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For Your Consideration: PodCastle Award Eligibility 2019

In 2019, PodCastle produced 15 original stories and 33 reprints. For your consideration, we present the Escape Artists stories which are eligible for nomination in the upcoming award season.

PodCastle itself is eligible for the Best Semiprozine Hugo Award. Staff in 2019 included Co-Editors Jen R. Albert, Khaalidah Muhammad-Ali, and Cherae Clark, Assistant Editor Setsu Uzume, Audio Producer Peter Behravesh, and Artemis Rising editors Krystal Claxton, and Elora Gatts.

Khaalidah Muhammad-Ali, Jen R. Albert, and Cherae Clark are also eligible for the Best Editor (Short Form) Hugo Award. (Please nominate all on the same ballot.)

A full list of current PodCastle staff is available here. We are so thankful for their work and proud of what we’ve achieved together. Thank you also to our authors, narrators, and listeners. Your enthusiasm and support makes the castle fly. Wishing you all the best in 2020!

— Jen R. Albert & Cherae Clark

 

Original Short Stories

I Am Fire; I Am Tears by Wendy Nikel

The Weaver Retires by Kai Hudson

Mister Dog by Alex Jennings

Elegy for a Slaughtered Swine by Rafaela Ferraz

Temptation by Karuna Riazi

Getaway by Jennifer Hudak

The Horrible Deaths of Helga Hrafnsdóttir by Christine Tyler

His Giant Heartbeat by Natalia Theodoridou

The Cost of the Revolution in Three Marvelous Confections by R. K. Duncan (flash)

By Jingly Bell, by Velvet Mouse by KT Bryski (flash)

A Thousand Points, the Sky by Michelle Muenzler (flash)

Tohoku by Nathan Susnik (flash)

Franken-Puppy by Derek Künsken

No Mercy to the Rest by Bennett North

River’s Giving by Heather Shaw, River Shaw, and Tim Pratt

Reprint Short Stories (first published in 2019 or earlier)

Candied Sweets, Cornbread, and Black-Eyed Peas by Malon Edwards

Shadow Boy by Lora Gray

The Griffin and the Minor Canon by Frank Stockton (d.)

A Place to Grow by A. T. Greenblatt

Dying Lessons by Troy Wiggins

Suddenwall by Sara Saab

Baby Teeth by Lina Rather

Cooking Creole by A. M. Dellamonica

El Cantar de la Reina Bruja by Victoria Sandbrook

One More Song by Eliza Chan 

Starr Striker Should Remain Capitol City’s Resident Superhero, by Keisha Cole, 10th Grade Student; All The Fishes, Singing by Amanda Helms; Hester J Rook

The Pull of the Herd by Suzan Palumbo

The Guitar Hero by Maria Haskins

Into the Wind by Marie Brennan

The Court Magician by Sarah Pinsker

A Toy Princess by Mary de Morgan (d.)

When Leopard’s-Bane Came to the Door of Third Heaven by Vajra Chandrasekera

The Bone Poet and God by Matt Dovey

I Am Not I by G. V. Anderson

Fathoms Deep and Fathoms Cold by A. Merc Rustad

Life in Stone, Glass, and Plastic by José Pablo Iriarte

The Resurrectionist by John Sullivan

The Masochist’s Assistant by Auston Habershaw

Strange Waters by Samantha Mills

Willing by Premee Mohamed

Labyrinth, Sanctuary by A.E. Prevost

Balloon Man by Shiv Ramdas

The Deliverers of Their Country by E. Nesbit (d.)

The Feast by K.C. Mead-Brewer

The Satyr of Brandenburg by Charlotte Ashley

The Sound of His Voice Like the Colour of SaltL Chan by L Chan

The Two-Choice Foxtrot of Chapham County by Tina Connolly

A Thousand Tongues of Silver by Kate Heartfield

Copy Cat by K. A. Teryna and Alex Shvartsman

Blood, Bone, Seed, Spark by Aimee Ogden

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PodCastle 610: Charlemagne and Florent

First published by Myths Inscribed.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:08 — 29.9MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG.

