February 2007 – Page 4

The Time Traveler Show #13 The Night He Cried by Fritz Leiber PLUS MORE!

SFFaudio Online Audio

The Time Traveler Show podcast #13 is out today. Along with the customary unabridged classic Science Fiction story (this one by none other than Fritz Leiber) the also show includes snippets from The Time Traveler’s recent visit to the ConFusion 2007 Science Fiction convention. While there TT recorded panels consisting of: John Scalzi, Karl Schroeder, Steven Harper Piziks, Toby Buckell, Tor editor Jim Frenkel, Elizabeth Moon, Howard Waldrop, Karl Schroeder, and Jim C. Hines!

You can also listen to the complete files for each panel on The Time Traveler’s site.

The Night He Cried
By Fritz Leiber; Read by Clarissa der Nederlanden
1 MP3 – [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: The Time Traveler Show
Podcast: February 19th 2007

Attentive listeners should recognize the narrator of this story as Flying Squirrel from The Red Panda Adventures Audio Drama podcast!

To read the complete show notes for podcast #13 click HERE or download the show MP3 directly by clicking HERE. Alternatively, automatically downloading can be ensured by plugging this podcast feed into your podcatcher:

http://www.timetravelershow.com/shows/feed.xml

posted by Jesse Willis

Tantor Audio offers several Exciting new titles for Spring & Summer 2007

SFFaudio News

Tantor Audio has some very exciting Speculative Fiction titles on the horizon! First up, there is a simultaneous release of a new Harry Turtledove Alternate History novel, quite far out is the new Richard K. Morgan audiobook (o0f which we have absolutely no plot info) AND best of all there are THREE Isaac Asimov Mystery/Science Fiction classics coming! There are even more titles too!!!

Beyond the Gap
By Harry Turtledove; Read by William Dufris
12 CDs or 2 MP3-CDs – Approx 15 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: February 2007 (?)
ISBN: 1400103827 (CD), 1400153824 (MP3-CD)
“In this promising first of a new saga, alternate-history maven Turtledove (Ruled Britannia) depicts a Bronze Age society in transition. A growing gap in the glacier that has formed the Raumsdalian Empire’s northern border for millennia allows Count Hamnet Thyssen and Trasamund the jarl, of the nomadic Northern Bizogot, to become the empire’s Lewis and Clark. They and their entourage, which inconveniently includes Hamnet’s unfaithful ex-wife, Gudrid, depart the empire’s capital city, Nidaris, to explore what lies beyond the glacier and search for the fabled Golden Shrine. On the way, a formidable and attractive (if unbathed) Bizogot shaman, Liv, joins the expedition—and Hamnet under the animal hides. If the Raumsdalians and Bizogots don’t always get along, their culture clash is nothing compared to the threat they face on the other side of the glacier: the Rulers, a tribe of imperious, mammoth-riding warriors. A vivid setting and strong characterization bode well for future installments.”

Ascent
By Jed Mercurio; Read by Todd McLaren
7 CDs or 1 MP3-CD – 8 Hours 30 minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: March 2007
ISBN: 1400103681 (CD), 1400153689 (MP3-CD)
Yeremin, a Soviet MiG pilot, rises from the privation of a Stalingrad orphanage to the heights of the cosmonaut corps. During the Korean War, as a member of an elite squadron, he shoots down the most American fighter jets—a feat that should make him a national hero, but because the Soviets’ involvement in the war is secret, Yeremin’s victories go unreported. When he is recalled from obscurity to join the race to the Moon, he realizes it is his chance for immortality.

Caves Of Steel
By Isaac Asimov; Read by William Dufris
7 CDs or 1 MP3-CD – 8 hrs 30 min [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: May 2007 (?)
ISBN: 1400104211 (CD), 1400154219 (MP3-CD)
A millennium into the future, two advancements have altered the course of human history: the colonization of the galaxy and the creation of the positronic brain. Isaac Asimov’s Robot novels chronicle the unlikely partnership between a New York City detective and a humanoid robot who must learn to work together. Like most people left behind on an over-populated Earth, New York City police detective Elijah Baley had little love for either the arrogant Spacers or their robotic companions. But when a prominent Spacer is murdered under mysterious circumstances, Baley is ordered to the Outer Worlds to help track down the killer. The relationship between Baley and his Spacer superiors, who mistrusted all Earthmen, was strained from the start. Then he learned that they had assigned him a partner: R. Daneel Olivaw. Worst of all was that the “R” stood for robot—and his positronic partner was made in the image and likeness of the murder victim!

