the End of America (Staff Picks 2024)

First published in the anthology A People’s Future of the United States edited by Victor LaValle and John Joseph Adams, and in Cast of Wonders 593 in July 2024

Image by Mirko Stödter from Pixabay

War, political intolerance

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:06 — 75.7MB)

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The Bookstore at the End of America

by Charlie Jane Anders

A bookshop on a hill. Two front doors, two walkways lined with blank slates and grass, two identical signs welcoming customers to the First and Last Page, and a great blue building in the middle, shaped like an old-fashioned barn with a slanted tiled roof and generous rain gutters. Nobody knew how many books were inside that building, not even Molly, the owner. But if you couldn’t find it there, they probably hadn’t written it down yet.

The two walkways led to two identical front doors, with straw welcome mats, blue plank floors, and the scent of lilacs and old bindings—but then you’d see a completely different store, depending which side you entered. With two cash registers, for two separate kinds of money.

If you entered from the California side, you’d see a wall hanging: women of all ages, shapes, and origins holding hands and dancing. You’d notice the display of the latest books from a variety of small presses that clung to life in Colorado Springs and Santa Fe, from literature and poetry to cultural studies. The shelves closest to the door on the California side included a decent amount of women’s and queer studies, but also a strong selection of classic literature, going back to Virginia Woolf and Zora Neale Hurston. Plus some brand-new paperbacks.

If you came in through the American front door, the basic layout would be pretty similar, except for the big painting of the nearby Rocky Mountains, though you might notice more books on religion, and some history books with a somewhat more conservative approach. The literary books skewed a bit more toward Faulkner, Thoreau, and Hemingway, not to mention  Ayn Rand, and you might find more books of essays about self-reliance and strong families, along with another selection of low-cost paperbacks: thrillers and war novels, including brand-new releases from the big printing plant in Gatlinburg. Romance novels, too. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 593: The Bookstore at the End of America

First published in the anthology A People’s Future of the United States edited by Victor LaValle and John Joseph Adams

Image by Mirko Stödter from Pixabay

war, political intolerance

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:22 — 76.0MB)

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The Bookstore at the End of America

by Charlie Jane Anders

A bookshop on a hill. Two front doors, two walkways lined with blank slates and grass, two identical signs welcoming customers to the First and Last Page, and a great blue building in the middle, shaped like an old-fashioned barn with a slanted tiled roof and generous rain gutters. Nobody knew how many books were inside that building, not even Molly, the owner. But if you couldn’t find it there, they probably hadn’t written it down yet.

The two walkways led to two identical front doors, with straw welcome mats, blue plank floors, and the scent of lilacs and old bindings—but then you’d see a completely different store, depending which side you entered. With two cash registers, for two separate kinds of money.

If you entered from the California side, you’d see a wall hanging: women of all ages, shapes, and origins holding hands and dancing. You’d notice the display of the latest books from a variety of small presses that clung to life in Colorado Springs and Santa Fe, from literature and poetry to cultural studies. The shelves closest to the door on the California side included a decent amount of women’s and queer studies, but also a strong selection of classic literature, going back to Virginia Woolf and Zora Neale Hurston. Plus some brand-new paperbacks.

If you came in through the American front door, the basic layout would be pretty similar, except for the big painting of the nearby Rocky Mountains, though you might notice more books on religion, and some history books with a somewhat more conservative approach. The literary books skewed a bit more toward Faulkner, Thoreau, and Hemingway, not to mention  Ayn Rand, and you might find more books of essays about self-reliance and strong families, along with another selection of low-cost paperbacks: thrillers and war novels, including brand-new releases from the big printing plant in Gatlinburg. Romance novels, too. (Continue Reading…)

angel outline against a blue sky

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Cast of Wonders 567: Disposable Gabriel

Cast of Wonders 567: Disposable Gabriel is a Cast of Wonders original.

Commercialisation of religion, abuse of non-human sentients, terminal illness.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:28 — 44.6MB)

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Disposable Gabriel

by Brian D. Hinson

The lights illuminated a young Mary sitting alone, in a humble abode of wood on the stage of a church that more resembled a sports arena. The stadium screen behind her displayed the dusty streets of Nazareth: clusters of connected adobe brick structures beneath an orange sun blazing its last glory on the horizon.

The angel Gabriel swooped in from an aerial catwalk, huge feathered wings angled for a glide, and a collective gasp filled the auditorium. He alighted in front of Mary, folding wings that glowed in the spotlight. Mary leapt up and screamed, back pressed against the far wall.

