''StarShipSofa'' is a

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

audio magazine and

podcast A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. For example, an episodic series of digital audio or video files that a user can download to a personal device to listen to at a time of their choosing ...

from the United Kingdom hosted by Tony C. Smith. It publishes audio short fiction, commentary, essays, and anthologies of transcribed material. StarShipSofa was the first ever podcast to be both nominated for and to win a

Hugo Award for Best Fanzine The Hugo Award for Best Fanzine is given each year for non professionally edited magazines, or "fanzines", related to science fiction or fantasy which has published four or more issues with at least one issue appearing in the previous calendar y ...

. It was also nominated for Best Fan Podcast in the 2007

Parsec Awards The Parsec Awards were a set of annual awards created to recognize excellence in science fiction podcasts and podcast novels. The awards were created by Mur Lafferty, Tracy Hickman and Michael R. Mennenga and awarded by FarPoint Media. They were f ...

. StarShipSofa is free directly from the web site and is available for subscription and automatic download through

iTunes iTunes () is a software program that acts as a media player, media library, mobile device management utility, and the client app for the iTunes Store. Developed by Apple Inc., it is used to purchase, play, download, and organize digital mul ...

History

The audio magazine is hosted weekly by Tony C. Smith in the UK. It was first broadcast in July 2006 by Smith and Ciaran O'Carrol with an episode focusing on

Alfred Bester Alfred Bester (December 18, 1913 – September 30, 1987) was an American science fiction author, TV and radio scriptwriter, magazine editor and scripter for comic strips and comic books. He is best remembered for his science fiction, inclu ...

. The next 70 episodes ran weekly and featured commentary on such subjects as

Harlan Ellison Harlan Jay Ellison (May 27, 1934 – June 28, 2018) was an American writer, known for his prolific and influential work in New Wave speculative fiction and for his outspoken, combative personality. Robert Bloch, the author of '' Psycho'' ...

Samuel R. Delany Samuel R. "Chip" Delany (, ) (born April 1, 1942), is an American author and literary critic. His work includes fiction (especially science fiction), memoir, criticism, and essays (on science fiction, literature, sexuality, and society). His ...

Charles Stross Charles David George "Charlie" Stross (born 18 October 1964) is a British writer of science fiction and fantasy. Stross specialises in hard science fiction and space opera. Between 1994 and 2004, he was also an active writer for the magazine '' ...

, and other well-known science fiction authors. StarShipSofa also covered subjects such as films and specific themes such as

religion in science fiction Science fiction will sometimes address the topic of religion. Often religious themes are used to convey a broader message, but others confront the subject head-on—contemplating, for example, how attitudes towards faith might shift in the wak ...

. In 2010 many of these original podcasts were transcribed and published in book form as ''StarShipSofa: The Captain's Logs''. At the end of this initial run O'Carrol left StarShipSofa and the podcast began to transition to an audio fiction magazine, with narrated fiction mixed with commentary and essays. Now calling itself ''StarShipSofa - The Audio Science Fiction Magazine,'' in October 2007 StarShipSofa began podcasting

Hugo Award The Hugo Award is an annual literary award for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year, given at the World Science Fiction Convention and chosen by its members. The Hugo is widely considered the premier a ...

winning audio stories for free. In March 2008, for the first time ever, all five of the short stories that had been shortlisted for the

BSFA The British Science Fiction Association Limited is an organisation founded in 1958 by a group of British academics, science fiction fans, authors, publishers and booksellers, in order to promote the writing, criticism, and study of science fiction ...

Award for Best Short Story were made available on the StarShipSofa in audio narrated format. Adam Pracht was the assistant editor up until September 2014, when he left to pursue other activities. He was replaced with Jeremy Szal, which was announced i
Episode 361
Szal is the fiction editor and producer, Gary Dowell the co-producer and Ralph M. Ambrose the assistant editor.

