News, Reviews, and Commentary on all forms of science fiction, fantasy, and horror audio. Audiobooks, audio drama, podcasts; we discuss all of it here. Mystery, crime, and noir audio are also fair game.
Here is one of the greatest stories of speculative imagination, a true Science Fiction yarn in the greatest sense of that tradition. Collected previously in such anthologies as Masterpieces: The Best Science Fiction Of The Twentieth Century and The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume Two A (in which it is the first story). Here is Poul Anderson’s magnificent novelette Call Me Joe.
Call Me Joe
By Poul Anderson; Read by Warren James
6 Parts – Approx. 1 Hour 22 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Provider: Hour 25 Online
Released: March 2001
Part 1 |MP3| Part 2 |MP3| Part 3 |MP3| Part 4 |MP3| Part 5 |MP3| Part 6 |MP3| To explore Jupiter you’ll have to do more than build a pressurized suit, you’ll need a lot more. Just ask Joe. First published in the April 1957 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.
THE CHALLENGE:
This is our 6th Annual SFFaudio Challenge. Every November 11th, for the last six years, we’ve offered the following challenge to SFFaudio readers:
“We’ll give you an audiobook if you make one for everyone else.”
That deal still holds. We’ll get you an audiobook if you make make an audiobook out of one of the public domain etexts we suggest. All you’ll need to do is claim a title (by email), record the audiobook, using your own human voice (sorry no robots), and follow the rules (see the first comment of this post for the rules). Some titles will not be public domain in all countries, but this is a global challenge. We’ve also added, for the very first time, a French language title!
Still feeling a little unclear on how it all works? Then have a look at our past SFFaudio CHALLENGES:
PRIZES: This year we’re doing something a bit different with prizes, something better. Instead of offering those unwieldy physical copies we’ve got DRM-FREE MP3 downloads for you! This not only saves us on postage it also allows for a much greater selection of audiobooks! For each audiobook you complete, you can choose one of more than 1,300 titles available! All prizes this year come courtesy of Tantor Media.
CHALLENGE TITLES: The Friendly Demon (aka The Devil Frolics With A Butler) by Daniel Defoe |HORRORMASTERS|PDF| (short story)
Seventh Victim by Robert Sheckley |PDF| (short story)*
CLAIMED BY CAINE DORR NOVEMBER 12, 2011
Untouched By Human Hands (aka One Man’s Poison) by Robert Sheckley |PDF| (short story)*
Writing Class by Robert Sheckley |RTF| (short story)*
CLAIMED AND COMPLETED BY WILLIAM COON (of Elquoent Voice) ON NOVEMBER 13, 2011
The Purple Cloud by M.P. Shiel |GUTENBERG| (novel)
City At World’s End by Edmond Hamilton |ARCHIVE.ORG| (novel)
The Common Man by Mack Reynolds |GUTENBERG| (short story)
I don’t think there’s a perfect narrator for any particular genre as a whole. But there are some pretty close cases. For a first person POV story, with a crazy sounding narrator, there’s nobody better at narration (to my ears) than Mr. Pat Bottino (he narrated Home Is The Hunter). For unbridled passion, anger, and pathos there’s Harlan Ellison (his narration of Run For The Stars |READ OUR REVIEW| was stellar). And for horror set in the USA there’s only one voice I need: Wayne June’s.
In fact, I’d be satisfied with every single American horror audiobook being narrated by his wonderful voice. While he sounds nothing like Vincent Price, he works me like a puppet in exactly the same way. He’s scary, and scared, he’s creepy and creeped. I know he can do other genres – but for me I’ve got him completely typecast – he’s just Mr. American Horror to me. He’s absolutely wonderful at it. Take this recently released novel…
Ghoul
By Brian Keene; Read by Wayne June Audible Download – 8 Hours 33 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audio Realms
Published: October 20, 2011 (on Audible.com)
Sample |MP3| June 1984. Timmy Graco is looking forward to summer vacation, taking it easy and hanging out with his buddies. Instead, his summer will be filled with terror and a life-and-death battle against a nightmarish creature that few will believe even exists. Timmy learns that the person who’s been unearthing fresh graves in the cemetery isn’t a person at all. It’s a thing. And it’s after Timmy and his friends. If Timmy hopes to live to see September, he’ll have to escape the Ghoul.
