Podcasts

Produced by Skyboat Media, and under the direction of Grammy and Audie award-winning narrator and producer Stefan Rudnicki, our podcast features audiobook-style recordings of four of the eight stories we publish each month in Lightspeed, released more or less on a weekly basis. To subscribe (free!) to the podcast, you'll either need our podcast RSS feed and put that into your favorite podcast client, or you can just subscribe via iTunes. All of our podcasts from Lightspeed: Year One are also available as an audiobook from Audible.com and Downpour.com.

Fantasy

The Aerialist

by Yoon Ha Lee

The typewriter proved, at first glance, to be a poor investment for a daring aerial escape. Kallista had been drawn to the typewriter from the moment she viewed it languishing in a Museum of Curioddities, a pun that 3% of Pennon City’s citizens might appreciate, if one rounded to the nearest human. The jury was out as to whether the placard’s sententious overview of Strange Olde Anti-Fae Percussive Instruments was someone’s idea of trolling or, equally likely, an exercise in mellifluous snake oil.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 192 (May 2026)

Science Fiction

The Star Where We Meet

by Sam W. Pisciotta

Author spotlight

The most surprising thing about my journey (well, the first most surprising thing) is that the dream I experienced while traveling lasted a thousand years, a single dream stretching all the way to the Iota star in the Gemini constellation. I dreamt of Bindi, my childhood dog, a heeler and pointer mix who used to follow me everywhere; now it seems, she’s even followed me to this distant star.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 192 (May 2026)

Fantasy

Sarah’s Laugh

by Melissa A Watkins

Author spotlight

Everyone knows the Walls around the cities fell. What some people don’t remember is that the first one fell because of a laugh. It sounded like a ringing bell. Not like it came out of a baby at all. That was the first thing I told the scholar boy. He was a grown man, a researcher. He looked it, too. Big round glasses, chubby cheeks, curly hair.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 192 (May 2026)

Science Fiction

The Knacker Man

by Scott Dalrymple

A year of living in the ground had not accustomed Moyer to the smell. He wondered how the French, who’d been at this business so much longer, could stand it. But if the officers who had trained his unit in the intricacies of trench life were any indication, they were so weary and battered as to scarcely notice the world around them any longer.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 192 (May 2026)

Fantasy

Time Management

by P.A. Cornell

On the morning Gwen woke with the ability to manipulate time, it was already too late. She didn’t immediately realize she could stretch or compress time—that would come later. At first, all she knew was Dianne was gone, and she wasn’t coming back.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 191 (April 2026)

Science Fiction

Empathetic Psychosis

by Justin C. Key

Author spotlight

Personality Disorder (Not Otherwise Specified)

My patients called me Dr. Holloway. My friends called me Jason. I won’t tell you what my three ex-wives called me but I’m sure you can guess. I was a psychiatrist (and a damn good one seventy percent of the time).

My adult life had been full of restarts, reinventions, and rehabilitations. This new beginning, though . . . this was supposed to be different. I’d taken a job at Margins Treatment Center in sunny Los Angeles as the Clinical Director.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 191 (April 2026)

Fantasy

Six-Gun Vixen and the Machinist of Doom Valley [Part 2]

by Ashok K. Banker

Author spotlight

The sun was sinking toward the horizon like a brass penny dropped in muddy water by the time I rode back into New Providence. My Halfie’s mechanical shoes struck sparks off the metal road plates, each impact sending little jolts of pain through my spine. Those hours of riding and tracking had taken their toll, but it wasn’t the kind of tired that sleep could fix. The kind of weary that comes from knowing too much, seeing too clear.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 191 (April 2026)

Science Fiction

Update on Rules for the Spatiotemporal Use of Campus Spaces

by Andrea Kriz

Dear Members of the Community,

As we begin yet another fall semester in the throes of the rogue timestream unleashed on our campus, I cannot help but take a moment to marvel at just how vibrant our community has become. In addition to our current residents, our University’s campus grounds and buildings have come to support thousands of students, staff, affiliates, and visitors from past, future, as well as alternate Universities.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 191 (April 2026)

Fantasy

Six-Gun Vixen and the Machinist of Doom Valley [Part 1]

by Ashok K. Banker

Author spotlight

New Providence sparkled like fool’s gold in the distance, all gleaming spires and whirring clockwork, nothing like the two-bit townships I usually rode through. My Halfie tensed beneath me, his wolf-hackles rising at the stink of machine oil and steam that drifted our way. I dug my spurs in gentle-like, just enough to remind him who was boss without drawing blood. Been doing that less lately—seemed like we were finally reaching an understanding, him and me.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 191 (April 2026)

Science Fiction

Dad Died on Discord

by Andrew Dana Hudson

When we moved Dad to the care facility, his only complaint was the Wi-Fi. “Laggy,” he called it when he was having a good day. “Fucking piece of shit,” he called it the rest of the time.

At first I was relieved. I’d been worried that he’d bristle at the cramped room, like a zoo animal pacing its enclosure in a sad documentary. But he never said a word about the bedsit quarters or the unfamiliar, ever-churning staff.

In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 191 (April 2026)