Hugo Award

On 4 April 2010, StarShipSofa became the first podcast to ever be included on the

s ballot. It was nominated in the category Best Fanzine. On 5 September 2010 StarShipSofa went on to become the first podcast to win a Hugo Award. The award was presented at Aussiecon 4 in Melbourne, Australia. As a result, the 2011 business meeting of the

Worldcon Worldcon, or more formally the World Science Fiction Convention, the annual convention of the World Science Fiction Society (WSFS), is a science fiction convention. It has been held each year since 1939 (except for the years 1942 to 1945, during ...

voted to create a new category for "Best Fancast", so that podcasts would no longer be deemed a

fanzine A fanzine (blend word, blend of ''fan (person), fan'' and ''magazine'' or ''-zine'') is a non-professional and non-official publication produced by fan (person), enthusiasts of a particular cultural phenomenon (such as a literary or musical genre) ...

or be eligible for a fanzine Hugo.

District of Wonders

In January 2012 StarShipSofa launched its first spin-off, a horror podcast hosted by Lawrence Santoro called Tales to Terrify. This was followed in July 2012 by two more spin-offs - the crime-themed Crime City Central hosted by Jack Calverley, and the pulp-themed Protecting Project Pulp hosted by Dave Robison. The four are now united under the District of Wonders banner. However, The District of Wonders soon abandoned both Crime City Central and Protecting Project Pulp. Instead in April 2014 they started fantasy podcast Far Fetched Fables, leaving the District of Wonders with three podcasts, respectively.

''StarShipSofa Stories''

To celebrate the 100th episode of StarShipSofa's audio fiction magazine, an anthology of stories titled ''StarShipSofa Stories, Volume 1'' was published, featuring fiction by

Michael Moorcock Michael John Moorcock (born 18 December 1939) is an English writer, best-known for science fiction and fantasy, who has published a number of well-received literary novels as well as comic thrillers, graphic novels and non-fiction. He has work ...

Gene Wolfe Gene Rodman Wolfe (May 7, 1931 – April 14, 2019) was an American science fiction and fantasy writer. He was noted for his dense, allusive prose as well as the strong influence of his Catholic faith. He was a prolific short story writer and nove ...

, Peter Watts,

Elizabeth Bear Sarah Bear Elizabeth Wishnevsky (born September 22, 1971) is an American author who works primarily in speculative fiction genres, writing under the name Elizabeth Bear. She won the 2005 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, the 2008 Hugo A ...

, and others. The second volume of stories was published in October 2010 and contains fiction by

Neil Gaiman Neil Richard MacKinnon GaimanBorn as Neil Richard Gaiman, with "MacKinnon" added on the occasion of his marriage to Amanda Palmer. ; ( Neil Richard Gaiman; born 10 November 1960) is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, gr ...

China Miéville China Tom Miéville ( ; born 6 September 1972) is a British speculative fiction writer and literary critic. He often describes his work as ''weird fiction'' and is allied to the loosely associated movement of writers called '' New Weird''. Mi ...

Mary Rosenblum Mary Rosenblum (born Mary Freeman; June 27, 1952 – March 11, 2018) was an American science fiction and mystery author. Biography Rosenblum was born in Levittown, New York and grew up in Allison Park, Pennsylvania. She earned a biology de ...

, and others. Two subsequent volumes, and a collection of stories from the Tales To Terrify horror show were later published.

Special episodes

In June 2015 fo
Episode 389
StarShipSofa produced and adapted in audio the story "The Men of Greywater Station" co-written by

George R. R. Martin George Raymond Richard Martin (born George Raymond Martin; September 20, 1948), also known as GRRM, is an American novelist, screenwriter, television producer and short story writer. He is the author of the series of epic fantasy novels ''A Song ...

and

Howard Waldrop Howard Waldrop (born September 15, 1946) is a science fiction author who works primarily in short fiction. He received the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 2021. Personal life Though born in Houston, Mississippi, Waldrop has spent ...

