This is my first podcasted story, and my third paying piece of fiction overall. You can listen to it—or read it—on The Centropic Oracle by clicking here. The title is “Lizzy’s Last Chance,” and it’s about the fictional Djinn family. And hopefully some part of that name rings a bell!

Now with that out of the way, holy smokes when it rains it pours! I got something else published a few days ago, which is always fun. I do not have any other stories “in the pipeline,” yet that’s OK since I’m so happy with this one. I really like “Lizzy’s Last Chance.” I dunno if you’d agree or not, but I think it’s the funniest thing I’ve ever written. Though the turn-around has been brutal! Publishing takes time, and audio production is vastly more complicated that putting something up on the web in an issue. From what I understand, anyway, because the thing is, after submitting this story I really had nothing else to do with it. What an adventure, right?

Since listening to the podcast, I’d say that the voice actress (Jill Raymond) did a fantastic job. I’m surprised she gave the characters accents, since I never envisioned them talking that way, but it makes sense in the context of the story. And it makes sense from a audio point-of-view: it’s a way to tell characters apart. I’m going to write more about podcasting soon, but to close, how’d “Lizzy’s Last Chance” come about? I can’t remember what gave me the idea, but I do remember that Leah was driving the car through West Virginia (we’d had Thanksgiving in DC). This story seemed like such a fresh idea that I wanted to write it right away, so I whipped out my laptop, got about 75% of the way through, and then I got massively carsick.

So “Lizzy’s Last Chance,” everyone—a story I am really proud of, and the reason I know that though I can ride, eat, sleep, and read in the car, I cannot type while the vehicle is moving. AT ALL.

–Jeff and Leah