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There's a non-zero amount of ✨denial✨in response to certain podcast-based events this week, as I bring you my thoughts about the fiction podcasts I've been listening to in this week's audio fiction Sunday blog post!

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Day 96! A commission for @donthurtthepeachrings!

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My dog and I are perfect for each other. He's on the floor under my bed, just barely out of reach. So I stretch as far as I can, and he lowers his head a literal half inch so I can touch his muzzle before he goes back to sleep.

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Wizard worm just emerged from a wizarding hole! Lucky you!!!✨🪱🪄🍀

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April 27th is International Crow and Raven Appreciation Day! My comic Crow time is pretty much stuffed to the brim with crows, so it's a good way to celebrate these goth little dudes.

READ CROW TIME!

OR GET PLUSH GOTH BOI?? WOW!

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✨Travelling Light - Episode 19!✨

The Traveller and Duytren clear the air; and how technology can be both a boon and a burden…

Subscribe now Spotify, Apple Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice 🚀✨ Full transcript available here.

Travelling Light is a science fantasy podcast that follows the Traveller as they explore their galaxy, collecting stories from the people they meet and adding them to their community archives.

Every week our artist Matt McDyre (@diabeticspoon92) creates a unique illustration for the episode's archive entry. This week’s entry was based on an idea from The Menagerie! Send in your suggestions, prompts and entries via social media, by email, or through monstrousproductions.org 📨

If you're enjoying the show, please consider signing up for our Ko-Fi. For £1 a month, you'll get access to bonus art, blogs, annotated scripts and more, as well as being able to vote in audience decisions! Head over to ko-fi.com/monstrousproductions to learn more 🤩

Finally, remember - the best way you can support us is to tell others we exist! Review the show wherever you listen, and share the love wherever (and whenever!) you can. Every little helps! 💖

🚀✨ See you next Friday! ✨🚀

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Friend who read the first draft sent me this. So, apparently, this is the energy I'm trying to get published.

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i hate when i send someone a meme in another language and they're like "uhm... translate? 😒" fucker i sent you a meme where 90% of the words have an english cognate and/or you don't need to know what they're saying to find it funny. can you at least TRY

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Season Three Premiere!!!

*In this distance, there is a crash* *A gust of moldering grave air ruffles your bangs*

SEASON THREE of THE WAY WE HAUNT NOW premieres today! https://pnc.st/s/the-way-we-haunt-now/0492846c/episode-twenty-one-the-subleaser

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Cairn and Rosemary reference sheets ✨

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Second Star to the left Pasithea Au??? 👀👀👀👀

okay there are actually three permutations that @munchiezxx and i discussed (listed in increasing order of my fondness for them!)--

scoutminder jane, scout sophie:

personalitywise, this one feels most obvious--sophie's got that intrepid explorer air, and jane WOULD be over-particular and stressed if she had to try to watch over sophie in a situation where she has almost no actual influence!

remember that part in pasithea season 1 where jane admits she doesn't mind hearing sophie's stories about other planets bc they're probably the closest she'll come to seeing new worlds herself? scout sophie lovingly describing her planet for the sake of jane, who they both assume will never see it, is born from that same wistfulness

like bell, scoutminder jane ONE HUNDRED PERCENT has a "criminal due to decisions of conscience" past that she drops no hints of and sophie is too self-absorbed to prod until something happens

a very funny situation made possible by this set up is that moreau is jane's on-station nemesis that she complains to sophie about and sophie's like "um are you're sure they're not flirting?? *i* think they're wildly attracted to you and it's pissing them off. you should flirt back" and jane's like "you're insane" and sophie, who finds the saga wildly entertaining, is like "jane pleeeease, im stuck on this nowhere planet, i can't start drama myself, you have to do it on my behalf, i'll literally coach you" except then one day jane gets on the radio and says "um. something very lgbt just happened between me and moreau" and sophie's like 👁👁 wait a minute (<- suddenly super jealous and BLINDSIDED by the feeling bc she literally spent weeks egging jane into this)

sometimes sophie crosses a line and jane gives her the cold shoulder, refusing to talk about anything non mission related, and sophie resorts to narrating stupid choices she's "going" to make until jane can't take any more and is like "i know you know that putting your fork in the outlet won't fix it, stop that" and sophie (who was bluffing about the fork AND the broken outlet) is like well okay fine :) 2. scoutminder sophie, scout jane:

my backstory thought here is maybe instead of jane getting thrown in prison for the ssttl-verse equivalent of the rowley conspiracy, she was "invited" to become a planetary scout

sophie would probably have an ideological faith in the institution of the scouting office (which she works for as scoutminder) that gets broken down over the course of the story

jane would freely rearrange mission priorities and modify equipment to suit her and sophie's like "for the love of god there is protocol to follow." and does jane listen? no <3

jane asks sophie to slip hieronymus cheng novels into her data download packages and sometimes she reads them out loud and sophie insists she's only half-listening and doesn't care about the plot. which is true she doesn't care about the plot!! but she loves to hear jane's voice :')

sophie also asks jane to describe her planet sometimes but she's trying so hard to picture jane, not the planet... she's like "what's the light like? is your hair up or down?"

