harbingers
Added 2024-09-19 21:00:07 +0000 UTCAn educator's watch of the winter skies sets him in anxious motion to shelter the innocent.
Music: “Cicada Killer” by idokay, “The Heir” by Emmanuel Jacob, “Meeting the Goddess” by Kyle Preston. All rights reserved. Interview with Ila Patton, Galax, Virginia, from the Blue Ridge Parkway Folklife Project collection (AFC 1982/009), American Folklife Center, Library of Congress.
Released everywhere else next week.
Art by S. Patrick Brown, https://www.instagram.com/scalawagarts/
P.S. I've been informed that over on the Knifepoint Horror Discord server, a writing contest will soon kick off. All are urged to enter by writing their own Knifepoint-ish story and submitting it for possible publication in a digital anthology. I'll do a narration of the winning tale (though I'll be leaving the judging to others, so sending me pie will get you nowhere, and said pie will merely be categorized in the warehouse as Miscellaneous Pie, though of course, it will still be eaten.) For more details on the contest, join the Discord group! https://discord.gg/mrVSYG5Uhd
P.P.S. A burning question: What was the scariest thing ever revealed when a character in a horror movie moved carefully and fearfully into their bathroom and then jerked the shower curtain back all at once, terrified something might be hiding behind it? It seems to me like there's NEVER anything there and I may as well just go get some Pringles when that scene begins. Prove me wrong, those who know of YouTube clips to the contrary!
Comments
Thank you so much! This story really resonated with me. It's a while ago now, but I'm pretty sure I immediately listened to it twice in a row, which is unusual for me. I'm an amateur fiction writer, so I think I might notice writing strategies or decisions more than most listeners, who just enjoy. Of course I listen for fun, like everyone else. But I try to comment not only about what captivates me, but why. This can be embarrassing, because sometimes it seems like I'm critiquing Soren's work for his own edification, which I'm not! I just occasionally try to mention what I hope other listeners might not have considered. Usually I'm just a regular fan girl. :-) Anyhow I hope you're not disappointed by my comments on other stories. You'll find only one common characteristic in all my comments (and replies to my comments). They're too long! I do edit my own work, but edit a comment? Nah. I leave you all to slog through them, or more likely give up... p.s. Full disclosure. I did edit this comment ;-)
Jill E Merrill
2025-01-14 18:00:11 +0000 UTCGreat thoughts here Jill. It’s good to read the words of someone who understands the nuances of Soren’s storytelling to an incredibly analytical level as you! I really feel that Soren appreciates your comments and thoughts. Am now going to check out some of my fave KPH stories to see what your thoughts about them are. And: I hope you are well in life, and have a great day Jill! -Nate
Nathan Michael Dufresne
2025-01-13 19:30:51 +0000 UTCLove this story. So good 🫨
Violence Zack
2024-10-11 14:57:57 +0000 UTCIf I want heartbreak, I listen to "bots." It's my favorite story to activate my gratitude sensory. I must say this is added to the list as well. I curtsy.
Hilde Marciniak
2024-10-06 19:12:02 +0000 UTCBoring analysis of candy corn ingredients. Regular candy corn contains gelatin, which is a meat byproduct and thus not vegetarian. Vegetarians do not eat meat or meat by products. Vegans do not eat products from live animals, such as milk. Thus, in threatening vegan candy corn, Soren was targeting the least average candy corn, and presumably the worst tasting to eaters of carnivorous candy corn. However I strongly suspect Soren was making up the whole thing. All candy corn tastes horrible, so why bother.
Jill E Merrill
2024-10-03 18:21:12 +0000 UTCIt was great. I have an old Folkways record of Jean Ritchie talking about her life. It reminded me of that, even though Ritchie was quite a bit younger than this lady at the time of recording.
Christopher Helton
2024-10-03 16:53:53 +0000 UTCMmmmm, sweet sweet Neccos….
Soren Narnia
2024-10-02 10:42:11 +0000 UTCis vegan candy corn the standard? because up until now i have always hated candy corn and anyone associated with it. but.,...is there... Are you saying there is a rare meaty candy corn version out there? could it be? i bet sorren likes that civil war quarry candy known as necco wafers. probably loves them, that..druid!
colin frasier
2024-10-02 03:32:27 +0000 UTCThank god I’m not a curious person!
