Posts Tagged ‘Traditions’

green-toned image of a bayou

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Cast of Wonders 653: Life and Death and Love in the Bayou

First published in Writers and Illustrators of the Future Vol 40, April 2024

Domestic Violence. Mention of past attempted rape.

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Life and Death and Love in the Bayou

by Stephannie Tallent

It was the February the rain fell so warm and hard the bayous swamped over old man Rochambeau’s gator curing shack and the whole parish smelled like graveyard mold and sour-smelling gator crap, even the houses built up on stilts above the high-water line, that I decided to help my mama once and for all. No matter the cost to my soul.

’Bout that shed . . . I knew old man Rochambeau would just hit up my mama to use the ham hut for his haul, and she’d say yes, so I didn’t feel too bad. Not for him, anyway.

Felt bad for my mama, who’d be stuck bumping up against log- shaped hunks of gator meat while she seasoned and cured the hogs. Touch one of those logs of meat, and it’s like the Spanish moss is dragging against the back of your neck, like the spirit of the gator is still there and pissed off and just waiting to chomp on you and roll you.

Those spirits are truly there, lurking to garner just a bit of power, enough to touch the living world. (Continue Reading…)

Australian Billabong

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Cast of Wonders 642: Feeding Spirits

Cast of Wonders 642: Feeding Spirits is a Cast of Wonders original.

Friendly haunting, bereavement

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 25:39 — 35.2MB)

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Show Notes

Image by Daniel Burkett from Pixabay

Feeding Spirits

by Emmi Khor

What does one feed a hungry ancestor? Fish and chips, chicken parmi, or steak pie didn’t seem like something my recently deceased Popo would enjoy.

I’d just returned from my backyard swamp with a full trash bag, when the phone rang. The call bounced with around-the-world echoes and I’d barely said hello, when Ma started in on her visit to the medium.

“I asked your Popo if she was comfortable. Ai yah, Li-Li,” cried Ma, “she scolded me! She said: Twenty years my granddaughter doesn’t come home. I go all the way to Australia to visit and she doesn’t even offer me a meal.” The click of Ma’s tongue was like a slap. “You should respect your ancestors!” (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 599: Little Wonders 45 – Future Legacies

Hitch Hiker, Guide was first published in Flashes Issue 2, a self-published collection of flash fiction, in August 2023

Seeds Travel was first published in Nature 572, 686 (2019).

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Hitch-Hiker, Guide

by Alasdair Stuart

Frank Duffy saw the astronaut on a gift stall on his way to work one day. A little guy, white and gold plastic, pointing at the sky with all the confidence of the non-sentient. Frank bought it on a whim, and it stayed on his monitor until he left a few years later. (Continue Reading…)

Girl with balloons walking on a landscape made out of an open book

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Cast of Wonders 558: Braiding Challah

Cast of Wonders 558: Braiding Challah is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 29:49 — 42.3MB)

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Braiding Challah

by Rachel Gutin

When my family agreed to take in one of the refugees from Haven 3, I was excited. Sarah was fifteen, just like I was and, even better, she was Jewish too! There were only a few Jewish teens on the ship, and it would be nice to have one more of us.

I knew things wouldn’t be perfect. Taking Sarah in meant sharing my tiny room with her. Once we added the second bed, there would hardly be space to walk between them. Still, I was sure we could make it work.

But my excitement didn’t last for long. The day she arrived, Sarah barely spoke a word to any of us. Every time I asked her a question, she’d nod or shrug or ignore me entirely. That night, she cried herself to sleep, and when I offered her a hug, she cried even harder. I couldn’t figure out how to make her stop. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 447: Candy Wrappers (Staff Picks 2020)

First published in Cast of Wonders episode 437 in November 2020

colonialism, death

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 34:41 — 32.2MB)

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Candy Wrappers

by Kaitlyn Zivanovich

The island is a circle. A magmic glow radiates from the lips of the volcano crater at one end—hot, and alive. On the other end the Visitor compound is white and cold, lit by the new false light. But it is darkness the island child seeks as she sprints through the garden of the dead, cradling her brother’s soul in her hands.

Mikmik dashes from night-shadow to night-shadow. She skirts around overgrown patches of soulseeds, left uncollected by their living. There is no singing in the garden. Jyn chatters and laughs in Mikmik’s palm, completely unchanged for all that he no longer has a body. “Faster!” he cries. The wind rushes over his soulseed. “Run, Mikmik, run!” (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 437: Candy Wrappers

Cast of Wonders 437: Candy Wrappers is a Cast of Wonders original.

colonialism, death

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 34:23 — 32.0MB)

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Candy Wrappers

by Kaitlyn Zivanovich

The island is a circle. A magmic glow radiates from the lips of the volcano crater at one end—hot, and alive. On the other end the Visitor compound is white and cold, lit by the new false light. But it is darkness the island child seeks as she sprints through the garden of the dead, cradling her brother’s soul in her hands.

Mikmik dashes from night-shadow to night-shadow. She skirts around overgrown patches of soulseeds, left uncollected by their living. There is no singing in the garden. Jyn chatters and laughs in Mikmik’s palm, completely unchanged for all that he no longer has a body. “Faster!” he cries. The wind rushes over his soulseed. “Run, Mikmik, run!” (Continue Reading…)