Jo

The Strange Case of Starship Iris title over a lo-fi photo of people surrounding a campfire.

While Team Hearthbound is taking a mid-season break, meet (or revisit) the motliest crew in the 'verse, created by @jesserbest.bsky.social. We've dropped TSCOSI's very first episode on our feed: episodes.fm/1807519201/e...

@camlannpod.bsky.social S1E3: I love the way this show hits all my favorite knight-related buttons: loyalty, pride, and determination to a glorious fault. Also, is it a meet-cute unless you're questioning if they're a desperate figment of your lonely mind? Oh, Shújūn/Gwen, my beloved.

(also see, the novel, Our Wives Under the Sea)

Alice Isn't Dead Part 1 Ch 1: Listening to this pilot feels like coming home. Lesbian wives?? In my audio drama?? It was absolutely not more likely than you think. Now almost 10 years later, I still don't think we've fully plumbed the depths of the wife-looking-for-long-lost-wife plot.

Inco S1E1: My new rarepair, Nova x peace & quiet. @itme.bsky.social creates an array of characters on the strength of their performance. It's easy to relate to Nova, facing the perils of gig work and other people's shenanigans.

Also, pour one out for Other Violet. If I had a nickel for every time I had to record a space-related death scene, I'd have two nickels, which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice in one year (shoutout to @dead-signals.bsky.social ).

The Strange Case of Starship Iris S3E4: I've known many a sapphic with commitment issues. None of them had war trauma as an excuse (someone hug Arkady). @jesserbest.bsky.social grounds space opera tropes in the real dirt and grime healing. A tortured past has real consequences & deserves real care.

Perhaps it's because we buried two of my partner's grandparents in the last couple years, and I've watched my own grow frailer with every passing season, but death never strays far from my mind. It's a comfort of sorts to have Anna here to keep those thoughts company.

Mabel Ep 1-2: Haunted houses are for queer women (thank you Shirley Jackson). It's something about the pull of the deep, the dark, the terrifying, and the true. In this house, Anna finds herself a death doula in more ways than one. A companion to a dying old woman, a dying house, dying memories…

It's #audiodramasunday again and queer women of color loving hours! Here's to telling our stories in a world that longs to erase us. We're still here. Featuring below some of my favorite shows highlighting those stories.

Jo MCs the Hearthbound mid-season live show at Sunny's Bar.

Keren Abreu sings, accompanied by Jeb Roberts.

An audience shot at Hearthbound's live show at Sunny's Bar.

A sign at Sunny's Bar: Live Music Tonight at 8pm.

10/10 would recommend throwing a live show for your audio drama at a 100yo bar 🍻

thx Rachel 😭

In all seriousness, before I met Anya, it was easy to nail Odessa's yearning for Penelope, but the lived-in-ness of their love was more elusive. Then as A and I built our life together, the picture became clearer and clearer. Hearthbound couldn't be what it is without her. To me, she's home.

She was wondering why I kept nonchalantly insisting that she should wear her cutest pants to the show 😂.

The sailor cowering before a towering the devil. The devil is soooo beefy.

Everyone say thank you to our illustrator, Manami Maxted, for making the devil super hot.

A digitally illustrated poster by Manami Maxted. Three panels show Odessa, Cal, and a tableau of a sailor with the Devil and Madame Brine. In the background, the moon and sun shine over a desert expanse with a small van and a trailer at the very bottom.

Did somebody say sea shanty?? Listen to episode 5 of Hearthbound on your fave podcast platform!

🔪 @forgedbondspod.bsky.social Ch1: The Greek gods were always our immortal mirrors, and it's fun to explore a Mount Olympus suited for Normal Gossip. I love Aphrodite and Ares' practical approach to marriage, as much as I love every god sick of Zeus' bullshit. As Marie Kondo once said, I love mess.

