Author Topic: PC476: Clay And Smokeless Fire  (Read 3121 times)

Ocicat

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on: June 27, 2017, 04:48:13 PM
PodCastle 476: Clay And Smokeless Fire

Welcome to PodCastle’s first Eid issue.

by Saladin Ahmed
read by Khaalidah Muhammad-Ali
hosted by Farah Rishi
First published in Slate Magazine

Rated PG-13

Qumqam stood upside-down atop a cellphone tower, twirling at its pinnacle on his fingertip. When the humans had first started to besmirch the Earth with the things, Qumqam had thought them hideous. But he’d come to love dancing on them the way he’d once loved dancing on ziggurats.

Click here to continue reading.



Saladin Ahmed was born in Detroit. His debut novel THRONE OF THE CRESCENT MOON, praised by George RR Martin as ‘a rollicking swashbuckler,’ received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Kirkus Reviews, and Library Journal, and was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel, and the Nebula Award for Best Novel. THRONE won the Locus Award for Best First Novel, and has been translated into a half-dozen foreign languages.

Saladin’s poems and short stories, nominated for numerous awards, have appeared in  publications ranging from Slate to Callaloo to BuzzFeed, and have been widely anthologized and translated. His essays on politics, geek culture, and Muslim American issues have appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and Salon. He lives near Detroit, and is currently writing BLACK BOLT for Marvel Comics.



Khaalidah Muhammad-Ali lives in Houston, Texas, with her husband and three children. By day she works as a breast oncology nurse. At all other times she juggles, none too successfully, writing, reading, gaming, and gardening. She has written one novel entitled An Unproductive Woman available on Amazon. She has also been published  in or has stories upcoming in Escape Pod, Diabolical Plots, and Fiyah! Magazine. Khaalidah also coedits Podcastle.org where she is on a mission to encourage more women to submit fantasy stories. Of her alter ego, K from the planet Vega, it is rumored that she owns a time machine and knows the secret to long youth. She can be found online at http://khaalidah.com and on Twitter at @khaalidah.

Listen to this week’s PodCastle!



GreySkies

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Reply #1 on: June 29, 2017, 02:50:43 PM
At first I thought this story was a little bit *too* "on the nose," but I really love the multiculturalism of it. By the end, the story made me smile.



danooli

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Reply #2 on: July 06, 2017, 11:31:57 AM
Sylvia Fucking Reitzes kicks ass and I love her.



Ocicat

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Reply #3 on: July 06, 2017, 10:43:49 PM
A conversation about Podcastle's editorial baises, or lack thereof, had gone far afield from the subject of this story, and has therefore been moved. 

Find it here: Political bias - moved from Re: PC476: Clay And Smokeless Fire

Please direct any further comments about Podcastle's politics in general there, and continue discussing Saladin Ahmed's story here.



Katzentatzen

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Reply #4 on: August 10, 2017, 12:32:31 AM
I really loved this story, it made me tear up a little. I like to think that violations of human rights are a universal outrage, but I can see from the conversation following this story that this isn't always the case.

"To understand a cat you must realize that he has his own gifts, his own viewpoint, even his own morality."
--LILIAN JACKSON BRAUN