my favorite aspect of THIS scenario is i think sophie would just wildly overshare abt her life to fill in gaps in conversation so she tells jane waaaay too much abt her love life on the station at first "for jane's entertainment" because "it's not like she's got much else going on", and then one day jane's like huh sophie hasn't told me about any of her hookups in excruciating detail recently, thank god (this is because sophie is pining horribly)

3. scoutminder jane (again), scouts sophie and george:

this one is notably different from scenario (1) bc in that one, scout sophie fills a gwen hartley-ish role; in this one she's mikhail

from sophie's pov: she finds out her planet is inhabited by a sentient species (the others!!!) and realizes that in order to protect them & humanity from each other, she has to fake her death and stay here alone. (i don't remember the name of mikhail's alien lover but THAT'S OMIKRON)

from jane's pov: sophie gets weirder and weirder over calls until jane hears another voice in the background and goes cold bc it sounds just like evelyn. and then sophie's like "yeah i need you to tell everyone i'm dead and leave me here alone with no company except my ghosts and the undead replica of the guy we both loved!!! and you have to be the only one who knows what happened to me while everyone else mourns me!!!"

meanwhile jane and moreau are having their whole haters-to-soulmates arc over the radio (remember how moreau names the egoran corpse in their closet and insists jane treat her with respect?? they would sooo anthropomorphize their bot and then condescendingly explain to it why jane is wrong during arguments)

also moreau's a xenobiologist and i just think they deserve to have a field day investigating the weird vines on their planet and jane listens to a thirty minute monologue abt the vines' growth behaviors and is like "wait why is this so endearing"

jane gets in trouble for insubordination on the station bc of course she does and moreau finally gets josephine to track down information abt jane's background, finds out abt [rowley conspiracy equivalent] and is like "oh shit. that actually makes me like her even better. shit she can't go to PRISON abt this"

i do think coordinating a long distance jailbreak by calling in favors from random ppl who are fond of jane (anders? david alegros?) is something moreau is capable of AND likely to do

so jane escapes to moreau's planet, they finally meet in person, and then sophie turns up out of fucking NOWHERE to find jane bc while moreau's been having their ssttl 'express your newly recognized feelings for your erstwhile scoutminder by breaking them out of jail and bringing them to your planet' plotline, sophie was having her pasithea s3 'i need to convince the aliens to give me a ride home' plotline

now all three of them are on a planet together and it's GOING to cause problems!! but the fun kind!!!

ANYWAY THANKS FOR ASKING!!!

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!!!!!!!!!!

This is not audio drama related, but I wanted to gush a little because one of my D&D friends got their first graphic novel published recently! It’s called Homebody, and it’s about a journey of discovery and comfort in relation to gender identity!

(Also there’s cats)

Go check it out!

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Rejection #4

This is my bad. She's right. This is firmly in novella territory, however...

I am choosing to ignore it.

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Filling out queries for Pax answering questions like:

What personality traits will your readers see in your characters that you think they'll connect with?

Oh god, I hope the answer is nothing. He'd be positively insufferable in real life lol.

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You ever see people giving advice and just go

oh...

oh no...

the way I did this was absolutely unhinged.

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F&S S2 Crowdfund: FINAL WEEK!

Well, detectives, here we are! The dawn of the final week. The finish line that marks that moment where we get to stop posting about the crowdfund (god I've copy-pasted that link so many times) draws near. The end is in sight. But first, we have ONE WEEK to push toward our goal. 

We are delighted and honored to say that we have raised 80% of our goal - at the time of this typing that means we are just under $6500 of our $8000 goal we set for this crowdfund. That means we have roughly $1500 to raise in 7 days. Will we make it? We don't know, and neither do you (unless you just found $1500 in a pocket when you were getting out your Spring clothes--no judgement, we WILL accept it!). We hope we'll make it across the line, but the only way we'll all be able to find out is if we spread the word. 

