It’s time for the first audio fiction debut list of 2019, and fiction has come out of the gate strong in number and form. I covered debuts every month in 2018 — you can work your way backwards starting here in December — but before we dive in, let’s talk about some changes and expectations. As usual, I’m going to be making selections of debuts; the goal is to be as comprehensive as possible in terms of genre and represented demographics and voices, without being overwhelming. This year, as you might be able to tell by the cool column title change, my selections are going to try to aim a bit broader in form and scope, so you may see some actual play podcasts more regularly, or some podcasts that live behind a paywall, but always keeping a primary focus on independent productions.

With that in mind, let’s discover what new audio came up over the horizon of 2019.

This calm voice hides a secret, both about whoever she directs her recordings to and this strange client she talks about — the narrator can see people’s dreams, your dreams, and the connections between them. With otherworldly music woven throughout, this single-voice podcast draws the listener into the story without prescribing any attitude or being to the “you” towards which she directs her warnings and analyses.

I always need more cyberpunk, and Cybernautica absolutely delivers with the world of Neo-Atlantis, powered by a mega-corp called Kraken, and splintered into Districts. There’s been civil wars, refugees, rogue factions fighting for power.This sprawling world comes through in Cybernautica’s design and performances, an evocative and seamless sensation of place and person melded together.

The first new podcast from the production studio Atypical Artists, ARCS is an actual play where three very unlikely people go in search of a famed relic, with Lauren Shippen and Briggon Snow from The Bright Sessions, Nathan Stantz (Esportsmanlike Conduct), and a fabulous Dungeon Master in Jordan Adika. ARCS has well-timed sound design and gorgeous original composition, but the best part about ARCS is the rapid-fire pace and the camaraderie that bleeds through from the table to the story.

Gwen Ortiz’s power of mending glass and reading the truth and origin in how it was broken is the one thing that can help the police force figure out the source of The Shattering: everything and anything made of glass within a five mile radius has burst in one unfortunate night. Fracture’s horror builds inside of Ortiz’s observations as she gets dragged deeper into the darkness of the city’s underworld.

Samir ends up, by accident and with no way out, in Wound Canyon — and what a strange land it is, trapped in a Weird West where demons, vampires, and all sorts — many of them very attractive — freely roam the land. Well, freely, but for the Caravans of bounty hunters that take them down. The newest work from The Whisperforge, Caravan is a beautiful experience in found family, supernatural adventures, and very relatable horniness.

The Make-Believe Association, based out of Chicago, is a diverse company that performs audio dramas and records them live, since essential to their construct is a breakdown conversation between the creators and the audience. Right now they are producing Grown Folks’ Fables, a series of reimagined and reinvigorated folk talks from different cultures and experiences — like “Brava”, a Mexican tale about a young, brave girl who must fight monsters of all kinds as she strives for her best life.

In a post-apocalyptic world, one homemaker makes sure to help people practice civility, etiquette, and keeping their house clean and neat, because are you really living if you’re living in squalor? The Nuclear Solution is full of clever bits of world-building, especially through topic selection — like how to clean shambler stains — and a host who is really only just barely keeping it together.

A truck driver drives across an America that is deeply fractured, meeting struggling communities and old awakened legends. This is a mythic fiction podcast, told like an episodic road trip, where everything and everyone he meets is strange and haunting. These are all beautifully designed episodes, and in between an oddness that triggers the imagination, there is a genuine feeling of building friendships and community, even when everything is broken in ways we can’t explain.

The crew onboard the Starstrider spaceship are trying very hard to work together to successfully complete Mission Swallow. Unfortunately, with the eccentric and fascinating personalities locked in (which include a James Oliva sighting; check that bingo card), that doesn’t seem like it’s going to go smoothly. The Pilgrimage Saga is about five humans and an AI that don’t exactly slot together with ease, and a journey into what it means to be human in the expanse of space.

Alex is an employee at GreenCom, a corporate monopoly that owns everything — food, schools, communication systems — after catastrophic climate change. A strange woman follows Alex around GreenCom, distracting Alex until it’s impossible to avoid her and the adventure that follows. Creator and voice actor Annamarie Carlson has beautiful turns of phrase and a gentle voice that brings a simmering ominousness to her talk of “the GreenCom family”.

The Vessel is a single-narrator, lightly sound designed space horror, set on a ship meant to save a thousand cryogenically frozen human lives in search of a new home in deep space. Jason Hill, the narrator, follows the story of a man who wakes up on Ark One with no memories. Hill has a perfect, experienced voice for narrating writer Brian Martinez’s effective horror.

The hopeful gladiator Atticus is not having a good day: he just barely avoids being conscripted into the army, he’s assigned to the worst arena in all of Rome, and they’re selling sludge in place of coffee. Bad Gladiator is an uproarious sitcom set in ancient Rome, with just the right amount of anachronism.

A.R. Olivieri, creator of 2298 and Magic King Dom, has created another micro-episode fiction podcast that packs a punch. In under three and a half minutes, Olivieri’s economic and yet poetic language performed by talented lead voice actor Leslie Gideon (The Van), and cast that includes such skilled voices as Jordan Cobb (Janus Descending) and Lucille Valentine (The Six Disappearances of Ella McCray) will deliver you into a Gothic urban fantasy world where immortality comes with a heavy price to pay.

Tongue very firmly in cheek and not coming dislodged anytime soon, Gay Future is a satirical, surreal podcast about a world where everyone is gay and living under the gay agenda’s totalitarian regime, except for one surprising, ordinary boy who may be the rebellion’s only hope: because he’s straight. At first blush, this sounds like a premise that can go very wrong, but it hasn’t in these hands, especially not when you find out that the entire thing purports to be an adaptation of a recently discovered and unpublished YA novel by Mike Pence. It’s completely ridiculous, and expertly subversive, especially in its handling of various genre tropes.

If you’ve been craving musical podcasts since 36 Questions ended, look no further: Loveville High is a musical taking place during one high school’s prom night, across nine different, loosely connected perspectives. Packed with Broadway stars, such as Kathryn Allison and Harrison Chad, Loveville High is a tender, funny, and touching look at those risky and thrilling moments when love comes into view, and all the ways that can take shape when you’re young.

How to Burn a Million Quid is a hysterical reimagining of what led up to the electronic band KLF burning an actual, literal million British pounds on the Isle of Jura in 1994. It follows Bill and Jimmy’s journey to the top of the music gindustry and the trail of chaos they left behind; it’s outrageous and surreal, and sometimes you have to laugh because there’s no other option.

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