![[audio]](/images/mediatype_audio.gif) | "An Arabian Nightmare" - Fitz-James O'Brien
An Arab merchant tells the tale of the winter he spent in Russia. Gently humorous.
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction
Downloads: 1,237
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| "A Terrible Night" - Fitz-James O'Brien
Two young men go hunting in the forests of upstate New York, and find themselves trapped in a nightmarish situation.
Downloads: 767 |
| "Ballad of the Shamrock" - Fitz-James O'Brien
From the March 1861 issue of Harper's New Monthly Magazine, a poem about an Irish immigrant mother and her son.
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry; Holidays; St. Patrick's Day; Immigration
Downloads: 533
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| "Captain Alicant" - Fitz-James O'Brien
An lonely old man with a vanished, disgraced son. A sweet Skye terrier who's always in disgrace. What's brewing in a town called Hopskotch?
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction
Downloads: 476
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| "The Diamond Lens" - Fitz-James O'Brien
Take one antebellum New York college student with a crazy dream of the perfect microscope. Add one spiritualist (modeled after the Fox sisters), one diamond, and one drop of water. Stir.
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction; Science Fiction
Downloads: 901
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| "The Enchanted Titan" - Fitz-James O'Brien
Poem about a Titan trapped by magic, and his star-crossed romance.
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry; Fantasy
Downloads: 856
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| "The Golden Ingot" - Fitz-James O'Brien
A young doctor is called out one night by a mysterious woman.
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction
Downloads: 1,574
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| "How I Lost My Gravity" - Fitz-James O'Brien
A (purposefully humorous) tale of pre-Civil War speculative physics.
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction; Science Fiction
Downloads: 1,000
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| "Jubal the Ringer" - Fitz-James O'Brien
This 1858 short story blends stalker love with magic and creates the ultimate bad wedding. Hurry to St. Phantasmos Church and meet Jubal the Ringer!
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction
Downloads: 1,657
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| "Three of a Trade" - Fitz-James O'Brien
Two street children wait for Kriss Kringle on a Victorian New Year's night.
Keywords: Holidays - New Year's; Christmas
Downloads: 460 |
| "The Man Without a Shadow: A New Version" - Fitz-James O'Brien
Humorous 1852 account of an odd creature one might still meet in New York.
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction
Downloads: 722
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| "Minot's Ledge" - Fitz-James O'Brien
A poem about a lighthouse keeper, set at Minot's Ledge, a dangerous group of rocks just outside Boston Harbor.
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry; Sea
Downloads: 329
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| "Our Christmas Tree" - Fitz-James O'Brien
A poor man contrasts his Christmas tree to that of a millionaire.
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry; Christmas
Downloads: 2,156
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| "The Pot of Tulips" - Fitz-James O'Brien
A lost treasure, a lady in distress, and a message from beyond the grave! This 1855 story is an earlier appearance of Harry Escott from "What Was It? -- A Mystery", and features the same entertaining mixture of science fiction, fantasy, and horror.
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction
Downloads: 772
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| "The Prisoner of War" - Fitz-James O'Brien
A Union soldier thinks of his friend, imprisoned down South. Written in December 1861. O'Brien was a Union officer. He died from his wounds in April 1862.
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry; War
Downloads: 390
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| "A Soldier's Letter" - Fitz-James O'Brien
Printed in March 1862 (about the time it would take to get such a letter written in January), this poem was one of the last things ever written by Fitz-James O'Brien. It's full of Victorian sentiment, but it also uses that in a rather clever way. It also tells a pretty good story. O'Brien was wounded in a skirmish on February 26, 1862, and died of complications from his wounds on April 6, 1862.
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry; war
Downloads: 663
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| "The Tenement House" - Fitz-James O'Brien
A bitter poem about a firetrap tenement house and its rich landlord.
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry; fires
Downloads: 424
Average rating:  (1 review) |
| "The Sewing Bird" - Fitz-James O'Brien
O'Brien knew London and Paris, where shopgirls were common. But in New York, the stores only employed salesmen, even in departments selling exclusively to women. The work was seen as too hard for women -- but slaving as seamstresses was not. O'Brien protests this injustice in a witty fantasy about a labor-saving fabric clamp (the eponymous Sewing Bird) come alive.
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry
Downloads: 463
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| "The Skaters" - Fitz-James O'Brien
"Like clouds they scud across the ice, His hands hold hers as in a vise...." From Harper's New Monthly Magazine, vol. 22, issue 129 (February 1861).
Keywords: Audiobook - Poetry; Winter
Downloads: 339
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| "The Dragon-Fang Possessed by the Conjuror Piou-Lu" - Fitz-James O'Brien
This 1856 short story is a rather nifty little dark fantasy which, though set in China, reminds me a bit of Irish nationalism and Irish legends as well. Beware of the dragon fang!
Downloads: 1,735 |
| "What Was It? -- A Mystery" - Fitz-James O'Brien
This 1859 short story probably influenced both Maupassant's "The Horla" and Bierce's "The Damned Thing". It's pretty spooky all by itself, though. The second phase of the story is a science fiction take -- a very odd one. See what you think.
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction; Horror
Downloads: 1,614
Average rating: (1 review) |
| "The Wondersmith", Part 1 - Fitz-James O'Brien
This 1859 Christmas horror story puts traditional figures of European legend and lore ('gypsies', hunchbacks, stolen children, wizards, and demons) into a tough New York City neighborhood. The result is a scary urban Victorian fantasy. Better hope Santa doesn't bring you presents from the Wondersmith.
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction; Christmas
Downloads: 967
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| "The Wondersmith", Part 2 - Fitz-James O'Brien
This creepy tale of an antebellum Christmas (and New Year's) in New York continues, with poison, fire, demons, mynah birds, and some action figures you'd rather not find in your stocking. Beware the Wondersmith!
Keywords: Audiobook - Fiction; Christmas; Horror; Holidays - New Year's Eve
Downloads: 9,033
Average rating: (0 review) |
