Category: News

XM Satellite Radio: Audiobook Cafe

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January 2nd 2005 sees the first broadcast of a new hour-long radio program called Audiobook Cafe. Set to air once a week on XM Satellite Radio, the show is hosted by full time author and part time audiobook narrator Lawrence Block. Block is mostly known for his award winning mystery and crime novels but his lengthy career has also included a few ventures in to the science fiction, fantasy, and horror realms.

Each installment of Audiobook Cafe includes two author interviews and several audiobook reviews with audio exerpts from the audiobooks covered. Authors already recorded include fantasy authors Peter Straub and Neil Gaiman! This is by no means a program focusing on science fiction and fantasy audiobooks – we wish – but it is still very cool.

Of peripheral interest to this story: The Lawrence Block word factory has produced an interesting article for the New York newspaper The Village Voice, entitled “Abridge This!”. Find it here!

Happy Holidays everyone! SFFAudio won’t post till…

Scott D.

SFFaudio News

Happy Holidays everyone! SFFAudio won’t post till the new year, probably on January 3rd. We wish everyone a peaceful holiday season!

Until then…

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Chapter 1 – Marley’s Ghost

Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge’s name was good upon ‘Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country’s done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail… -MORE-

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

From Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski come…

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio News

CBC Radio OneFrom Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski comes a new limited series The Adventures Of Apocalypse Al to be broadcast on CBC Radio One. Straczynski, says that it is an 80-minute audio drama (made up of 20 five minute episodes) and will be produced and co-directed in Toronto by himself. He describes it as “comedy/action, very noir, with a supernatural bent.” This sounds great to me I’m a big fan of his short lived anthology series City Of Dreams produced for Seeing Ear Theater. The series is scheduled to air in 5 five-minute segments weekdays for four weeks, with half hour recaps on the weekend (presumably collecting that week’s broadcasts). The scripts have been completed so casting and production are sure to start soon. Straczynski suggests it will be syndicated worldwide, “to the BBC and elsewhere,” and he assures us it will be released on CD “down the road”. We’ll let you know when we know more about airdates.

Posted by Jesse Willis

From the Toot Our Own Horn Department… Announcing…

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SFFaudio News

Deuce AudioFrom the Toot Our Own Horn Department… Announcing Deuce Audio!

The first two titles from our very own audiobook company, Deuce Audio, are available as of today for download from Fictionwise! They are: The Retrieval Artist by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, read by Stefan Rudnicki (2 hours, $4.99) and Shed Skin by Robert J. Sawyer, read by Stephen Hoye (45 minutes, $2.99).

Our goal is produce great audiobooks using excellent stories, performed by professionals, and at the best possible price. We hope you like them!

Though we’ve taken this baby step into publishing, be assured that SFFAudio will continue. Because we do this for the love of the stories and how they are told, we don’t expect our Deuce Audio publications to influence our objectivity when reviewing other titles. We certainly won’t review our own titles here (unless we find an independent voice to do so), nor will we fill your screen with “Buy me!” pop-ups. SFFAudio is a site for fans of science fiction and fantasy audio in all its forms, and it will remain just that.

All my best, everyone, and thanks for visiting SFFAudio!

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

I consider myself lucky to have seen Posing as Peo…

Scott D.

SFFaudio News

I consider myself lucky to have seen Posing as People last weekend in Los Angeles. If you are in the area, I urge you to check it out. Posing as People is a theatrical adaptation of three Orson Scott Card short stories – “Clap Hands and Sing”, “Lifeloop”, and “Sepluchre of Songs”.

I am no professional theater critic, but I do have plenty of mainstream (community and professional) theater-going experience. I found Posing As People to be intimate, affecting science fiction presented in a medium in which I’d never seen it. I found the performances powerful, the material moving. It worked beautifully.

What does all this have to do with science fiction audio? Well, it stars Scott Brick, one of the finest narrators out there. He also wrote one of the adaptations. It also stars Stefan Rudnicki of Skyboat Road, who has skillfully produced and narrated many audiobooks, including Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game, a personal favorite of mine.

More info on the production (including a few reviews, some pictures, and some MP3 clips) can be found at Orson Scott Card’s website. The production runs through October 16 at the Whitefire Theater in Sherman Oaks, CA.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson