The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences has many forgotten stories in its Archives. Stories of madcap adventures in all corners of the Empire, dark doings in hidden places, and mysterious devices and artifacts that the everyday citizen should never become aware of for fear it would quite undo their minds.
In this episode:
Women of the Empire— written and read by JR Blackwell
Wellington Thornhill Books and Doctor Josepha Raven Blackwell share ‘an encounter’ after-hours at the Ministry, all part of Dr. Blackwell’s research into hysteria.
Brief as the encounter, one of them will not come out quite the same from it.
About the Author:
J.R. Blackwell is a writer and photographer. Her essay “Evidence of a Baker†was published in the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster in March 2006. Her stories have been published by Escape Pod Magazine, Aoife’s Kiss, Kaleidotrope, Bewildering Stories, Static Movement Magazine, EMG Magazine, HeavyGlow Magazine and in the first Podiobook anthology “Voices: New Media Fictionâ€. She is one of the founding members of 365tomorrows.com which produces a new piece of science fiction daily.
J.R. has produced the covers to the Anthology “Voices: New Media Fiction†and the novels “Playing for Keepsâ€, “The Case of the Singing Sword†and “The Case of the Pitchers Pendantâ€. Her photography has been featured in SubLit Magazine and Flames Rising Magazine. J.R. is the Creative Director at Galileo Games and holds a Masters of Liberal Arts from the University of Pennsylvania. She lives in Philadelphia with her husband, artist Jared Axelrod.
Theme music for the Ministry composed and created by Alex White.
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J.R. Blackwell here with a note on the story. Although, as noted, I did study creative writing for my Masters, my undergrad degree is a double major in political science and psychology. For my senior thesis in psychology, I wrote a historical view of hysteria and how it was regarded, and eventually discarded, by medicine. I have never had more fun writing a in-depth academic report in my life. Much of what I wrote Women of the Empire is drawn from that undergraduate research, including the bits about ancient Egypt and the idea of using devices to calm the nerves. It’s fascinating to look into, for anyone so inclined.
Will this be coming out in print? While I appreciate all the hard work, artistry, and creativity in the audios, I do like words on the page. Well, ummm, e-ink on the e-reader.
Thanks for asking Tempest! The ebook comes out the week after the audio. Keep an eye on the short story page—each story is 99c and then collections of 4 stories come out in a collection (once there are enough of them released) at $2.99
Excellent! Said story now resides happily on my nook. (I lack the willpower to wait until the collection comes out.)