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As a former "tomboy" I've had some fun getting into makeup while becoming more comfortable presenting femme, and I enjoyed the dialogue on appearance re: societal norms vs. one's own preference of expression. 

Kenneth Schneyer's The Last Bombardment, the Pseudopod Best of 2015 story from Episode #459, has been adapted into a stage play, which will be performing at the MN Fringe Festival, starting next Thursday, August 3. If you're nearby, please come check it out!

http://www.fringefestival.org/2017/show/?id=20171227

This one took a couple of turns I absolutely wasn't expecting. As it began I thought, OK, we're in some kind of post-apocalyptic dystopia, the boy and Ya-Ya are survivors eking out an existence in the desert. When the police showed up, that was a surprise, but not entirely out of place. Why shouldn't a post-apocalyptic dystopia have some remnants of government trying to hold things together. The stuff that came next though - I couldn't have anticipated it. That's the point where the story became seriously disturbing. Thanks!

This is one of those awesome stories that an anthology could be written on. I read Ten Steps to Thin Mountain and thought it was great even for how short it was. I want more but I see how the "Less is more" rule applies here.

I also developed this image of a creepy "Big Rock Candy Mountain".

Good one.
End of the world, but with optimism.
I like strange spires

Narration was good.

I know that this wasn't the point of the story, but the treatment of depression meant a lot to me. When I heard that Calla was sick I was expecting some exotic fever but when it was stated that she was depressed, that she was gravely ill, all I could think of was yes, it is a sickness, thank you so much for recognizing that. I really appreciated the descriptions of how she was unable to play chess because the illness made the game completely incomprehensible and she couldn't keep her mind on it. It's what happened to me with reading. I rely on audio fiction now. Thank you so much. So many stories get it wrong, and you getting it right made me cry.

This one is a bit of a classic among Campbell's stories, but it took me a while to warm up to it over the years since first encountering it. At first, it just felt like haunted house trip with a sexual assault edge to it, which I suppose it is on some level. But encountering it here again, I am forced to see how fun it really is as a wonderfully well written story.

Yet another menacing dead being appears in a Campbell story, yet, this time, instead of relying on a sense of mystery alone or hints of cosmic horror, the writer relies on grimly specific and even embarrassingly uncomfortable details to slowly terrorize the main character and draw in the reader. By the end, instead of a lingering sense of fearful mystery, practically the whole of the thing is laid bare, metaphorically and literally, and there is no comfort in the revelation. The main character isn't even curious about how an apparently dead thing can be moving around and lustfully playing with his terror, as it just doesn't matter at that point.

At the same time, the story is amusingly self aware, explaining how the character is straining, as a modern person might, to take in the scene with an open mind and a lack of judgment, only to discover at every turn that his worst judgments don't do the situation justice. It would be a comedy routine about the manners and self policing we try to engage in when in awkward situations, if it wasn't so ugly. Amazing stuff.

Hello, everyone! Big fan of Escape Artists, interested in seeing how this contest unfolds.

Added Little Wonders - Death:
"Chrysalis" by Jennifer Lee Rossman
"The Black Veils" by Jenny Rae Rappaport
"Moments in the Crawl" by Evan Berkow
"Even Death" by Christine Lucas

Zombie story beginning with good intentions it seems, save the bees!
I liked that inevitable zombie apocalypse was not depicted here.
I didn't like that it was a little vague on why exactly that was the only way to save the bees.

Narration was excellent.