. The story was published in the anthology '' Songs of Stars and Shadows'', published in 1977 and now out of print with no electronic copies existing and the story never previously appearing online. The story was narrated by English actor Nicholas Camm. StarShipSofa produced a YouTube video discussing the story to promote the episode. In an interview with Boing Boing, assistant editor Jeremy Szal revealed that the author offered to post a copy of the anthology by snail mail. Shortly after the episode's launch the author himself publicly approved of the story's production and narration on his blog. YouTuber prestonjacobs created an analysis of the podcast's adaptation and the story, highlighting the similarities to the ''

A Song of Ice and Fire ''A Song of Ice and Fire'' is a series of epic fantasy novels by the American novelist and screenwriter George R. R. Martin. He began the first volume of the series, ''A Game of Thrones'', in 1991, and it was published in 1996. Martin, who init ...

'' canon and theorizing that all stories written by George R. R. Martin are contained in one singular universe.

Notable Authors

Notable authors published in the magazine include: * Harry Harrison *

Kevin J. Anderson Kevin James Anderson (born March 27, 1962) is an American science fiction author. He has written spin-off novels for ''Star Wars'', ''StarCraft'', ''Titan A.E.'' and ''The X-Files literature#Novels, The X-Files'', and with Brian Herbert is the ...

Neal Asher Neal Asher (born 4 February 1961) is an English science fiction writer. He lives near Chelmsford. Career Both of Asher's parents are educators and science fiction fans. Although he began writing speculative fiction in secondary school, he did ...

Paolo Bacigalupi Paolo Tadini Bacigalupi (born August 6, 1972) is an American science fiction and fantasy writer. He has won the Hugo, Nebula, John W. Campbell, Compton Crook, Theodore Sturgeon, and Michael L. Printz awards, and has been nominated for the Na ...

Kage Baker Kage Baker (June 10, 1952 – January 31, 2010Obituary: Kage Baker
" SF Site, January ...

Terry Bisson Terry is a unisex given name, derived from French Thierry and Theodoric. It can also be used as a diminutive nickname for the names Teresa or Theresa (feminine) or Terence or Terrier (masculine). People Male * Terry Albritton (1955–2005), Am ...

Aliette de Bodard Aliette de Bodard is a French-American speculative fiction writer. Writing de Bodard published her first short story in 2006. In 2007, she was a winner of Writers of the Future, and in 2009 was nominated for the John W. Campbell Award for Best ...

David Brin Glen David Brin (born October 6, 1950) is an American scientist and author of science fiction. He has won the Hugo,Ben Bova Benjamin William Bova (November 8, 1932November 29, 2020) was an American writer and editor. During a writing career of 60 years, he was the author of more than 120 works of science fact and fiction, an editor of '' Analog Science Fiction and F ...

Pat Cadigan Patricia Oren Kearney Cadigan (born September 10, 1953) is a British-American science fiction author, whose work is most often identified with the cyberpunk movement. Her novels and short stories often explore the relationship between the human ...

Ted Chiang Ted Chiang (born 1967) is an American science fiction writer. His work has won four Nebula awards, four Hugo awards, the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and six Locus awards. His short story "Story of Your Life" was the basis of the ...

Cory Doctorow Cory Efram Doctorow (; born July 17, 1971) is a Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author who served as co-editor of the blog ''Boing Boing''. He is an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of ...

* Stephen Donaldson *

Paul Di Filippo Paul Di Filippo (born October 29, 1954) is an American science fiction writer. He is a regular reviewer for print magazines ''Asimov's Science Fiction'', ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'', ''Science Fiction Eye'', ''The New York Re ...

Jeffrey Ford Jeffrey Ford (born November 8, 1955) is an American writer in the fantastic genre tradition, although his works have spanned genres including fantasy, science fiction and mystery. His work is characterized by a sweeping imaginative power, humo ...

Eugie Foster Eugie Foster (December 30, 1971 – September 27, 2014) was an American short story writer, columnist, and editor. Her stories were published in a number of magazines and book anthologies, including '' Fantasy Magazine'', ''Realms of Fantasy'', ' ...

Karen Joy Fowler Karen Joy Fowler is an American author of science fiction, fantasy, and literary fiction. Her work often centers on the nineteenth century, the lives of women, and alienation. She is best known as the author of the best-selling novel ''The Jan ...