I was curious about which of our podcasts was popular. Since it’s relatively easy, and I’m always interested in other podcaster’s podcasts statistics, I thought I’d reveal ours. Maybe this post will prompt some others to post theirs too.
Here is a list of SFFaudio’s single most popular podcast per month (by download) from January 2011 to October 2011.
As you can see, for the last three months our single most popular download has been the exact same show. It is a complete and unabridged reading of Richard Connell’s The Most Dangerous Game. This show, which came out on April 25, 2011, has been downloaded about 22,000 times so far. That makes it one of our most popular (if not the most popular shows’s we’ve ever done). It is however a bit of an anomaly. This is due to the fact that The Most Dangerous Game is commonly assigned in schools. Almost all of the rest of the credit should go to the most excellent narrator, William Coon, who recorded it – go check out his site he has many other excellent audiobooks too.
If we exclude that episode from the last three months we get the following results:
Looking at just the most popular downloads I’m pleased to see that nearly all of our kinds of shows are represented. READALONG, AUDIOBOOK, and even regular discussion podcasts are all popular. Our listeners all have great and eclectic tastes it would seem.
For a complete listing of all our past shows go HERE.
And for other podcasters (and anyone else who cares) here is the raw data on our top ten downloads for each month (January 2011 to October 2011):
The Alloy of Law: A Mistborn Novel
By Brandon Sanderson; Read by Michael Kramer
11 hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Published: 2011
Themes: / Fantasy / Magic / Allomancy / Feruchemy / Series / Mistborn /
Ed. – Welcome to Jeff Miller (aka The Curt Jester) to the pages of SFFaudio! This is his first review for us.
Having just finished reading the Mistborn trilogy I was delighted to see that a new novel in the Mistborn universe is about to be released. The world-building, plotting, and characters of the original trilogy got me hooked and there is plenty of potential for new books in the same universe.
The original series is epic fantasy with elements of Tolkien eucatastrophe. The Allow of Law is a standalone novel with a different feel to it. It takes place 300 years after the events of The Hero of Ages. The cultural stasis that had been maintained by the Lord Ruler has fallen apart and Scadrial is approaching a more modern age reminiscent of the turn of the 20th Century. The societal structure has changed to reflect a paid working class along with the influential families tied to the previous society.
A prominent part of the Mistborn series is the use of Allomancy and Feruchemy. Alllomancy allows those born with the ability to ingest and burn certain metals and alloys for physical and mental powers. Feruchemy is similar, though the same metals and alloys are worn and used to store attributes that can be released later. The fallout at the end of the original trilogy sets up the case where the use of one or both of these powers is more common along with the ability to use two new metals. Those having both abilities are called Twinborn.
The main protagonist is Waxillium Ladrian, a rare Twinborn, who falls into the Bruce Wayne, Tony Stark template. Born to a prominent family he spent much of his life working in the Roughs using his abilities as a sort of Marshall. Common to this template he is also the emotionally-wounded hero with past events playing a part in his dealing with other people. Circumstances bring him out of this life to have to lead his family business and as you might expect further circumstances involve him in investigating a series of robberies and kidnappings in the city.
Add in the roguish wisecracking partner along with the intelligent young woman and a nearly indestructible villain and you have all the standard devices similar to the superhero genre. The difference is that Brandon Sanderson makes it all work seamlessly and you don’t feel the sharp-edges of a put-together template. The use of Allomancy and Feruchemy provide a good framework, but it is really his characters that shine and make his novels so worthwhile. While I enjoyed the original trilogy more, I still quite enjoyed this novel and his taking the series in a different direction.
At 336 pages this is almost a novella by Brandon Sanderson standards and it certainly appears to be a start of a new series involving these characters. While this novel is considered standalone, it would be much better understood in context if you had read the original trilogy first.