SO. If you haven't donated yet and are planning to, this is so very incredibly much The Time to do that--and get one of our fantastic rewards AND some episodes of audio drama! No donation is too small, we truly treasure every donation that comes in whether it be $5 or $750. If you have already donated and are wondering what you can do to help, first of all THANK YOU from the bottom of our hearts--and second of all, the answer to that question is to simply tell people we're here. Recommend us to your friends, your enemies, your neighbors, leave us a review, bake some Matcha Focaccia (yes, we have lovely folks doing that already and we LOVE IT)! Spreading the word is the best thing aside from donations that we can ask for. 

Also, in case you missed it, as a thank you to everyone who helped us reach out $750 match goal, we released a FIFTH STICKER which will automatically get added to the sticker pack of anyone who donated or donates at the $30 tier or above at any point in the campaign. Check out our "Ask Me About Sherlock Holmes Entering the Public Domain" sticker below!

[STICKER]

We also released a mini-mystery that YOU all helped us create, so if you haven't already, head over to our feed for The Case of the Missing Magician today! And as if that wasn't enough, we ALSO released the recipe for Archie's Lotcha Matcha Focaccia! As we mentioned above, people have even been baking it already! 

Again, thank you. And while the future of this campaign, as well as the future of our detectives, remains a bit of a mystery, we will always be honored to tell this story to you, whether we meet our goal and make it at our intended pace, or take a bit longer to make sure it's good enough and our artists are provided for. If you or anyone you know has any doubts, this money will go toward a story we find such joy in bringing to you. If we can make our listeners feel even a fraction of the joy that we feel making it, we will have done our jobs well. It's the best job anyone could ever have. 

And now, one more time, for our final week: #ForAmbrosius! 

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Hi!

I have been following this blog for a while now and I love using it to find new podcasts. I was wondering, if you have time, what you think is the scariest podcast you've listened to or what your favorite horror podcasts might be? Thank you, and I hope you have a great day :)

I'm so glad to have helped you find new shows!

I don't really get scared by horror podcasts (not sure why. It isn't some "I'm tough" thing, I get startled by the toaster, and it's not like I never feel unsettled or concerned or icked out at podcasts, just not scared) so I'm not sure I can give you a good answer on that one, but I'll gladly give you ten of my personal favourites instead:

Alice Isn't Dead: The podcast that got me into podcasts. A truck driver travels the USA looking for her wife, who until recently, she had thought was dead. Along the way she has all manner of strange encounters, and sees a side to the world that few truely comprehend.

Archive 81: A young archivist takes a job at a remote outpost organising and digitising a collection of tapes. On the tapes is a series of interviews and investigations made by a social worker in the 90s as she becomes familiar with a bizzare apartment building. The archivist, naturally, has an increasingly bad time. Each season is part of the same story, but they're all a bit different.

Ghost Wax: Recorded interviews conducted by the last surviving necromancer, and various people who died under seemingly otherworldly circumstances.

Hello From The Hallowoods: Supernatural and cosmic horror. A powerful and dramatic entity visits your nightmares to relay stories of the people (to varying degrees of both human and alive) who inhabit the beautiful and deadly Hallowoods. What start off as individual stories quickly connect to a larger narrative.

Hi Nay: A supernatural horror following a young woman named Mari, who's babaylan (shaman) family background draws her into helping people with various horrific supernatural problems around Toronto. Formatted as phone calls to her mother telling her what's happened.

I Am In Eskew: Often-horrific stories from a man living in something that very much wishes to be a city, and a private investigator who was, in her words, hired to kill a ghost. Many people seem to agree this one is scary.

Janus Descending: A xenoarcheologist and a xenopaleontologist are sent to investigate and sample the ruins of a long-dead alien city, and discover more than they anticipated. The format for this one is really clever: you hear her audio logs first to last, and his last to first, and the story is all the more heartbreaking for it. I'd recommend listening to the supercut.

The Lost Cat Podcast: A man befriends strange entities, loses bits of himself and drinks an awful lot of wine while looking for his cat. Soft and cosmic horror.

The Moon Crown: The shortest on this list, but also one of the most fascinating. A disgraced scribe living in a city of humans, beasts, and other bizzare entities, begins to recount recent happenings, and actions she has a hard time explaining, on broadcast. But the people she's hoping to reach might not be the ones listening.

The Silt Verses: In a modern world where gods are plentiful, both illicit and commercialised, two disciples of an outlawed river god go on a pilgrimage.

Although, maybe some other listeners can help me out and share what scared them?