Posts Tagged ‘Young Adult fiction’

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Cast of Wonders 362: Hare’s Breath

Originally published in Shimmer, Issue 39 (2017)

Content Warning: discussion of medical procedures and suicide

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Show Notes

This episode is part of our 2019 Summer Spotlight, showcasing the work of the year’s major award finalists.

Shimmer is a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Semiprozine.

Many thanks to Shimmer for the use of their issue cover art for this episode.

Sweden Admit to Racial Purification (from The Independent)

“The so-called sterilization laws were instituted by the Swedish parliament in 1934 and 1941. Both allowed sterilization without consent under certain conditions. The reasons (indications) to perform sterilizations were threefold: eugenics (race/genetic hygiene), social and medical. Of the total number of sterilized individuals, 93 percent were women.”

From the report “Steriliseringsfrågan i Sverige 1935 – 1975” / “The issue of sterilization in Sweden 1935–1975,” issued by Socialdepartementet / Ministry of Health and Social Affairs, Sweden, March 2000.

Hare’s Breath

by Maria Haskins

1947, Västerbotten, Sweden

It’s Midsummer’s Eve and even this close to midnight there’s no darkness, only a long, translucent dusk that will eventually slip into dawn.

Britt and I are fifteen, and she has just come back from That Place, the one the adults won’t talk about even when they think I’m not listening. Something’s happened to her there, but I don’t understand what it is, and she can’t find the words to tell me.

We’re sitting on the wooden fence near my family’s potato patch, looking down the slope at the red-painted barn and stable, watching the hare. He sits upright on his haunches by the forest’s edge, ever watchful, bending now and then to nibble grass and clover, grey-brown fur all sleek and trim, long ears turning.

The hare reminds me of Britt: dark eyes watching to see if you’ve come to kill it; long legs always ready to run.

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Cast of Wonders 360: Kulturkampf (Encore!)

Originally published in the Immersion Book of Steampunk from Immersion Press, UK, in 2011.

Previously aired as Cast of Wonders Episode 24 in February 2012, and selected as a Staff Pick by Barry J. Northern in 2013.

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Kulturkampf

by Anatoly Belilovsky

September 1, 1870

Most respected Feldmarschall von Moltke,

I wish to thank you for giving me the opportunity to put my theories to the test in the taking of Sedan. They were, of course, entirely correct, and our clear tactical victory I am happy to be reporting.

Die Grosse Bertha worked to perfection; we were able to play Bruckner’s Zero Symphony at half steam while the technicians adjusted all their valves and levers. Steamwinds worked perfectly on the first try, and though of course strings needed to be tuned, of the steam tympani there was never any doubt. I have perhaps been harsh on occasion in my estimation of Herr Bruckner’s work, but for making the listeners run away screaming I should say his symphonies are without rival.

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Cast of Wonders 359: Tiger, Tiger

Cast of Wonders 359: Tiger, Tiger is a Cast of Wonders original.

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Tiger, Tiger

By Drea Silvertooth

Echo had always thought that when the world ended, she’d either be running with a motley band of survivors or instantly vaporized. Not a single book, show or movie had prepared her for being apocalypse adjacent.

In the Tropical Asia building, protected by thick glass walls and a ventilation system designed to keep air warm in the winter and sticky in the summer, she hid with her animals. Warty pigs snuffled through the decorative undergrowth, a siamang family sung like sirens in the canopy overhead, and the Malayan tapir and small-clawed otters had taken residence around the cement-bottomed stream that wound through the exhibit. There was still no sign of the sloth bear or the orangutans. Echo wondered if, while she’d been lying face down in the public restroom fighting for consciousness, they might have been evacuated.

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Cast of Wonders 357: Little Wonders 21: 2018 Flash Fiction Contest Runners-Up

Cast of Wonders 357: Little Wonders 21: 2018 Flash Fiction Contest Runners-Up is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 20:37 — 19.3MB)

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Grounded

by J. T. Nilson

“I can’t,” Sophie sulked. “I stayed out past curfew last week and I’m not allowed to go out.”

