The Space Casey Podcast by Christiana Ellis

“Some heroines will steal your heart… This one will steal your wallet.”

In my never-ending quest for cool stuff to read and listen to, I’m always on the lookout for something that makes me laugh.  There’s just something magical to me about people who can string words together and have them echo with the wit, humor and sarcasm that I like to think exists in my own mind, but rarely actually does.  I’m drawn to writers like that and if they can somehow find it in themselves to tickle my inner geek by making me laugh in outer space…I’m a fan for life.

A long time ago, my friend Andie introduced me to Douglas Adams and The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.  Soon there after, I was hooked on all things that had to do with towels, the phrase “Don’t Panic” and the number 42.  I just loved the smart and funny voice that Douglas Adams wrote in and when he passed away, I will admit to being selfishly distraught because I would never get to hear that voice again.

All these years later I read, “Some heroines will steal your heart… This one will steal your wallet.”  And I laughed.  That’s all it took really, one line and I knew I had found something that had the potential to make me a fan.  I also knew there was another podcast I had to listen to by the name of Space Casey.

Christiana Ellis, author of the painfully funny Nina Kimberly the Merciless podcast novel, recently began podcasting her latest project, Space Casey at the end of November 2007.  Her writing with Casey has that same witty and irreverent feel that initially drew me into Douglas Adams’ work. 

Ellis has also continued to hone her already wickedly funny writing, which she first showed off in Nina Kimberly, into a tighter and more polished outer space epic with her latest work.  Space Casey is funny and whip smart with a heroine who you want to like, but you’re never quite sure of her motivations.  You’re relatively sure there’s more under her roguish space fairing exterior than larceny, piracy and her attempts at one big score but you just can’t prove it…yet

I guess I’ll just have to keep listening to Space Casey, her neurotic spaceship AI with a fashion sense and the splashing sounds of a hyper-excited space spider with a crush to find out what happens.  Just like I had to keep reading all those years ago to find out the answer to life the universe and everything.  Once again, I’m looking forward to the ride.

7 Things I Will Never Tell You from Tag In The Seam by Leann Mabry

I listen to my iPod a lot. I’m jacked in all day at work to help me both concentrate on and forget about the work that I do. I listen at the gym. I listen in the car. The fact that my Prius had an iPod/aux in jack was a huge deciding factor in my getting the car…well, that and the astronomical cost of gas these days. That being said, I have a serious need for new content. I used to get all of it from either music or Audible.com, where I would download audiobooks.

Both of those have fallen by the wayside lately with my discovery Podiobooks.com. From Podiobooks.com I found a deep well of great new authors who produce amazing work. The quality of those works pushed me to research the authors and, in turn, led me to their websites and in some cases their other podcasts. Now even that find is bearing fruit, in that those same podcasts are recommending even more people and podcasts I should be listening to.

A combination of all of those circumstances recently led to me download one of the most amazing pieces of audio I have ever heard. I know that people throw terms like “most amazing” around without there being a lot behind them most of the time, but in this case I’m not saying it just to have something to say. I promise you that if you take the time to download Episode 25 of Leann Mabry’s Tag In The Seam podcast, your mind will be blown just like mine was.

Episode 25 of Tag In The Seam was originally released on June 18, 2007. I’m not going to tell you anything about the content of the episode other than its name, which is 7 Things I Will Never Tell You, for two reasons. The first of which is you really should listen to it without any preconceptions of what you’re going to hear. In other words, you should just experience it.

The second of which is I don’t have the words to describe what I heard exactly. I guess I could say that it’s the arual equivalent of a "trip", but I would only be speaking second hand and not doing Leann Mabry’s creation justice. I find myself in an unfamiliar situation akin to trying to describe what the color blue is to some one who was born blind. I just can’t do it.

I know what I heard was powerful and yet compassionate. I know it was personal to the point of being intimate and yet and an altogether isolating experience. It was light and dark, color and black and white. It was all of those things together at the same time.

Try to think about a painting for a minute. When you view it up close, you can see colors and brush strokes and all kinds of little things that don’t really make any sense. When you step back far enough, you can see what all of the parts that were out of context become, but you’re no longer able to see the individual pieces. If 7 Things I Will Never Tell You was a painting, you would be a fixed point in a room while it flew towards you and away from you, constantly changing perspective from one moment to the next; occasionally the whole, occasionally the parts, occasionally both.

That’s the closest I can come to describing it, but the only thing that can truly do Leann Mabry and 7 Things I Will Never Tell You justice is if you go and listen for yourself. So please go listen, you won’t regret it.

More about 7 Things I Will Never Tell You:

It’s not work safe or kid safe so be prepared. Listen in front of your boss or junior at your own risk.



More about Leann Mabry:

Leann is the host of her Tag In The Seam podcast as well as the owner of one of the most amazing voices in audio. If you listen to 7 Things I Will Never Tell You and think she sounds familiar, that’s because she probably is. If you’ve ever listened to a podcast or a podcast novel, odds are you’ve heard her. She has lent her voice to numerous trailers for podcast novels as well as been a voice actor in the podcast novels Morevi: The Chronicles of Rafe & Askana as well as Billibub Baddings and The Case of the Singing Sword both by Tee Morris, Murder at Avedon Hill by P.G. Holyfield and The Metamore City Podcast by Chris Lester just to name a few.