A grieving mother wakes up to find all traces of her lost son have been erased as if he had never existed. Only in the hallway mirror is she able to see a glimpse of the reality she remembers having lived—the reality she wants back.
The Counterworld
4 Sci-Fi Podcasts With Starship Crews You’ll Want to Join
Image Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
When storytellers want to see just how far they can push the resolve of their characters, there’s only one place to send them—space. Creed, oaths, and religions come face to face with the inky darkness of the void, and the myriad of friends, foes, and otherwise that they’ll find on each new planet’s surface. Our protagonists’ resolves and bodies are tested in the heat of laser sword based combat and the cold of an ice clad moon—and sometimes while being chased by popcorn aliens while working jobs to pay their impossibly large debts to a multi-solar conglomerate. It’s all par for the course with these renegades, rogues, scoundrels, and space detectives.
Fortunately, this particular sliver of science fiction has been well explored in audio fiction podcasts, and there are days worth of stories available to be delivered right to your ears. Here are four space podcasts that will make you want to venture off into the stars.
Star Trek: Discovery’s Fifth Season, Now Coming Out in 2024, Will Be Its Last
Credit: Marni Grossman/Paramount+
The upcoming season of Star Trek: Discovery will be the final one for the series.
Terry Pratchett Book Club: The Thief of Time, Part III
Time’s stopped. Guess we should ponder the effects of existence on mortal form.
Series: Terry Pratchett Book Club
Into the Woods: Five SFF Stories About Forests
Photo: Sebastian Unrau [via Unsplash]
Most Canadians, presented with an untouched forest, would be filled with quite reasonable questions:
- Why has this forest not been clearcut?
- Into how many suburban homes could these trees be converted?
- Is the dark, green expanse plotting even now to lure children away forever, before replacing them with enigmatic changelings?
Truly, it is said that to see old-growth trees is to reach for one’s chainsaw. Science fiction and fantasy authors, being of the curious bent that they are, suggest there may be other uses for forests. Of course, they’re wrong, but it sure is interesting to read about such odd opinions. Here are five different takes on forests.
History’s Demons: Mariana Enriquez’s Our Share of Night
It opens with a departure. From the opening pages of her novel Our Share of Night, Mariana Enriquez brings the reader into the visceral lives of her characters, zeroing in initially on a man named Juan who’s pondering the heat outside and taking preventative steps for “the headache he wasn’t feeling yet.” He wakes his young son Gaspar and they set out on a long journey—one that Juan is convinced that they must make. That journey begins in Buenos Aires. The year is 1981.
Depending on your knowledge of Argentine history, that combination of time and place might set off a few alarms.
Natalie Haynes’ Stone Blind Fills in Mythological Silences
Natalie Haynes is a comedian, writer, and broadcaster, and along with Professor Dame Mary Beard, is probably at the moment the UK’s most well-known female classicist. Stone Blind is her third novel to draw directly from the well of classical mythology, after A Thousand Ships and Jocasta’s Children, and in Stone Blind Haynes turns her gaze on Medusa, the mortal Gorgon, daughter of Phorcys and Ceto.
Jack Kesy To Take Up Hellboy Mantle in Mike Mignola’s The Crooked Man Adaptation
Screenshot: Prime Video
The latest Hellboy adaptation co-written by comic book creator Mike Mignola has found its titular character.
20 Newly Discovered Terry Pratchett Stories Will Be Published This Year
Photo by Silverlutra
Terry Pratchett was adamant that any works in progress of his would be destroyed (by a steamroller, no less) after his death. And when he passed away in 2015, his former assistant and friend Rob Wilkins did just that. So how could their be unknown works to his name?
“Anyone else wanna throw more weird shit at me?”— Star Trek: Picard’s “Seventeen Seconds”
Image: CBS / Paramount+
A big part of the appeal of the TNG reunion that we have been promised in season three of Picard is answering the question, “What’ve they been doing for the last two decades?” The first two seasons answered that question for the title character, and various episodes of Lower Decks and this show have done likewise for Riker and Troi.
This week, we get answers for both Crusher and Worf, and that, at least, is a mixed bag. It’s the best episode of the season so far, though, because everything is starting to come together in a manner that has some delightful surprises, not just for TNG fans, but fans of DS9 as well…
Heads Up, Foolish Mortals! We’ve Got a Haunted Mansion Trailer
We’ve finally got our first real glimpse of this year’s Haunted Mansion movie, a film based on the legendary Disney theme park attraction that centers around Rosario Dawson playing a woman who, along with her son (Chase W. Dillon), move into a home with some spooky squatters.
New Young Adult Science Fiction & Fantasy for March & April 2023
Is it spring yet? No? Well, let’s pretend it is by checking out this big ol’ list of some exciting forthcoming young adult science fiction, fantasy, and horror books. We have time loops, space horror, god magic, ghosts, and more!
You Don’t Have to Finish Every Book You Start
Photo: Olga Tutunaru [via Unsplash]
We’ve all been there. Perhaps you were drawn in by a beautiful cover, hooked by the summary on the back of a paperback, or intrigued by the way a book was being discussed on Twitter. You read a great review; your favorite author was raving about a book; your group chat wouldn’t shut up about a twist. So you started the book. And you knew, whether immediately or 50 pages in, that it wasn’t for you.
Rhythm of War Reread: Chapter One Hundred Eleven
Oh my storms, my Cosmere Chickens, this is a heck of a ride. This is a very long chapter and we’ve got a lot to cover here, from new Radiant Oaths being sworn, revelations about Heralds and spren and highly Invested swords, and bad guys getting their just rewards. (Hmm, that almost rhymed!) Let’s jump right in, shall we?
Series: Rhythm of War by Brandon Sanderson
Revealing Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon by Wole Talabi
Photo courtesy Wole Talabi
A mythic tale of disgruntled gods, revenge, and a heist across two worlds…
We’re thrilled to share the cover and preview an excerpt from Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon, the debut fantasy novel from award-winning Nigerian author Wole Talabi. Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon publishes August 8, 2023 from DAW Books.
Viva Las Vegas! Agent Elvis Trailer Has The King Becoming A Secret Government Spy, With Expected Results
The animated Netflix series Agent Elvis is coming to the streamer in mere weeks, and we’ve got a trailer that gives us a taste of what the star-studded show will be like.
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