Charlemagne and Florent

By Ranylt Richildis

This is what happened to les deux bretons before I met them, back in the 70s when they were boys in Vannes. One was abandoned at nineteen months (no one knows why, or by whom), the other orphaned by a car wreck at age three. I should say he was orphaned in a car wreck, strapped to a safety seat in the car in question. The fact of the child safety seat indicates the degree of his late parents’ love for him; baby seats were indulgences in 1971. He was brought to the same agency as the foundling, where someone had the kindness to put them together in the same bassinet. Or — it might just as easily be said — someone made the mistake of placing them together.

The fair boy was registered under the unlikely name of Charlemagne Kermorgant, the dark one attached to the much less remarkable Florent Edig. Florent remembers the occasion of their meeting, just as he remembers the car wreck that erased his alternate life. He sees, when he tries, a characterless room, a lurking nurse, a dreary olive drape, and a toddler with matted white hair crawling up to peer at his eyes. A scent, one part applesauce, one part diaper. Children’s squeaks and squalls. A pain in his left leg and another on the right side of his head. A rather stunning absence, quickly filled.

Charlemagne was so named by at least one of his derelict parents. The name was inscribed on a note taped to his wrist. There was no family name, of course, so Kermorgant became his surname, as it became the surname of all the ciphers left on the steps of the eponymous hospice. An interim label, it stuck to him through to the age of majority and sticks to him still. (Continue Reading…)

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PodCastle 609: The Epic of Sakina — Part 2

Previously published by Fiyah Lit Mag Issue 5.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 35:50 — 33.3MB)

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Show Notes

Rated PG-13.

The Epic of Sakina

By Shari Paul

[Note: This is part 2 of a two-part novelette. Visit our previous post to read Part 1.]

The ride back to her father’s house had never felt so long, doubly so under Naima’s interrogation. Sometime during the wait for Sakina’s return at the barracks, Naima had spoken to a few of the guards and decided that Leif was a djinn. It was a welcome distraction, as she teased her friend and gave her only the vaguest answers. This was not something she could share, and once Naima realised this, she changed tack anyway, instead telling Sakina about the business at her store.

Sakina went straight to the library when she was back at the house, ancestors whispering in her ear. It was time she started a record of this. As she sank into her chair though, someone knocked at the door.

She looked up and a shiver coursed her spine like lightning. It was the alim. (Continue Reading…)

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PodCastle 608: The Epic of Sakina — Part 1

Previously published by Fiyah Lit Mag Issue 5.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 45:30 — 42.2MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | Stitcher | Spotify | RSS

Show Notes

Rated PG-13.

The Epic of Sakina

By Shari Paul

The moon was a pale, golden disc in a lavender sky. Sakina, in a brilliant blue caftan that brought out the colour in her skin and eyes, strummed her kora a few times to check the tuning. At her ear, an ancestor whispered, “He is quite brazen to be out here when the moon is full…or powerful enough to resist it.”

Sakina looked over at the tall, thin man sinking into one of the dougou-tigui’s fine silk cushions. Asif the alim looked as if a stiff breeze would knock him over, the skin stretched tight over his bones. Naima had called him a ghoul and Sakina agreed. He noticed her stare, smiled, and said, “Of all the djeli I have met in my travels, you are by far the most captivating.”

There were a few titters from the assembled guests, wealthy merchants, fellow djeli, and the imam of the Cunapo Mosque. Their host, the dougou-tigui Hussain, coughed lightly, embarrassed, and said, “My nephew, Farouk, certainly thought so. He could not have found a more beautiful wife.”

“Yes, yes,” said Asif, still smiling at Sakina. “And then he left her to go travelling with your maghan. If I had found a wife as lovely, my journeys would end.”

“They are young, they think they can do whatever they like,” said Hussain with a chuckle, jiggling two of his three jowls.

Sprawled beside Asif, surrounded by trays of fruit and starches and spiced teas, the dougou-tigui was the larger of the two but he sat considerably higher. The ancestor continued at Sakina’s ear, “See how the mass he does not show nevertheless affects the environment around him? The beast he becomes must be strong.” (Continue Reading…)