Showing results by narrator "Susan Iannucci" in Science Fiction & Fantasy

R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots) is a science-fiction drama that was first presented in Czech in 1921. It introduced the term "robot", which is derived from a Czech word meaning "worker," to international vocabulary. The action opens in a factory that has successfully produced thousands of robots, who are essentially mindless drones. An idealistic humanitarian activist launches a plan to imbue some of the robots with human traits. The robots which have been humanized then assume leadership over the other robots and seek to organize them in a revolution to take over the world.

H. G. Wells (1866-1946) was fascinated with imagined realities, alien worlds that intersect with human life, and the human condition developing throughout generations. With his keen observation of human behavior, Wells imagines worlds vastly different than the one in which he was writing.

In a city of majesty and brutality, of warring races and fragile alliances, a sacred mermaid has been brutally murdered. An abomination, a soulless Arukh is summoned to hunt the killer. As the world around the Arukh drifts into war and madness, her search for justice leads her on a journey to discover redemption and even beauty in the midst of chaos.

Dorothy Scarborough was an academic and author who had a particular interest in the supernatural. The following collection, first published in 1921, features stories that have a strong comical or satirical focus.

Rediscover the animal stories written by beloved children's author, Thornton W. Burgess. First published in 1918 and still highly enjoyable, adventurous Bobby Coon faces life in the Green Forest with the help of Farmer Brown's boy. Wonderful stories for long rides!

When immortals start meddling with a century-old murder mystery, the King of the Eternal City summons Delphi Janjack: fixer, tour guide, gentleman’s gentleman...a one-person army meant to solve problems without mussing his top hat and brocaded vest. Delphi might also be a disgraced champion in hiding, his secrets so abhorrent nothing but death will wipe the slate clean. Nearly 400 years after the Elves invaded South America, there is just one free city left: Austen, Tejas. With the heir to Court Royale missing, the last bastion of human independence faces inevitable destruction.

Danielle Michele Fleming, the 10-year-old daughter of a French aristocratic mother and a father who is the second son of English gentry, finds herself caught in the economic ruin that surrounds the failure of the Bourbon Monarchy. She lands aboard ship, destined for the Queen's Bush of Upper Canada and a life with the catalyst of her doom, her uncle, Edgar Fleming. Relentless in his hunt for her, her uncle has her tracked not only by bounty hunters, but in the end through another shaman of evil intent and a blood-debt to settle.

When lonely physicist Chloe Carsen discovers a parallel world, she becomes addicted to her life there with a perfect family and a perfect career. She doesn't even care that her physical body in the real world is wasting away. But, then, in the alternative world, her ideal life begins to fall apart. Her anti-gravity experiment unleashes a government manhunt for her and her family; they'll do anything to get their hands on her tech. The lives of Chloe's alternative-world husband and sons are endangered.

On the eve of the end of the world, 20 December 2012, five friends meet in Spanish Gardens, the cafe where they had celebrated their college graduation 20 years before. Over Irish coffees, they reminisce—and reveal long-held and disturbing secrets. Each friend in turn is given a curious set of instructions by an enigmatic bartender named Ariel: "Your life is filled with crossroads, and you are free to choose one road or another at any time. Stepping through this door takes away all choices except two—the choice to live a different life, or return to this one."

When Olaf Jenson discovers a secret hidden world within the bowels of the earth, he has no idea that it will be as hard to leave as it was to find it. This subterranean, Edenic civilization is inhabited by a race of scientifically advanced giants who worship the “smoky God” in the center of the earth.

A baker‘s dozen of futuristic and space travel tales await you in this audiobook of short stories, originally published in the science fiction magazine, IF (1960-61). These stories are both a sign of their times and a testament to the imaginative powers of writers in the era between Sputnik and Neil Armstrong’s steps on the moon. Death and Taxes are inevitable, of course, but you’ll also find a (Mind)snake, and maybe even a Garden of Eden within.