“But the gnome army marches onward!” cried Aithne, flitting in circles within Sophie’s window frame, her glowing wings a hummingbird-like blur. “The pixie tribes need our human champion to bring forth the magic. We must triumph!”

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Cast of Wonders 356: Little Wonders 20: 2018 Flash Fiction Contest Winners

Cast of Wonders 356: Little Wonders 20: 2018 Flash Fiction Contest Winners is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 23:23 — 21.9MB)

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Show Notes

Dream Foundry is a new organization helping all professionals, especially beginners, working in the speculative arts. Back their Kickstarter to make sure they last and grow, and to get yourself some nifty rewards.

 

Website: www.dreamfoundry.org
Twitter: @dream_foundry
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dreamfoundryorg/
Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dreamfoundry/dream-foundry-2019-hatching

An Economy of Words

by Wendy Nikel

Growing up so far from the wordfields, I’ve learned to appreciate the few words I have, so as the fitting for Baron Kensington’s festival garments drag on, I cringe at each wasted remark.

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Cast of Wonders 355: Why I Spared the One Brave Soul Between Me and My Undead Army (Artemis Rising 5)

Cast of Wonders 355: Why I Spared the One Brave Soul Between Me and My Undead Army (Artemis Rising 5) is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:38 — 30.4MB)

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Why I Spared the One Brave Soul Between Me and My Undead Army

by Setsu Uzume

I am loathe to admit that the ambush was masterful. Not only had the bounty hunters slain my contacts, but they had done so in the right order — dispatching the Ritualist before she had any corpses to animate. Had I come on horseback, they would have had me, too.

In addition to my dead allies and their hobbled wagon, I counted four hunters lumbering through the dark. Big lads, experienced and well-equipped, but given the style of their breastplates they had come from the west — tracking the cultists and not me. It made them slow and ill-prepared to face me in my glory. I whirled, my shadow splitting off to pierce kidneys and slice the backs of their knees while I led them a merry dance through dead leaves and bracken. One of them even turned, his blade slashing a wide arc, but shadows have no heads to remove. Him, I killed the quickest.

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Cast of Wonders 354: Wordslinger, Wordwreaker (Artemis Rising 5)

Cast of Wonders 354: Wordslinger, Wordwreaker (Artemis Rising 5) is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 38:52 — 36.1MB)

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Wordslinger, Wordwreaker

by Amanda Helms

The wordslinger first came into Lasthope on the back of a scarab the size of a large pony, during the worst flaying-wind storm in a generation.

Mind, we didn’t know then that she was a wordslinger, or even that she was a she. I didn’t witness it direct, but later one of our regulars told me of her, all bundled up in hat and gloves and too-big cloak, on account of them winds, you see. She climbed off her scarab with the stiffness of someone too long in the saddle. But like any rider worth her salt, she saw to her mount afore she came into the saloon, which is where I first saw her myself.

Me and Ruby were on a break, letting my babe Arlie grab at and occasionally suck on the tassels of our gowns. Spurs jangling, the wordslinger ambled to the bar as she pulled back her cloak–she had two canteens slung on her belt, one on each side–then, slowly removed her hat and, slower yet, peeled off her gloves. Waiting to see if anyone’d comment on her color, I reckon, for the raggedy leather of her attire was just a few shades lighter than her own skin.

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Cast of Wonders 353: With Cardamom I’ll Bind Their Lips (Artemis Rising 5)

First published in Uncanny Magazine (April 2017)

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With Cardamom I’ll Bind Their Lips

by Beth Cato

In the spring after the war’s end, the soldiers’ spirits began to wander home, and Lady Magdalena bound their lips with cardamom so that they could not speak.