💧 @camlannpod.bsky.social S1E2:
It's beautiful the history these friends have with each other. Tequila drama and embarassing nicknames (more Pear Bear pls). Despite how they talk past one another, you know they're ride or die. Comes in handy when the horse in question absolutely wants to drown you.

🪡 @hinaypod.bsky.social Ep1:
I love seeing WOC sure in the face of the supernatural. We're raised with stories, instructions, rituals. No second guessing for Mari when faced with the horrors. Just recalling lessons and trusting her gut. And staying in a murder building bc free utilities (relatable).

🌳 Residents of Proserpina Park S1E1: Only problem with a 3 headed dog is that Alina only has 2 hands. I love this show for its Persona-like music cues and the cross-cultural educational mythology. It takes me back to childhood adventures-of-the-week, where you learn something new every episode.

🌀 Circè Prologue: Space witch space witch space witch. Lyrical and evocative, this ep sets the stage for something a little One Thousand and One Nights, a little Circe by Madeline Miller, and a little Saga the comic series. Circe is and always will be the Witch of All Time (WOAT?).

A chubby torbie showing a lot of belly.

Oop late again on #audiodramasunday. Here's Gentleman Cat as tribute.

[Sue Perkins voice] It's mythology week!

Hearthbound's my own queer, brown, Americana take on The Odyssey, and the best thing about myths is how many spins can be spun. Sapphic, anti-colonial, irreverent, you name it! Let's go!

A small dirt path on Antelope Island. A single cloud breaks the horizon line.

The dusty road towards Western Utah.

Bryce Canyon at sunset.

The waterfall along the hike to Mossy Cave in Bryce Canyon National Park.

we were called to the canyon

Hearthbound | An Untelling of the Odyssey

Odessa's journey home to her wife leads her along the Loneliest Road in America. Amid strange hosts and echoes of the past, this folk musical audio drama explores love, restoration, and the road trip of a lifetime. Are you ready to join her?

🌯 @desertskiespodcast.com Ch1:
A lil slant, we're going synthwave (south)west. It's hard to walk the fine line between pathos/bathos, but this meditation on death/grief/acceptance (and a lack) made me tear up and laugh out loud with a single line. If my wife were a burrito, I'd eat her too.

🌩️ @heart.glass 101: It was 100°F (38°C) in Brooklyn at the time I listened to this premiere, so I felt immersed in the heat of the desert in more ways than one. There's a maximalism quality to this show that's invigorating in an audio-only medium. You think, hell, I'm just hanging on for the ride.

🚂 @deadwestpod.bsky.social
Part 0-1: There's a slow burn to the strangeness of these American outlands. It's a companionable amble with Conrad, and even as Blackwater makes its sinister oddities known, it feels quite comforting to take it in with him. Clearly, it ain't his first Weird rodeo.

🎪 @strangekindstudio.bsky.social MERCY S1E2: Obsessed w/ Sawyer's butchering the words "laetitia medusa" at every opportuntity and that he's starting to like being bullied about by Doctor Daisy Gray. It ain't a western without a harrowing murder scene, a carnival mystic, and a gunshot cliffhanger.

A photo of a road and telephone wires stretching off into Salt Lake City mountains in the distance. Dramatic clouds frame a golden sunset.

I'm in SLC, officiating a wedding for my dear friends, then heading deeper into the desert for some camping under the dark skies of Utah. In honor of that, this #audiodramasunday, we're going west (but weird). This round-up went up on other platforms last week, but I totally forgot bluesky lol–

A digitally illustrated poster by Rosenkranz, in a painterly style. Odessa, in orange coveralls and a green bandanna, crouches with Mack, her blue heeler dog, in front of her yellow van on a sandy lot. He's barking at a figure off-screen, whose shadow looms menacingly over the two of them. Next to Odessa is her souped-up radio guitar.

It's time you met Calypso. Episode 4 now available on all podcast platforms. Poster by the marvelous @rosenkranz.bsky.social!