April 6, 2019

“The Maltese Goddess”

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts, Member Writing & Art

Third and Final Episode Here we are folks, as promised, at the same time and same station, headphones poised to listen to the last episode of our mystery-adventure in 3-D sound from our friends and fortunately frequent contributors at ZBS. I do want to give them a great big fist bump from Fictional Café and a nudge for you to go check out their site, because it is full to overflowing with great stories and tales for listening. You’ll recall that “‘The Maltese Goddess’ is “a detective story set in the 1930s, with voodoo, mobsters, goddess worshippers, a snake cult, and an ancient, priceless, statue from Malta.” And, as you remember, it won first prize in the Prix Italia audio arts contest a few years ago (you’ll hear about this again in the Introduction). It’s…

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March 30, 2019

“The Maltese Goddess” Part 2

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts, Audio Arts, Podcasts

Saturday Night at the Podcasts As promised, here’s the second episode of ZBS Media’s incredible noir detective opera. If you missed Part 1, you should definitely click back through the slider on our home page and listen to it first. There is one more episode, which will “air” here next week. Or, as we used to say in radio, “same time, same station.” As we did last week, we’re also posting the Introduction as a separate audio file. There’s a technical, not aesthetic, reason for this. Because “The Maltese Goddess” was produced in 3-D sound, these episodes are large files. So large, in fact, that they exceed WordPress’s size limit. But through the miracle of audio editing technology, we were able to separate the intro from the story itself and . . . Voila! Here…

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March 23, 2019

“The Maltese Goddess”

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts

Saturday Night at the Podcasts We are so delighted to welcome ZBS Media back to The Fictional Cafe with “The Maltese Goddess,” an entertaining and original takeoff on Dashiell Hammett’s novel, The Maltese Falcon. Not only is the script first class, but the ZBS Artistes have added two extraordinary aspects to this storytelling. One, from time to time the main characters break into song. And not just any song, like a pop diva, but operatic song in which the character is singing their lines from the script! They call “The Maltese Goddess” a detective opera. It’s just great, and even if you don’t think you like opera, I think you’ll like this. Two, the entire three-episode production is recorded in 3-D sound. What in the heck is that? you may be asking, so I thought…

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January 19, 2019

For Your Listening Pleasure, The Saturday Night Podcast

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts, Podcasts

Good evening, listeners! Tonight we welcome back to the Café another podcast from Jack J. Ward’s Electric Vicuna Productions, and a second thoughtfully curated old time radio show for your entertainment. From EVP’s Deadline Anthology Series, our first offering is “Clay Pigeon Shooting.” Don (John Bell) takes his employee Andrew (Cayenne Chris Conroy) out for a friendly weekend hunting. The game is something more elusive than deer. Something of an hommage to “The Most Dangerous Game.” Next, we offer for your listening enjoyment an episode of a rare radio show from the mid-10940s, “The Avenger.” It has two earmarks of all crime-fighting radio plays of the era: one, the message is always “crime does not pay” and two, a creaky old organ providing the musical background and scene segues. That said, this is a good…

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January 12, 2019

Tonight, Podcasts Return to FC!

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts, Podcasts

Ruby and Jack are pleased to bring you some new audio arts dramas tonight, courtesy of our friends at Electric Vicuna Productions. There are many people out there who work tirelessly, without compensation and often without praise, creating great audio content for our enjoyment. Jack J. Ward is one of those people; see his bio at the bottom of this post. But now, please enjoy the Electric Vicuna production and re-creation of one of the most famous radio dramas ever written or aired [thanks so much, Lucille Fletcher]: “Sorry, Wrong Number.” We’re also including the original version, which was broadcast on the CBS radio show “Suspense” on May 25, 1943 — then again, and again, due to its popularity. It starred Agnes Moorhead, and some years later was made into a film starring Barbara Stanwyck….

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October 29, 2018

Another Night of Halloween PodioFun

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts, Audio Arts, Podcasts

Following last night’s premier podcast, here are eight more Halloween treats from ZBS Media’s “90-Second Cellphone Chillin’ Theater.” You podcast lovers might recall “Saratoga Noir,” which we re-podcasted here a few months ago. Tomorrow night, Halloween, we’ll present the final eight episodes, for a total of 24. Do we deliver great content or what? “Zombie Al’s Big Night Out” “Dixie Doodle, Girl Geek, in ‘Totally Flat Busted’” “When the Wolfling Learns to Whistle” “Eating Crackers in a Crypt” “Dixie Doodle, Girl Geek, in ‘My Boyfriend’s Back’” “Drooling Doreen” “Revenge of the Tooth Fairy” “Loathsome Sally Under the Texas Moon” That’s all, folks! We hope you enjoyed and if you did, check in tomorrow night for the final eight episodes of “90-second Cellphone Chillin’ Theater.”