William Gibson William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as ''cyberpunk''. Beginning his writing career in the late 1970s, his ...

Joe Haldeman Joe William Haldeman (born June 9, 1943) is an American science fiction author. He is best known for his novel ''The Forever War'' (1974). That novel and other works, including ''The Hemingway Hoax'' (1991) and '' Forever Peace'' (1997), have wo ...

* Peter F. Hamilton *

Robin Hobb Margaret Astrid Lindholm Ogden (born March 5, 1952), known by her pen names Robin Hobb and Megan Lindholm, is an American writer of speculative fiction. As Hobb, she is best known for her fantasy novels set in the ''Realm of the Elderlings'', w ...

Hugh Howey Hugh C. Howey (born 1975) is an American writer, known best for the science fiction series ''Silo'', part of which he published independently through Amazon.com's Kindle Direct Publishing system. Howey was raised in Monroe, North Carolina and be ...

* Kij Johnson *

James Patrick Kelly James Patrick Kelly (born April 11, 1951 in Mineola, New York) is an American science fiction author who has won both the Hugo Award and the Nebula Award. Biography Kelly made his first fiction sale in 1975. He graduated magna cum laude from ...

Caitlín R. Kiernan Caitlín Rebekah Kiernan (born 26 May 1964) is an Irish-born American published paleontologist and author of science fiction and dark fantasy works, including 10 novels, series of comic books, and more than 250 published short stories, novella ...

Ted Kosmatka Ted Kosmatka is an American writer. His short stories have been reprinted in ten Year's Best anthologies, and he is co-winner of the 2010 Asimov's Readers' Choice Award. His 2012 novel The Games was nominated for a Locus Award for Best First Novel ...

Nancy Kress Nancy Anne Kress (born January 20, 1948) is an American science fiction writer. She began writing in 1976 but has achieved her greatest notice since the publication of her Hugo- and Nebula-winning 1991 novella ''Beggars in Spain'', which became a ...

Jay Lake Joseph Edward "Jay" Lake, Jr. (June 6, 1964 – June 1, 2014) was an American science fiction and fantasy writer. In 2003 he was a quarterly first-place winner in the Writers of the Future contest. In 2004 he won the John W. Campbell Award for Be ...

* Mark Lawrence * David D. Levine *

Karen Lord Karen Lord (born 22 May 1968) is a Barbadian writer of speculative fiction. Her first novel, ''Redemption in Indigo'' (2010), retells the story "Ansige Karamba the Glutton" from Senegalese folklore and her second novel, ''The Best of All Possib ...

Jack McDevitt Jack McDevitt (born April 14, 1935) is an American science fiction author whose novels frequently deal with attempts to make contact with alien races, and with archaeology or xenoarchaeology. Most of his books follow either superluminal pilot Pri ...

* Ian McDonald *

Will McIntosh Will McIntosh (William D. McIntosh, born 31 January 1962 in New York City) is a science fiction and young adult author, a Hugo-Award-winner, and a winner or finalist for many other awards. Along with ten novels, including Defenders, Love Minus ...

Ken MacLeod Kenneth Macrae MacLeod (born 2 August 1954) is a Scottish science fiction writer. His novels ''The Sky Road'' and ''The Night Sessions'' won the BSFA Award. MacLeod's novels have been nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke, Hugo, Nebula, Locus, an ...

Cat Rambo Cat Rambo (born November 14, 1963) is an American science fiction and fantasy writer and editor. Rambo uses they/them pronouns. Rambo was co-editor of '' Fantasy Magazine'' from 2007 to 2011, which earned them a 2012 World Fantasy Special Awar ...

Robert Reed Robert Reed (born John Robert Rietz Jr.; October 19, 1932 – May 12, 1992) was an American actor. He played Kenneth Preston on the legal drama '' The Defenders'' from 1961 to 1965 alongside E. G. Marshall, and is best known for his role as the ...