The Society Of S
By Susan Hubbard; Read by Joyce Bean
8 Audio CDs or 1 MP3-CD – 10 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: May 2007 (?)
ISBN: 1400104262 (CDs), 140015426X (MP3-CD)
Ariella Montero is seeking the true identities of her mother and father—and of herself. She’s been taught literature, philosophy, science, and history, but she knows almost nothing about the real world and its complexities. Her world is one wherein ghosts and vampires commune with humans; where Edgar Allan Poe and Jack Kerouac are role models; where every time a puzzle seems solved, its last piece changes the entire picture.

The Naked Sun
By Isaac Asimov; Read by William Dufris
7 CDs or 1 MP3-CD – 8 hrs 30 min [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: June 2007 (?)
ISBN: 140010422X (CD), 1400154227 (MP3-CD)
A millennium into the future, two advancements have altered the course of human history: the colonization of the Galaxy and the creation of the positronic brain. On the beautiful Outer World planet of Solaria, a handful of human colonists lead a hermit-like existence, their every need attended to by their faithful robot servants. To this strange and provocative planet comes Detective Elijah Baley, sent from the streets of New York with his positronic partner, the robot R. Daneel Olivaw, to solve an incredible murder that has rocked Solaria to its foundations. The victim had been so reclusive that he appeared to his associates only through holographic projection. Yet someone had gotten close enough to bludgeon him to death while robots looked on. Now Baley and Olivaw are faced with two clear impossibilities: Either the Solarian was killed by one of his robots—unthinkable under the laws of Robotics—or he was killed by the woman who loved him so much that she never came into his presence!

The Robots Of Dawn
By Isaac Asimov; Read by William Dufris
13 CDs or 2 MP3-CDs – 15 hrs 30 min [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: July 2007 (?)
ISBN: 1400104238 (CD), 1400154235 (MP3-CD)
A puzzling case of roboticide sends New York Detective Elijah Baley on an intense search for a murderer. Armed with his own instincts, his quirky logic, and the immutable Three Laws of Robotics, Baley is determined to solve the case. But can anything prepare a simple Earthman for the psychological complexities of a world where a beautiful woman can easily have fallen in love with an all-too-human robot?

Thirteen
By Richard K. Morgan; Read by Simon Vance
22 CDs or 3 MP3-CDs -Approx. 27 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: July 2007 (�)
ISBN: 1400104319 (CDs), 1400154316 (MP3-CDs)

posted by Jesse Willis

A Strange Manuscript Found In A Copper Cylinder claimed in our Challenge

SFFaudio News

Robert A. Graff, a truck driver from Rochester, NY, has accepted our challenge! Bob wrote in to claim A Strange Manuscript Found In A Copper Cylinder by James De Mille, which is of course, one of the titles from our first SFFaudio Make An Audiobook Challenge! Bob is aiming to complete the novel by November 1st, 2007 – that works out to about one chapter per week. As Bob puts it:

“I’ve always been a fan of the more baroque-style SF/horror authors such as Verne, Wells, Bellamy, and Poe. I really enjoy the style of writing and especially the dialogue – far enough in the past that it expresses a romantic era now gone but not old enough that it degenerates into Beowulf.”

A Strange Manuscript Found In A Copper Cylinder was originally serialized in Harper’s Weekly in 1888. The publication was posthumous for its author De Mille, who was variously a professor of classics, rhetoric and history at Canadian universities. De Mille was the son of a United Empire Loyalists and has the distinction of being Canada’s first Science Fiction author. The novel itself has been much admired as a Swiftian satire. The setting for A Strange Manuscript Found In A Copper Cylinder is that of an Antarctic “lost world” inhabited by pre-historic creatures and an insidious death cult. Some have compared it to Edgar Allan Poe’s Narrative of Gordon Pym others to H. Rider Haggard’s She and King Solomon’s Mines or even to Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World. The title and locale were likely inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s Ms. Found in a Bottle.

The main story of the novel is the narrative of the adventures of Adam More (keep that last name in mind), a British sailor shipwrecked on the homeward voyage from Tasmania. After More passes through a subterranean tunnel of volcanic origin, he finds himself in a lost world of prehistoric animals, plants and people, all sustained by a natural volcanic heat despite the long Antarctic night (which may remind you of Marvel comic’s Ka-Zar and his “Savage Land”). A secondary plot about the persons who find the manuscript of the title, written by More, and forms the frame for the main narrative. In his strange volcanic world, More finds a highly developed human society comparable to Sir Thomas More’s Utopia, Erewhon by Samuel Butler and Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. The copper cylinder’s manuscript describes a society that has reversed the values of Victorian life: wealth is scorned and poverty is revered, death and darkness are preferred to life and light. Rather than accumulating wealth, the natives seek to divest themselves of it as quickly as possible.