Soren Narnia
2024-09-26 16:15:45 +0000 UTCOk, I just watched a horror movie with quite possibly the worst of all shower scenes: Jack Frost. Dirty shower snow man monster. That’s all I’ll say. YouTube search at your own peril for those curious.
Mike M.
2024-09-26 15:07:43 +0000 UTCOhhh! That’s a good one
Lori K.
2024-09-26 14:43:13 +0000 UTCI think there’s not one, but TWO scenes of people behind the shower curtain in the first series of American Horror Story…
David
2024-09-25 12:35:47 +0000 UTCProbably best for us that you haven't...
Rebecca R
2024-09-24 03:21:53 +0000 UTCSwarming rats is something I’ve never seen, thank god…
Soren Narnia
2024-09-23 21:00:03 +0000 UTCThe birds reminded me of a semi-repressed childhood memory; coming accross a group of swarming rats on a "charachter building" "gentle stroll" some mank november in the arse-end of nowhere . The footpath took us through some farm out buildings (where I guess they had found a food source) . We backed away without incident. The sight of them all moving like one entity is now swirling round my brain again. Otherwise thanks for another great story
Rebecca R
2024-09-23 19:18:07 +0000 UTCHi Jill! I was just making a wee joke… riffing on the barely-there connection of two guys working with kids in a classroom setting, wocka wocka. But now that Soren has confirmed it as canon I can’t figure out where the joke ends or begins!
Connor Salanger
2024-09-23 02:49:06 +0000 UTCI'm asking Connor, not Soren!
Jill E Merrill
2024-09-23 02:32:48 +0000 UTCHuh? How did you figure out the connection? I'm baffled.
Jill E Merrill
2024-09-23 02:31:05 +0000 UTCThe chills I got from, “Anders, my hand won’t come free.”
Molly S
2024-09-22 23:29:21 +0000 UTCIf you hadn't had Anders admit right away to making up the phenomenon of a "helmsman's front," I'm sure I would have googled it, exactly as I googled "Circle of Frontier Guardians" after listening to "gifters," only to find no mention of its existence. But that's what I love about your stories. They are complete worlds unto themselves. Thanks for another beautiful haunting.
Jeanette DeMain
2024-09-22 21:20:06 +0000 UTC🙏 Screw your courage to the sticking-place, And we'll not fail.
buddhapugz
2024-09-21 23:38:50 +0000 UTCWow Soren! This one is so sad and haunting yet there’s a tranquility to it as well. The imagery of the birds and the dark triangle over the schoolhouse is so sharp. Beautiful story as always.
Neha Lal
2024-09-21 17:06:59 +0000 UTCWell here on Patreon you ARE the zeitgeist!
Lori K.
2024-09-21 15:28:31 +0000 UTCHa, I lost the Zeitgeist sometime around 2003 and never found it again!
Soren Narnia
2024-09-21 15:13:08 +0000 UTCJill, I think Soren is trying to tell you to get down with the zeitgeist in his own subtle way
Lori K.
2024-09-21 15:05:01 +0000 UTCCAVEMAN 1: Dude, you gotta check out the new thing, it’s called fire CAVEMAN 2: Look, I’m just not into following the zeitgeist, okay?
Soren Narnia
2024-09-21 14:15:34 +0000 UTCThat’s okay, Jill…by their very nature, zeitgeists come and go ;)
Lori K.
2024-09-21 14:11:33 +0000 UTCHere's the full recording; her witch stories are at the very beginning: https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1982009_afs21526/
Soren Narnia
2024-09-21 10:45:06 +0000 UTCThe voice in the beginning of the episode had the dialect and even sounded slightly like my late great grandmother. It brought me to tears and I never expected to be so emotional at one of your episodes. You are an exceptional story teller.
Kayley Grissom
2024-09-21 06:10:19 +0000 UTCLori K: I forgot to put your name on my reply so that Patreon will tell you about it. Maybe. I'm too old to understand the zeitgeist of social media posting.
Jill E Merrill
2024-09-21 04:39:06 +0000 UTCThank you! I have a fangirl fangirl! ;-)
Jill E Merrill
2024-09-21 04:32:09 +0000 UTCWow. The lengths you go to for KPH! Can you post the entire recording, including the witch story?
