BBCR4X: Bradbury 13

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

BBC Radio 4 ExtraCoolness! Mike McDonough, the legendary producer of the famous BRADBURY 13 audio drama series, writes in to say:

Gentlemen,

A good friend of mine pointed me to your website. I’m glad to see there are others in the world like me, who LOVE audio, and think it is a perfect medium for telling stories. I’ve been fascinated with the power of audio since I was a kid growing up in Los Angeles.

I’m glad you liked “A Sound Of Thunder“. That’s one of my favorite Ray Bradbury stories, and certainly one of the most successful of the thirteen audio adaptations that I did in the series. Bradbury’s writing is so visual sometimes, it was just a natural for audio. By the way, the series is currently being broadcast on the BBC in England. Here is a link to their blog about the shows I did many years ago! The series is also lately available for download on iTunes for anyone who might be interested.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/radio4/2011/06/radio_4_extra_the_making_of_br.html

Keep up the good work on your website. It seems very well-done and comprehensive.

All My Best,

Mike McDonough

Indeed, check out the BBC Radio 4 Extra blog post that has some vintage photographs of the McDonough actually recording the programme! It makes a great compliment to Radio Drama Revival’s excellent interview with McDonough. And, of course, BBCR4X is presenting all 13 episodes weekly right now! Blackstone Audio has released the collection on CD, it is available through iTunes and Audible.com has it too!

Blackstone Audio - Bradbury Thirteen

Posted by Jesse Willis

Audioboook Sync: SIXTEEN FREE Young Adult AUDIOBOOKS: (2 per week over the summer)

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Overdrive Media Console

AudiobookSync.com is offering “FREE audiobook downloads of Young Adult audiobooks and Summer Reading Classics this summer! Watch for a new pair of audiobooks each week from 6/23/11 – 8/17/11.” That’s 16 FREE audiobooks. Unfortunately, like last summer, the files are not straightforward right-click downloads. The good news is that the files themselves are in the MP3 format and don’t expire (even though the offer does).

First, you will have to instal a piece of software called “Overdrive Media Console” and of course you must “take a moment” to read the 2000 word EULA (and presumably have finished law school). Next you’ll need to |CLICK HERE| to get the first audiobook (and follow the instructions). That will get the first audiobook downloading. To get the second audiobook you’ll need to |CLICK HERE| and do the same. There is a query regarding your country of residence. Ignore it (unless you want to risk not getting your audiobook).

Be sure to take careful note where the files are set to download to. I sent mine to a custom folder on my desktop.

Here is the first pair, available between June 23 and June 29:

SCHOLASTIC AUDIO - Shiver by Maggie StiefvaterShiver
By Maggie Stiefvater; Read by Jenna Lamia and David Ledoux
MP3 Download – Approx. 10.75 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Scholastic Audio Books
Published: 2009
ISBN: 0545165067
For years, Grace has watched the wolves in the woods behind her house. One yellow-eyed wolf–her wolf–is a chilling presence she can’t seem to live without. Meanwhile, Sam has lived two lives: In winter, the frozen woods, the protection of the pack, and the silent company of a fearless girl. In summer, a few precious months of being human . . . until the cold makes him shift back again.
Now, Grace meets a yellow-eyed boy whose familiarity takes her breath away. It’s her wolf. It has to be. But as winter nears, Sam must fight to stay human–or risk losing himself, and Grace, forever

BBC RADIO 3 - William Shakespeare's Romeo & JulietRomeo & Juliet
By William Shakespeare; Performed by by Douglas Henshall, Sophie Dahl, Susannah York, and a Full Cast
MP3 Download – Approx. 3 Hours [AUDIO DRAMA]
Publisher: AudioGO / BBC Radio
Published: 1999
ISBN: 9780563553441
Douglas Henshall, Sophie Dahl and Susannah York star in Shakespeare’s passionate story of doomed love. BBC Radio has a unique heritage when it comes to Shakespeare. Since 1923, when the newly formed company broadcast its first full-length play, generations of actors and producers have honed and perfected the craft of making Shakespeare to be heard. With the intimacy of radio the full beauty and meaning of some of the most lyrical lines ever written can be truly heard: tenderness and passion, betrayal and bigotry are brilliantly evoked as the tale comes to its tragic conclusion. The play is introduced by Richard Eyre, former Director of the Royal National Theatre, and the accompanying booklet includes a scene-by-scene synopsis, full character analysis, brief biographies of the leading actors and of Shakespeare himself, as well as an essay from the producer on their interpretation of the play. Revitalised, original and comprehensive – this is Shakespeare for the new millennium.