Expect to see the wondrous 19th century novel, the only one of this vintage from our Challenge, coming to the LibriVox catalogue by November 2007: Audiobook - A Strange Manuscript Found In A Copper Cylinder by James De Mille

posted by Jesse Willis

New Releases

SFFaudio New Releases

Newcomer ElectricStory.com (through Fictionwise.com) has a Hugo and Nebula award winning story for just $0.99…

Bears Discover Fire
By Terry Bisson; Read by Alec Rowell
1 MP3 Download – 27 Minutes 35 Seconds [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Fictionwise.com / ElectricStory.com
Published: February 2007
– Listen to an MP3 sample –
The title pretty much says it. Whether because of climate change or some even more mysterious cause, bears have discovered fire. This affords the Southern-gentleman narrator new opportunities to teach his nephew about life, death, and how, more than ever, “it’s best not to alarm bears.” This audiobook comes bundled with an afterword read by Bisson himself at RustyCon 2007.

The New Moon’s Arms
By Nalo Hopkinson; Read by Gin Hammond
8 CDs – 10 Hours 15 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: BBC Audiobooks America
Published: February 2007
ISBN: 0792747356
– Listen to an MP3 sample –
What’s in a name? A lot, according to Caribbean-born Chastity, who has adopted the more fitting moniker Calamity. Now in her fifties, true to her name, Calamity is confronting two big life transitions: Her beloved father has just died, and she is starting menopause, a physical shift that has rekindled her special gift for finding lost things. Suddenly she is getting hot flashes that seem to forge objects out of thin air. Only this time, the lost item that has washed up on the shore is not her old toy truck or her hairbrush, but a 4-year-old boy.

posted by Jesse Willis

Software Review: Markable from iPodsoft

SFFaudio Audiobook Software Review

MarkAble
Portable media bookmarking software
OS Environment: Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP
Manufacturer: iPodsoft
Version: 1.6.0

MarkAble is designed for audiobook listeners who own an Apple iPod, or who use iTunes to listen to such books. Or podcast listeners wanting to be able to combine and bookmark their saved files. Audiobook files bought from the iTunes Music Store or from Audible.com are ‘bookmarking’ – that is, the iPod (or iTunes) remembers the point of the book where you were up to, and resumes from there when you start listening again. This, of course, is vital. However, there are many other sources of audiobooks. Such books may be in a variety of different formats such as MP3 files, or audio CDs or tapes you may have bought. MarkAble makes it easy to merge a large number of tracks or individual files into a few files which will bookmark on your iPod.

So I ask you… all SFFaudio surfers out there, what do you use to bookmark your audiobooks?

Me? I’m a MarkAble man, but I would like to know what everyone else uses for the good of the audio community. So what is MarkAble, I hear you ask?

Well, it’s a little bit of nifty software that allows you to bookmark all your audiobook files so iTunes , and more importantly your iPod, can remember them automatically. I was informed about this piece of software from one of our listeners over at the StarShipSofa podcast. The cost, a mere $15. Well worth the investment to rid oneself of the irritating problem of finding your last position on something so mammoth as Neil Gaiman’s American Gods or Haldeman’s Forever War.

So I ask you… for the good of the community… is there something better out there and if there is – we need to know about it. Please post your comment’s below.

posted by Tony Smith from StarShipSofa

CBC Radio One greenlights Science Fiction RADIO DRAMA series

SFFaudio News

CBC Radio One audio dramatist Joe Mahoney reports on his blog:

“Canadia, the Science Fiction/Comedy pilot I produced with Matt Watts, has been picked up for ten episodes.”

WOOHOO!

It appears that two pilots were made for the show, the second starring Matt Watts (Steve, The First and Steve, The Second) and Donnelly Rhodes (Battlestar Galactica) was the clincher for CBC Radio execs.

Joe sez producing duties on Canadia will be helmed by CBC veteran Greg DeClute. Mahoney will be story editor and series advisor on the show. Joe writes: “I’ve had long talks with both Greg and Matt about how this is going to work and I’ve concluded that the three of us working together should be able to come up with something phenomenal — or at the very least not half bad.” If Canadia‘s quality lives up to that of the extremely popular, non-genre, audio drama Afganada, that is currently airing on CBC Radio One, Canadia will be a appointment radio. Canadia begins airing next month! March 2007!

One should also remember this is pretty cool time at CBC Radio One, if you recall from some stories we posted last year, the mother corp still has the J. Michael Strazcynski series The Adventures Of Apocalypse Al in the can. Hopefully it will be airing by the summer or concurrently with Canadia. We’ll keep you posted as more details about SF on CBC Radio One as it comes in.

posted by Jesse Willis