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October 28, 2018

Trick or Treat? Three Nights of Halloween Goodies for You

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts, Audio Arts, Podcasts

Thanks to our friends at ZBS Media, we present three nights of Halloween audio fun: “The 90-Second Cellphone Chillin’ Theater!” These are ghoulishly fun little podio stories created to get you in the mood for Halloween. Tonight we offer you the first eight, plus eight more tomorrow night, and eight again the Halloween night. We hope you enjoy them, and if you do, please write a Comment for us the share with ZBS. If you love audio stories, we encourage you to visit the ZBS Media website. It’s an audio treasure trove! “The Okie Dokie Swamp Thingie” “Hotel Catatonia” “Don’t Eat on Twilight Street” “The Monkey”s Magic Eyeball” “Don’t Eat at Igor’s” “The Sweet Scent of a Succubus” “Frankenstein’s Finger” “The X-Filings Dental Case”

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September 7, 2018

Friday Night is Gumshoe Night Again: “Saratoga Noir”

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts, Audio Arts

Ruby Fink, our Audio Arts Barista, and I were talking recently about great detective podcasts and we both agreed that “Saratoga Noir” was one of the best ever. And since it’s Friday night, our traditional audio arts/podcast evening, we’re rolling that tape again. Here’s the first episode of ZBS’s “Saratoga Noir,” featuring one of the world’s greatest, most humorously cynical and yet endearing gumshoes, Danny Boyee. Please click on the arrow below to listen to Episode 1 of “Saratoga Noir.” If you want to listen to the entire story, they’re all here at the Café: https://www.fictionalcafe.com/saratoga-noir-2018s-first-audiobook/ https://www.fictionalcafe.com/saratoga-noir-podcast-episode-2/ https://www.fictionalcafe.com/saratoga-noir-five-new-episodes-tonight/ https://www.fictionalcafe.com/5-audiobook-episodes-saratoga-noir/ https://www.fictionalcafe.com/saratoga-noir-episodes-8-14/ https://www.fictionalcafe.com/saratoga-noir-thrilling-conclusion/ Enjoy, with another big thank-you to our friends at the ZBS Foundation! Please visit their site. It’s a treasure trove of audio delights.

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May 2, 2018

Barista Ruby Fink’s Podcasting AMA

Posted by Mike Rochester in Audio Arts, Audio Arts, News

A letter from our Audio Arts barista. It’s Ruby Fink’s Podcasting AMA (ask me anything)! Greetings, beloved readers, writers, artists and friends, If you don’t know, the Fictional Café is going to be turning five years old on May 22nd… live on Facebook. This is a very special occasion, and will be celebrated with the pomp and jubilation that only a five year old website dedicated to the arts deserves. However, this day would not be possible without all of you. Without the 500+ subscribers, artists, writers, readers, visionaries and dreamers from 6 continents and over 40 countries sending in their masterpieces, Jack and the rest of us baristas would have folded our tents, separated and gone back to our random doodles, poems, sappy love stories and hermit-like, minimally social lifestyle. (Or maybe that’s…

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April 13, 2018

“The Diarist” – Your Friday Night Podcast

Posted by Jack B. Rochester in Audio Arts, Audio Arts, Podcasts

We welcome a new auteur and audio arts experience tonight with “The Diarist,” created by Rose Gluck, as she prefers to be known. Here’s her description of “The Diarist,” an audio story replete with a cast of characters. music and sound effects. We present the first episode here, tonight, for you Coffee Clubbers one and all. After completing Katherine Gibbs Secretarial School, Andrea Davies takes a position at a large New York Advertising firm, admittedly to find a husband and secure a life as a well-to-do country-club socialite. Andrea becomes increasingly drawn into her boss Richard Hayes’ bizarre personal life. She begins to assume the role of his wife and mother to his young daughter. However, a parallel reality continues in his apartment, where his psychotic wife moves in and out of insanity. Things are…

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