“These souls walked for months, their only thought to return home. You must remember, little of their personality remains at this point. They are solid enough to nudge furniture and not sink through the floor, but they’re not fully here.”

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Cast of Wonders 352: Barter Queen (Artemis Rising 5)

Cast of Wonders 352: Barter Queen (Artemis Rising 5) is a Cast of Wonders original.

Content Warning: Profanity

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 35:50 — 33.3MB)

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Barter Queen

by Sarah Pauling

Soledad lets Gabe do the introductions because most strangers see him as the more respectable sibling. His attentive green eyes stare from under thick lashes, and his hair lies flat even when it’s desperately in need of a cut.

“We want Queen Mary’s protection,” he says, brazen as anything. Soledad tries not to stare at the ground. Gabe squeezes her hand.

“What can you give her?” the man at the door asks. Huge firearms dangle from his sides.

“We got guns, for one thing. And we’re mechanics. We can fix things. Bikes.”

The bouncer taps a finger against his forearm. “What kind of bikes you mean? Motorcycles or the other ones?”

“No engines,” Gabe says, firm and deliberate. “The kind that’ll last when there’s no gas left.”

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Cast of Wonders 351: The Angel (Artemis Rising 5)

Cast of Wonders 351: The Angel (Artemis Rising 5) is a Cast of Wonders original.

Content Warning: Terminal illness

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 47:14 — 43.7MB)

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The Angel

by Kate Cobey

I: Sterile

“Just don’t treat her like anything less than a person,” Mama fretted from the front row of the cab. Never mind that this was the fourth time we’d come to see her, and we’d heard the same plea every single time. Cautiously, Mama asked the white hospital archway next to her, “May we enter?”

“Card?” responded the building.

“You don’t need to be so formal. It’s just a robot,” Nina complained from the back. “It’s aaaall robots, here.”

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Cast of Wonders 350: The Last Fifth (Part 2 of 2)

Cast of Wonders 350: The Last Fifth (Part 2 of 2) is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 25:03 — 23.3MB)

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The Last Fifth (Part 2 of 2)

by Naru Dames Sundar

Anur cradled his face in his hands, his split lip still oozing blood.  It hurt, a kind of searing pain far greater than the dull ache of bruises he had suffered at the hands of the bullies at school.  He tried to run when the men had exited the van, tried to get away, but he had tripped and fallen amidst the smoke and the wreckage.  Bala, the man with the scraggly beard, hit him and dragged him by one arm back into the van.

The men had retrieved something from the wreckage.  Anur had only caught a glimpse of it, a charred sphere the size of a soccer ball, bits of wire dangling from it.  Tears welled in Anur’s eyes. He wanted to be at home, sitting on the big blue couch wrapped in a blanket while mummy fed him halwa and sweet tea with jasmine.  But his tears and his wants didn’t help him, they didn’t bring him any closer to freedom.

“Child.”

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Cast of Wonders 349: The Last Fifth (Part 1 of 2)

Cast of Wonders 349: The Last Fifth (Part 1 of 2) is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 28:07 — 26.1MB)

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The Last Fifth (Part 1 of 2)

by Naru Dames Sundar

Anur slumbered under the ledge of the sloping walkway, leaning on the housing of a small flower strewn altar to Ganesh.  Rain plinked onto the jasmine-filled votive bowls that lined the altars on the opposite wall. Anur blinked his eyes open, looking sideways at shafts of light breaking across the falling drops, shimmering gold as they drizzled onto the row of Shiva-lingam jutting out from the wall.  The narrow street still looked dry, yet the rain continued. The voices of two men spoke across the pitter patter of the falling drops.

“Do you trust the buyer, Kalan?  Can he really get Pankaj out of that mountain hell-hole?”

“The buyer has a reputation to uphold, Bale.  And I promised Amma that I would get him out somehow –”

“It leaves us very… exposed.”

“We’re exposed by being who we are, Bala.  All or nothing, my friend, all or nothing.”
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