Mike Resnick Michael Diamond Resnick (; March 5, 1942 – January 9, 2020) was an American science fiction writer and editor. He won five Hugo awards and a Nebula award, and was the guest of honor at Chicon 7. He was the executive editor of the defunct ...

Alastair Reynolds Alastair Preston Reynolds (born 13 March 1966) is a Welsh science fiction author. He specialises in hard science fiction and space opera. He spent his early years in Cornwall, moved back to Wales before going to Newcastle University, where he s ...

Kim Stanley Robinson Kim Stanley Robinson (born March 23, 1952) is an American writer of science fiction. He has published twenty-two novels and numerous short stories and is best known for his ''Mars'' trilogy. His work has been translated into 24 languages. Many ...

Spider Robinson Spider Robinson (born November 24, 1948) is an American-born Canadian list of science fiction authors, science fiction author. He has won a number of awards for his hard science fiction and humorous stories, including the Hugo Award 1977 and 198 ...

R. Scott Bakker Richard Scott Bakker (born February 2, 1967, Simcoe, Ontario) is a Canadian fantasy author and frequent lecturer in the South Western Ontario university community. He grew up on a tobacco farm in the Simcoe area. In 1986 he attended the Univers ...

Jason Sanford Jason Sanford is an American science fiction author best known for his short story writing. His fiction has been published in '' Interzone, Asimov's Science Fiction, Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Year's Best SF 14'', ''InterGalactic Medicine Sh ...

John Scalzi John Michael Scalzi II (born May 10, 1969) is an American science fiction author and former president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. He is best known for his ''Old Man's War'' series, three novels of which have been nom ...

Norman Spinrad Norman Richard Spinrad (born September 15, 1940) is an American science fiction author, essayist, and critic. His fiction has won the Prix Apollo and been nominated for numerous awards, including the Hugo Award and multiple Nebula Awards. Pe ...

Allen Steele Allen Mulherin Steele, Jr. (born January 19, 1958) is an American journalist and science fiction author. Background Steele was born in Nashville, Tennessee on January 19, 1958. He was introduced to science fiction fandom attending meetings o ...

Bruce Sterling Michael Bruce Sterling (born April 14, 1954) is an American science fiction author known for his novels and short fiction and editorship of the ''Mirrorshades'' anthology. In particular, he is linked to the cyberpunk subgenre. Sterling's first ...

* Eric James Stone *

Lavie Tidhar Lavie Tidhar ( he, לביא תדהר; born 16 November 1976) is an Israeli-born writer, working across multiple genres. He has lived in the United Kingdom and South Africa for long periods of time, as well as Laos and Vanuatu. As of 2013, Tid ...

Harry Turtledove Harry Norman Turtledove (born June 14, 1949) is an American author who is best known for his work in the genres of alternate history, historical fiction, fantasy, science fiction, and mystery fiction. He is a student of history and completed ...

Lisa Tuttle Lisa Gracia Tuttle (born September 16, 1952) is an American-born science fiction, fantasy, and horror author. She has published more than a dozen novels, seven short story collections, and several non-fiction titles, including a reference book o ...

Jack Vance John Holbrook Vance (August 28, 1916 – May 26, 2013) was an American mystery, fantasy, and science fiction writer. Though most of his work has been published under the name Jack Vance, he also wrote several mystery novels under pen names. ...

Carrie Vaughn Carrie Vaughn (born January 28, 1973) is an American writer, the author of the urban fantasy '' Kitty Norville'' series. She has published more than 60 short stories in science fiction and fantasy magazines as well as short story anthologies and ...

* Peter Watts *

Tad Williams Robert Paul "Tad" Williams (born March 14, 1957) is an American fantasy and science fiction writer. He is the author of the multivolume ''Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn'' series, ''Otherland'' series, and ''Shadowmarch'' series as well as the standal ...

References

External links

StarShipSofa website

Tales to Terrify website

District of Wonders website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Starshipsofa Audio podcasts Science fiction podcasts Science fiction websites 2006 podcast debuts 2006 establishments in the United Kingdom Hugo Award-winning works