Gabriel’s voice thundered. No mic pickup was necessary. “Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favor with God. And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus.”

The crowd cheered.

Pastor Anabel stood offstage, arms crossed. By her side, the play’s director, Pastor Jude, beamed as he scratched his beard, an old anxious habit. It was Christmas Eve, the final performance, and things were going perfectly. (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 400: Knitting in English (Staff Picks 2019)

Originally appeared in Cast of Wonders 371 (August 25, 2019)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 18:07 — 17.0MB)

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Knitting in English

by Brit E. B. Hvide

Looping the thread over her needle, Kari caught the sun in her knit. It was an old spell: warmth trapped in rows of neatly patterned wool to stave off the winter wind. The first spell her pappa taught her. The only one she knew.

(Continue Reading…)

Text message from story

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Cast of Wonders 390: The Tale of Descruptikn and the Product Launch Requirements Documentation

Cast of Wonders 390: The Tale of Descruptikn and the Product Launch Requirements Documentation is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:39 — 30.4MB)

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The Tale of Descruptikn and the Product Launch Requirements Documentation

by Effie Seiberg

Once upon a time there was an associate project manager named Jaime. She knew she was lucky to have this job – so many others in her graduating class were still juggling nanny gigs and catering gigs and tutoring gigs and so many side hustles they could’ve been a dodecahedron.

It was at a small company that ostensibly helped foreign students find scholarships for American colleges, but actually if you looked closely you could see that the company didn’t do much and was just a vanity project so the founder could say he was innovating and disrupting and other such nonsense buzzwords. Considering how little the company actually accomplished, Jamie was astonished that she was the one hundredth person to join the team. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 372: Little Wonders 22: #FantasyWorldProblems

Cast of Wonders 372: Little Wonders 22: #FantasyWorldProblems is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 48:45 — 45.5MB)

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Show Notes

“Whatever the Price” and “The Supervisor of Accountants and the Great Grey Wolf” are original to Cast of Wonders (2019)

“An Evil Opportunity Employer” was originally published in Unidentified Funny Objects 6, edited by Alex Shvartsman (2017)

Whatever the Price

by Matthew Bailey

The road to defeating an evil Corpse Lord is long, the oracle had told me, but it always starts with proper financing.

With a deep breath, I stepped into the Rootbridge Savings and Loan praying I wouldn’t have to sully my honor. Knowing I would, if it came to it. One way or another, I was getting what I came for–whatever the price.

At least the place wasn’t as imposing as the larger, marble-hewn banks I’d already tried back in the capital. Banks that would laugh at anyone without their own personal standard and at least one hornblower. Banks that existed solely to help those who already had money make more of it. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 371: Knitting in English

Cast of Wonders 371: Knitting in English is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 16:37 — 16.0MB)

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Knitting in English

by Brit E. B. Hvide

Looping the thread over her needle, Kari caught the sun in her knit. It was an old spell: warmth trapped in rows of neatly patterned wool to stave off the winter wind. The first spell her pappa taught her. The only one she knew.

Ironically, the spell was supposed to be easier to cast here at the equator, but more useless for the same reason: the sun was strong enough. She let a long leg dip into the pool, imagining the chill of it as snow. At fourteen, she’d never seen winter outside of the movies. Above her, a gap in the tall tembusus and rain trees showed a clear blue sky with rain clouds off to the east. The cicadas chirped, their call vibrating against her skin, comforting as an old blanket. The rainforest was always full of noises. Silence didn’t suit her.

Kari bit her tongue and focused on the yarn in front of her: knit, perl, knit, perl. She wasn’t good enough yet to try anything more complicated than a seed pattern, still dropping stitches and backtracking to pick them up again. But it was a start. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 368: If Only a Word for All Things

Cast of Wonders 368: If Only a Word for All Things is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:48 — 30.5MB)

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If Only a Word for All Things

by Jameyanne Fuller

I hunched my shoulders and leaned closer to the automatic ticket machine. I punched in the date and time with tense fingers, chose the train I wanted, and stuffed some crumpled Euros into the slot. At any moment a carabiniere would take one look at me, know I was somewhere I shouldn’t be, and march me right onto the train back to Assisi. But I wasn’t running away, not really. I was going to Paris to find Maman and bring her home. We needed her home. Her and her magic words.

The ticket machine thought, then spat out my ticket. I seized it.

“Do you know where to go, signorina?” a station guard asked at my shoulder. I jumped, but I reminded myself she was only trying to be helpful. As long as I didn’t give myself away, I would be fine.

(Continue Reading…)