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PODCAST

Stories

Francis Rosenfeld

A weekly podcast of short stories and book readings by Francis Rosenfeld. Discover literary fiction, surreal tales, and introspective narratives exploring reality, identity, and human connection—perfect for listening on the go.

fiction

All Episodes

10:37

A Year and A Day - February - The Feast of the...

Stories ·

2025/12/05

Towards the end of February winter started easing its grasp on the mountain springs, allowing them to come back to life, almost suddenly, in bubbling expressions of movement and sound. The tiny brooks searched for each other down the mountain, forming tiny pools and waterfalls, and when they could, they joined their forces in larger streams, with the playfulness of living things, and very young ones at that. From the window of her room, Aifa had a very good view of that side of the mountain, and the

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11:41

A Year and A Day - February - The Festival of Candles

Stories ·

2025/11/28

Ifyou were born in Cré at the beginning of February, you would be among the youngest people to enter the Hearth. It was the yearly tradition that new mothers should bring the babies who have been born over the course of the previous year to receive a blessing. Aifa was born in the summer, so she was a few months old when she first breathed the air of the Hearth, which was believed to be able to imbue people with health and vigor, and even, in some instances, restore health, but many of the babies

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11:55

A Year and A Day - January - The Spirit of Awakening

Stories ·

2025/11/21

“Wake up, granddaughter,” Aifa’s grandmother shook her gently, so she wouldn’t be startled out of her deep sleep. “We need to go to the Hearth soon, we don’t want to keep people waiting.”Aifa got up quickly, washed her face and hands and put on the clothes that she’d been setting aside the day before, hand made and never worn before, like tradition required. She knew they weren’t going to leave immediately, one had to sit and think, and write down what one perceived to be one’s shortcomings from

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11:25

A Year and A Day - January - The Blessing of the Waters

Stories ·

2025/11/14

Aifa had always asked herself, ever since she was a little child, why would a community decide to perform a ceremony that featured water during the time of year when it was almost guaranteed to be frozen. Of course if she asked her mother, she would have gotten hours of cross-referenced instruction about the significance of the holiday, complete with historical dates and the most important writings about it.It had to do with the Twins, of course, everything in Cré had to do with the Twins, but as

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12:27

A Year and A Day - December - The Birth of Life Itself

Stories ·

2025/11/07

Itwas the week before the feast of the Birth of Life, a time when the city of Cré was usually bustling with activity. Everybody rushed to finish the preparations for the feast, get the gifts wrapped, and most importantly, get ready for the big social gathering that happened at the Hearth each year to mark this event.

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11:36

A Year and A Day - December - The Night of the Mothers

Stories ·

2025/11/01

Onthe longest night of the year, the women of Cré gather quietly, dressed in their festive garments, whiter than snow, to walk the gentle hill towards the Hearth of the Gemini, whose limestone walls glow ghostly in the distance. They have no lights to guide them, other than those of the stars and the moon, as they slowly join in long files, which in turn join larger streams, which in turn join the main procession to pass through the gate of the Hearth together, like confluences of rivulets and

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28:51

Door Number Eight - The BEGINNING

Stories ·

2025/10/24

“Taylor? Taylor Bradford?” a voice called from behind the counter, with non-dissimulated boredom. “I’ve got the reference materials you requested. Where do you want them?” Taylor pointed to the table in the middle of the reading room and one of the assistant librarians who were working in that section dropped the thick stack of books on it, went back behind his counter and adjusted his ear buds to disappear into his own musical world.Taylor was at a loss as to where to go from here. How do you

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29:40

Door Number Eight - Door Number Eight - The Forbidden...

Stories ·

2025/10/17

“Whoa, what’s on fire?” Taylor woke up the next morning to painful, unholy banging on the door. “What’s gotten into Christine, and why doesn’t she just come in, she knows the lock doesn’t work?”She stumbled towards the door, nursing a bear of a headache, surprised to see that somebody had already repaired the broken lock. The door burst wide open, slamming into the wall, and in came Matthew, carrying a giant pizza, steaming hot. The sheer amount of meat on top of it was enough to make Taylor’s

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29:57

Door Number Eight - Door Number Seven - The Afterlife

Stories ·

2025/10/10

“Where are we?” Taylor looked around, trying to recognize her surroundings. There was something very familiar about the place, it felt as if she had spent a lot of time there, but so long ago, maybe in a dream.“For lack of a better word, dead,” he clarified, too calm for comfort. “Not dead-dead, just on the other side of the river Styx, visiting, sort of. Don’t worry, we’re going back.” “I didn’t know one could visit,” she thought, “without being, you know…” “Sure you can,” he reassured her. “Well,

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24:39

Door Number Eight - Door Number Six - Soul Journeying

Stories ·

2025/10/03

”Are you sure you are ready for this? It may be a little unsettling,” he asked.“As sure as I’ll ever be,” Taylor answered, doubtful. She hadn’t slept well the night before, well, with the sea lion visiting and whatnot, and was a little concerned about the extra preparation required for this door. “What is it this time?” she tried to anticipate her challenge. “Just remember, whatever you see or feel, it’s all in your mind. You are perfectly safe and you can leave anytime if it gets to be too much

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27:41

Door Number Eight - Door Number Five Splintered Self

Stories ·

2025/09/26

The thing about the human mind is that it trains itself to be very efficient, so it automatically eliminates the events that have an extremely low probability of happening so that the brain doesn’t get burdened with useless information to the detriment of day to day activity. When these very rare events happen, the mind gets confused and resentful, trying in vain to reconcile what it thought it knew about the world with the new image that simply doesn’t fit into that knowledge. Stepping into the

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30:08

Door Number Eight - Door Number Three Shared...

Stories ·

2025/09/19

Taylor woke up to a timid knock on the door, followed by a soft fumbling with the door handle. It was Christine, who was trying to balance a large box of jelly donuts and two cups of coffee. She entered, sheepishly, waiting for Taylor’s reaction.“Peace offering?” she said, from behind the donut box. “What gives?” Taylor asked, more curious than upset. “I”m so sorry, Taylor! I realized yesterday afternoon it wasn’t you, it was that girl, Jessica, I told you she’s following Matt and his friend around

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31:26

Door Number Eight - Door Number Three - Alternate...

Stories ·

2025/09/12

“Have the lessons from yesterday’s field trip reached you yet?” he asked, smiling politely.“More than I care to process,” she thought, still upset about the musts and the have to’s, but she answered in the same good mannered vein. “A few, I’m still analyzing them.” “Just remember, before we go through door number three, that not every rule is there to be broken, but it helps, every now and then, to question your assumptions. It seems fitting, since we are on this subject, and given that all of

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24:05

Door Number Eight - Door Number Two - Time

Stories ·

2025/09/05

“I have to ponder this rationally,” Taylor thought and quickly put together a plan to address the current situation. Whether it was real or not, she figured all of this weird stuff kept happening to her around four o’clock, and if she managed to avoid her haunting ghost, hallucination, prankster or whatever he was around that time of day she should be fine. Since the thought of locking herself in the women’s restroom for an hour sounded a little bit like overkill, she moved to the next best option,

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25:49

Door Number Eight - Door Number One - Space

Stories ·

2025/08/29

Taylor woke up and got ready for classes, as if nothing had happened the day before, trying to avoid looking at the door, somewhat uneasy with the thought that if she did, she might not see it there anymore. The first day was filled with the trepidation of adjusting to new settings and finding her way through the maze of buildings and hallways, and in all the excitement she almost forgot about the “class” that was supposed to start at four. She hadn’t had anything to eat the whole day and stopped

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30:06

Door No. 8 - Chapter 1 The Beginning

Stories ·

2025/08/22

“Taylor? Taylor Bradford?” a voice called from behind the counter, with non-dissimulated boredom. Taylor fumbled with the paperwork and rushed to the counter to finish registering for classes before the four o’clock deadline. The clerk handled the documents absentmindedly, while she watched the clock and switched to a more leisurely mindset in anticipation of the get together she had planned with her friends later at the bar on the campus corner. Taylor walked out the door thirty seconds after

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09:15

The Gates of Horn and Ivory - Chapter 10.3 Chorus

Stories ·

2025/08/15

“Persephone, darling! What a joy to have you back home!”Demeter welcomed her daughter effusively at the mouth of the cave of Cumae and presented her with the traditional sheaf of barley. The oracle of Cumae bowed deeply to both goddesses, concealing a resentful glare, while Demeter performed a critical assessment of her daughter, staring her up and down in search of things that required attention. “You look thinner, Persephone. Are you sure you’re eating enough in the underworld? I am

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09:35

The Gates of Horn and Ivory - Chapter 10.2 The Silent...

Stories ·

2025/08/08

Persephone was careful about lifting her torch, to avoid scorching the healthy roots which poked through the vault of the cave, drawn by the sound of the small stream running through it. Plants can hear water from great distances.Plants can hear water from great distances and extend roots to capture it. They are a lot more sophisticated than people know. A delicate root tracery was covering the entire vault, surrounding the larger tap roots, which found themselves mimicking stalactites, and growing

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10:40

The Gates of Horn and Ivory - Chapter 10.1 Spring Fever

Stories ·

2025/08/01

As spring approached, Persephone started getting restless.She was startled from her sleep, shaken by the feeling she forgot something important, whose absence had consequences which were now piling up out of sight. Her daydreaming trips to the gardens got shorter, as she spent more and more time with Hecate preparing for her trip. Most of the hard work of spring was happening underground, quietly. While the dirt was still frozen, the seeds already started their labor of sprouting, and the old roots

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09:48

The Gates of Horn and Ivory - Chapter 9.3 - The...

Stories ·

2025/07/25

Hades always felt empty after Persephone saw the returning souls off into the world. To allay her sadness, she went to the Hall of Scrolls, to reread what the Moirae had in store for them.Hades’s palace was vast, and not many people knew that, because very few had been allowed past the sumptuous rooms at the front, which were intended for receiving visitors. It had libraries and vaults, salons and dining halls, and since his marriage with Persephone, interior gardens. Since Hades didn’t have

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114 results

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