Listen to our audio presentation of “Jackalope Wives” by Ursula Vernon. Narrated by Windy Bowlsby.
Ursula Vernon
Ursula Vernon is the winner of the Hugo, Nebula, and Mythopoeic Awards. She has written a number of children’s books, short stories, and comics, and writes for adults under the name T. Kingfisher. She likes fairy-tale retellings, gardening, and has strong opinions about heirloom beans. You can find more of her work at redwombatstudio.com.
PODCAST EP. 19: POCOSIN
Listen to our audio presentation of “Pocosin” by Ursula Vernon. Narrated by Lisa Shininger.
The Dark Birds
My mother had daughters year after year, and one by one, my father devoured us.
Razorback
There was a witch who lived up in the mountains, and I never heard but that she was a good one.
The Tomato Thief
Grandma Harken lived on the edge of town, in a house with its back to the desert.
Pocosin
This is the place of the carnivores, the pool ringed with sundews and the fat funnels of the pitcher plants.
This is the place where the ground never dries out and the loblolly pines grow stunted, where the soil is poor and the plants turn to other means of feeding themselves.
Jackalope Wives
he moon came up and the sun went down. The moonbeams went shattering down to the ground and the jackalope wives took off their skins and danced.
They danced like young deer pawing the ground, they danced like devils let out of hell for the evening. They swung their hips and pranced and drank their fill of cactus–fruit wine.