Jill E Merrill
2024-09-21 04:30:11 +0000 UTCNailed it!
Soren Narnia
2024-09-21 01:09:35 +0000 UTCWas not expecting a huge KPH lore reveal in this story! So Anders Mather is the one who gives out vegan candy corn and tells stories about blueberries… BIG
Connor Salanger
2024-09-21 01:08:39 +0000 UTCSpeaking of which, I think Macbeth may be the creepiest, spookiest play of all time. I’d like to do a straight horror adaptation of it sometime!
Soren Narnia
2024-09-21 00:12:24 +0000 UTCJill, your analyses are always compelling and interesting. Oh, to have such a fan.
Lori K.
2024-09-20 23:07:18 +0000 UTCI’d love to hear that story!
Lori K.
2024-09-20 23:06:18 +0000 UTCThat voice in the beginning is a fragment from a real interview with a woman remembering growing up in rural America, taken from the Library of Congress history archives. She goes on in that recording to tell a witch story!
Soren Narnia
2024-09-20 18:37:10 +0000 UTCStorks, not stories.
Jill E Merrill
2024-09-20 18:20:57 +0000 UTCWhat amazing little parts make this story so ineffable and beautiful. I love the repetition of three: three sides to the triangle in the sky, three sides to the wooden top to the wagon keeping the three dead children from falling out, the narrator wondering about the personal meaning of three, and the three never conceived children. And again, the three sides of the triangle in the sky. I also love the birds. The doves, in their strange yet unthreatening circles, terrified me far more than Hitchcock's birds. The stories were just pleasantly weird. A non-omen of children not to come. I really loved this story. For it's subtlety, it's sadness, it's hopelessness. Quietly beautiful, so well thought out that every phrase seemed to blend in. Except maybe the woman who began the story, who I can't claim to understand but somehow played the town against the principal perfectly. What an addition to the Narnia annals.
Jill E Merrill
2024-09-20 18:18:48 +0000 UTCSo beautiful and haunting. 💜
Lisa
2024-09-20 15:56:39 +0000 UTCOnce again masterfully weaving the terrifying and tragic! This ghostly, wintery world is a sad and lonely one, and self-made. Especially for the ghosts! Beautiful and poignant. Good luck to the contest writers!
Mike M.
2024-09-20 15:45:59 +0000 UTCIt may be the only one that truly does!
Soren Narnia
2024-09-20 14:03:05 +0000 UTCYep, I believe I know exactly the one you have in mind…
Soren Narnia
2024-09-20 11:02:56 +0000 UTCThis year, instead of fall, it’s this terrific dread-inducing KPH tale that is the harbinger of winter! Thanks, Soren. As for the shower scene I propose a role reversal, with the terror creeping in from outside the curtain. And, it’s probably a moment that paved the way for every shower scene that followed it!
Lori K.
2024-09-20 11:01:32 +0000 UTCSuitably creepy as we head into the fall. I’ll have to re-listen to take it all in.
Ryan Fahey
2024-09-20 04:13:59 +0000 UTCHmm, does the tub scene in The Shining count?
Frequentj
2024-09-20 02:26:24 +0000 UTC🙏"When shall we three meet again? In thunder, lightning, or in rain? When the hurly-burly's done, When the battle's lost and won."
buddhapugz
2024-09-19 23:39:09 +0000 UTCSo good
Laura Forgeson
2024-09-19 22:31:23 +0000 UTCLights off, candle lit, door closed…here we go
Lori K.
2024-09-19 22:18:07 +0000 UTCAh yes, yes….
Soren Narnia
2024-09-19 22:01:56 +0000 UTCThis is the right answer.
Henry Linehan
2024-09-19 21:59:11 +0000 UTChttps://youtu.be/yz50BJZRDo8?feature=shared
Nichole Hamilton
2024-09-19 21:14:17 +0000 UTCSchwing
Dougal
2024-09-19 21:12:08 +0000 UTCYes!! 🖤🖤
Amy Fernandez
2024-09-19 21:07:10 +0000 UTCThe best notification to get
Charles Pickering
2024-09-19 21:03:09 +0000 UTC