Michael Kramer is once again the reader for the Mistborn series. Kramer is the type of reader who is skillful enough to read a story without making his character voicing forced. He provides enough differences in character speech patterns and accents to help you easily follow the story.
The SFFaudio Podcast #133 – Beyond The Black River by Robert E. Howard, read by Todd McLaren (courtesy of Tantor Media’s The Conquering Sword Of Conan). This is a complete and unabridged reading of the novelette (2 Hours 29 Minutes) followed by a discussion of it (by Jesse and Tamahome).
Talked about on today’s show:
Todd McLaren, Conan’s voice is confident, Balthus is the Jimmy Olsen to Conan’s Superman, Robert E. Howard’s avatar in Beyond The Black River is Balthus, “the damnedest bastard who ever lived”, “buckets of mead”, a noble death, a prominently displayed dog, barbarism vs. civilization, Red Nails, “the viking hat”, The Savage Sword Of Conan, Roy Thomas, John Buscema, Tam is a Conan novice, The Last Of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper, western, “alabaster skin”, the triumph of Barbarism (is the coda for the story), Texas, would the 1% agree with Howard?, Picts, the world of Hyboria, Cimmeria was a real place, history, historical romance, physical display, don’t overblow the homo-eroticism, Edgar Rice Burroughs, H.P. Lovecraft, autodidacts, Margaret Atwood’s interview on CBC’s Q, “occasionals”?, Walt Whitman and Henry James, The Turn Of The Screw, sword and sorcery, did Howard invent the barbarian as a character?, Genghis Khan, forbidden knowledge, Howard and Jack London, The Call Of The Wild, California, Alaska, Yukon, slavery, civilization to barbarism, “a Conan dog”, atavism, Zogar Sag is the Jesus to Jhebbal Sag’s God, secret language magic, secret symbols, Conan The Barbarian, Conan is at the height of his power, atavistic magic, “what was I missing”, chatty Conan, Brian Wood’s new Conan comic (adapting Queen Of The Black Coast), Barry Windsor Smith, “he’s busy getting revenge”, a distillation of what’s in the stories, Conan and the philosophers, Oliver Stone and John Milius, Conan The Destroyer, sword vs. sorcery, Berserk (manga), “if you were in the Hyborian age which god would you worship?”, “a Klingon god”, “who is the good guy in Beyond The Black River?”, why does Conan side with the Aquilonians?, “swarthy white men”, Conan is bronzed by the sun not swarthy, end the Jersey Shore references, “this is a war story”, Conan doesn’t believe in an external valuation, why is there only one Devil?, Gullah the Gorilla God – the hairy one who lives on the moon, Africa, Aquilonia is France, Hyboria is Europe, Hyperborea (boreal + hyper = far north), Stygia = Egypt, Texas history, the Picts are the Comanche in this story, Julius Caesar, degenerating white men, Kull, Brule The Spearslayer, “noble savage”, a “symphony of racism”, Bran Mak Morn: The Last King by Robert E. Howard, Kings In The Night, The Whole Wide World, The One Who Walks Alone by Novalyne Price Ellis, Vincent D’Onofrio as Robert E. Howard channeling Conan, photographs of Robert E. Howard, Howard was a LARPer, “Howard was a rough-hewn intellectual”, boxing, gun culture vs. cat culture, WWII, Lidice, “even a white man’s dog is worth more than seven Picts”, Bill Hollweg’s Queen Of The Black Coast audio drama, would Beyond The Black River make a good audio drama?, Lou Anders’ Hollywood Formula doesn’t work here, philosophy of the woods, audiobooks and comics are better than movies, SSOC #26 & #27, Dark Horse’s Savage Sword Of Conan, Volume 3, ostrich feathers tell a story, a frontier story, Weird Tales covers by Margaret Brundage, the Hulk, supple, Red Nails would be a good readalong, laser beams and dinosaurs.
THE CHALLENGE:
