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Asimov's Science Fiction

Asimov's Science Fiction

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 With every new issue, Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine shares one piece of short fiction in podcast form. Enjoy these audio treats from our pages!Copyright 2025 Asimov's Science Fiction Arte Historia y Crítica Literaria
Episodios
  • Episode 53: Cryptid or Your Money Back by Misha Lenau

    Episode 53: Cryptid or Your Money Back by Misha Lenau
    May 9 2025

    In Asimov's latest story from Misha Lenau, a middle aged person finds themself longing to be someone—something—else, and, thanks to a bold new business franchise, endeavors to turn themself into a hairy, bloodsucking beast: El Chupacabra. But after a series of disappointing events, our protagonist wonders if they'll ever be happy. Will El Chupacabra finally become comfortable in their own skin? Find out in “Cryptid or Your Money Back,” read and written by the author.


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    20 m
  • Episode 52: Going Deep by James Patrick Kelly

    Episode 52: Going Deep by James Patrick Kelly
    Feb 27 2025

    Get a peek into Mariska Volochkova's past in "Going Deep," James Patrick Kelly's story printed in 2009 that gives a little background on our current tale by Jim, "Moon and Mars."
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    50 m
  • Episode 51: Mere Flesh by James Maxey

    Episode 51: Mere Flesh by James Maxey
    Dec 18 2024

    Robert is a scientist who has been working on an AI mobility system named Isaac, which he has been testing on his dementia-stricken father Hank. When Hank is discovered wrestling an alligator and acting less and less like the 103-year-old that he is, Robert begins to wonder if Hank’s adventurous streak will jeopardize Isaac’s rollout. Here is “Mere Flesh,” read and written by James Maxey.
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    32 m
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Getting good narrators with good microphone systems... We can take the occasional less than stellar reader here on audible of course, and skip the episode, or not buy/listen to the book. But when the reading could be enjoyable but is ruined by a poor recording setup I always shake my head... there are a few basic things these narrators could do to figure out what they're going to end up with. It helps too if the people narrating on the mic are also fans of audiobooks in general and have a sense of the quality of recording that is expected: no echo, use some slight compression if your i/o gets clipped, etc. etc. I'm an amateur btw too, but I know to look out for those things and how to avoid them having played around in GarageBand, not to mention there are many tutorials on the web both written, spoken, and visual about basics of spoken word recording. Finally, in the end, don't give up and think you have to start again! Just pay someone 10-30 bucks on a freelance website to fix those things for you in post, which can be done, but it's always better to fix it in recording. This stuff is being advertised to a very large audience I dare say. Isn't it worth making it decent instead of poor?

Another problem newer / some narrators make I think is trying to pronounce things like a linguist. Speaking more naturally, conversationally, colloquially really sounds much better for the simple reason as a newer narrator fixated on "proper American English pronunciation" your focus is on the words themselves and not on emoting as the characters would, and therefore failing to create a -feeling- with your voice which basically makes it, as the most lethal reviews of audiobooks put it, "monotone". This is the principle flaw of unversed / unaware narrators. You're reading to us, make it engaging, not putting to sleep reading from a textbook talk! The author took the time to write it! Take the time to honor that by reading it like you're having a good time too, and that you're -performing- for an already interested audience! Now, I don't mean like the -dramatized- (a technical term here) voices on those video ads from audible (on TV?) where there is a throaty female voiced period piece being acted.... just listen to some audiobooks with dialog that is mildly convincing, just change your voice -slightly- to indicate you're speaking for a character of your opposite sex, it doesn't have to be cartoon like, so by shying away from dramatization (which we don't want you to, because it is DIFFERENT from reading a book/story) too much you risk ending up monotone again, and making one of the cardinal skill based mistakes of the craft, IMHO. Not everyone can do this decently out of the gates, that's just a fact. Try reading / recording yourself with some auto-suggestion / positive self-talk scripts, and see if you yourself like it at least, or if it comes out monotone and not really warm and encouraging. It's all pretty subtle, but in the end, we don't know you, so you have to make a little -less- subtle when performing for someone else. That's why for those of us who don't like pictures being taken of us, especially as children, get the instruction "BIG smile" instead of just "smile" because when we fake a smile it can be really subtle and we "think" we're smiling, but for someone looking at a group photo they're not going to notice... maybe a helpful analogy if you were / are sensitive in that way.

The two main problems with pieces like this are:

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The authentic Taiwanese teenage girl telling the story (as read by the male author) is as passionate, and as drama-addicted, naive and over-emotional as you would find in any privileged high school in the US. Her world is about vanity, self-image & the lengths she will go to in order to obtain her standard of beautiful hair. And rivalry. The competitive sport being an inventive martial art performed on bladed skates.

The authors skill in describing this made up sport and the movements executed in the competitive trials are extraordinary. I could actually visualize all of the moves and felt like I knew exactly what it would look like. Fun & funny.

♥️ Teenage Angst: Piss Off To Death!

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I had an idea about a sentient toaster. this story did it much better. well thought out. fun!

loved it

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A lot of very meh stories. Some of which are okay but most are not any good.

meh

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This was a great story that had me on pins and needle until the end.

Enjoyable

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Awesome narration and a great story, This is what I read sf for. I hope I can find more works by this author.

Wonderful

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The volume is so low that even with every speaker in the house turned almost all the way up, I can’t hear all the words. I am pretty sensitive to loud noises, and I am not willing to turn this up any further, It is truly ridiculously quiet.

Would be great to hear the story.

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Why. There seems to be info lacking. The story is drama Queen on skates. Ok I will try part 2.

I give the reader/author points for reading his own story so the inflection is correct which is nice.

It is ok at best.

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The audio is monotone and couldn’t finish it I was always a slow reader but every word men’s something from a righter and every person in the book deserves a voice to identify their personality. As the writer intended

Good story

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