Future audiobooks released through the same method:

Available June 30 – July 6:
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow |READ OUR REVIEW|
The Trial by Franz Kafka

Available July 7 – July 13:
Where The Streets Had A Name by Randa Abdel-Fattah
A Passage To India by E.M. Forster

Available July 14 – July 20:
The Last Apprentice: Revenge of the Witch by Joseph Delaney
Beowulf by Francis B. Gummere [Trans.]

Available July 21 – July 27:
Chanda’s Secrets by Allan Stratton
Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

Available July 28 – August 3:
Ashes, Ashes by Jo Treggiari
Rescue: Stories of Survival From Land and Sea by Dorcas S. Miller [Ed.]

Available August 4 – August 10:
Immortal by Gillian Shields
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

Available August 11 – August 17:
Storm Runners by Roland Smith
The Cay by Theodore Taylor

Posted by Jesse Willis

Prometheus Unbound: Review of The Syndic by C.M. Kornbluth

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Prometheus UnboundHere is a very interesting, but highly ideological, podcast review of (and apology for) Cyril M. Kornbluth and his 1953 novel The Syndic. It is an interesting listen, but as I mentioned, it is extremely narrowly focused – seemingly like a sermon to the adherents of some sort of religion called “libertarianism.” There is no audiobook available at the moment, but Wonder Publishing has an ebook edition available.

|MP3|

Incidentally, Groff Conklin‘s March 1954 Galaxy magazine review of the novel describes The Syndic as “remarkable both for its inconclusiveness and for its surprisingly philosophical depth.”

The Syndic by C.M. Kornbluth

The Syndic by C.M. Kornbluth

The Syndic by C.M. Kornbluth

Posted by Jesse Willis

Everything Is A Remix

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Here’s a really terrific project that illustrates, in a very succinct way, the history of creativity. It’s thesis is that there is a fundamental through-line which connects all human creation and that is to copy, modify and mix (or remix) the creations of the past to make something new.

Everything is a Remix Part 1 from Kirby Ferguson on Vimeo.

Everything is a Remix Part 2 from Kirby Ferguson on Vimeo.

Everything is a Remix Part 3 from Kirby Ferguson on Vimeo.

One example, not cited in the series so far, is this thread of remixing:

Edward Bellamy’s Looking Backward (1888) -> David Butler’s Just Imagine (1930) -> C.M. Kornbluth’s The Marching Morons (1951) -> Mack Reynolds’ Looking Backward From The Year 2000 (1974) -> Robert A. Heinlein’s For Us, The Living (written in 1938, published 2003) -> Mike Judge’s Idiocracy (2006)

In fact, we recently posted an audiobook reading of C.M. Kornbluth’s The Marching Morons, which took inspiration from the 1930 film Just Imagine. Robert A. Heinlein’s first novel (which went unpublished until 2003) was also a response to this movie. But Just Imagine itself likely took its inspiration from Edward Bellamy’s immensely popular 1888 utopian novel Looking Backward 2000-1887. Science Fiction writer, Mack Reynolds, wrote a couple sequels to Looking Backward but he wasn’t alone – in fact more than a dozen sequels, responses and inspired works followed. The history of Science Fiction is a flowing and knotted tapestry of scientific discovery, theory, ideology, adventure, and drama that cannot be summed up with any simplistic bag with the names like “inspiration” or “genius.”

Posted by Jesse Willis

StarShipSofa No 194 Eric James Stone

Scott D.

SFFaudio Online Audio

StarShipSofaThe 194th StarShipSofa contains Eric James Stone’s Nebula Award winning (and Hugo nominated) novelette “That Leviathan, Whom Thou Hast Made”. Great story, well worth a listen!

|CLICK HERE|

You can find another of his great stories at Escape Pod: EP277: Rejiggering the Thingamajig by Eric James Stone

Posted by Scott D. Danielson