Chapter 5 Of The New Sci-fi Novel, Engineer Your Perfect Child, By Bett Correa, As Narrated By Russil

An audience member at a recent fiction open mic suggested that I ought to apply my talent for character voices to the presumably exciting field of prank phone calls. I wasn't quite sure how to take that...

Gratuitous Photo of My Silliness

Waves of Loyalty:  the final novel in a trilogy from the prolific pen of Susie Harrison.  The book is available on Amazon, and the complete audiobook (including this chapter) will be released on Audible.  Excerpt narrated by Russil Tamsen, 13 mins. In this chapter, a thirty something army field tech, Jesse, briefly relates his life journey so far. From learning to swim to fishing in the stream behind his house with his high school best pal but archrival for girls’ attentions - especially for the heart of Sandi. Jesse doesn’t get the girl but his flame never goes out either. He marries another gal who soon dies young of cancer. He goes into a tailspin, and is only pulled out by a tech job that flies him to warzones around the world with Black Water consulting...

All rights reserved. Russil Tamsen: narrator, comic improv actor. Book editor and author of 21 ebooks. Please visit my ebookstore at QuirkEbooks.com and follow audiobooknarrator. Know a piece of fiction that deserves a great reader? Run it by me!

Cry It Out Baby, a short story by Ariadne Paige aka mslabyrinth, narration by Russil Tamsen. What a touching piece of magical realism this is. Or you might call it a parable. So beautifully written - not a comma out of place, nor an unnecessary word! Original text here.

A dumped lass slowly repairs her emotional self one step at a time, but her decision to skip the grieving stage has some paranormal consequences. Is she losing her mind - as well as her hands? It's only through the kindly intercession of a nearby babushka in the girl's greatest moment of need that the healing tears are finally triggered.

All rights reserved. Russil Tamsen: narrator, comic improv actor, book editor, and author of 21 ebooks. Please visit my ebookstore at QuirkEbooks.com and follow audiobooknarrator. Know a piece of Tumblr fiction that deserves a great reader? Run it by me!

Autumn Wing, a monologue by Blank's Page, performed by Russil Tamsen. 5 mins. Written version here.

A wistful piece from the windowless halls of an insane asylum, with its routines of meds and scheduling... and one redemptive walk per day past a mystery lady in the courtyard.

All rights reserved. Russil Tamsen: narrator, comic improv actor, book editor, and author of 21 ebooks. Please visit my ebookstore at QuirkEbooks.com and follow audiobooknarrator. Know a piece of Tumblr fiction that deserves a great reader? Run it by me!

Back in March of this year a well-established author approached me to do an audio book for her. I had done erotica narrations before; this one was a bit of a stretch for me, being a gay erotic romance. Came out pretty well, actually! Lots of fun character voicings. Even some steamy humor, all fresh out of the oven and for sale! Pass along 2 your gay pals...

The rough and tumble erotic story of disturbia by Molly Cupcakes, They'd Fucked Five Times So Far. Russil Tamsen's second audio version of the piece. 3 mins. Written text here.

It's fascinating how different acting choices by a speaker can create vastly different results. This was the first time I'd ventured two very different versions of a story, and it was enlightening. Feedback from one listener of the first version got me imagining how this flash fiction story would sound delivered in a normal narrator's voice. Using a resonant, understated approach, one that let the language do all the legwork: a very different choice from overstated version one.

To me it sounds really good this way. It might possibly be the better choice!

All rights reserved. Russil Tamsen: narrator, comic improv actor, book editor, and author of 21 ebooks. Please visit my ebookstore at QuirkEbooks.com and follow audiobooknarrator. Know a piece of Tumblr fiction that deserves a great reader? Run it by me!

A charming flash fiction from certainwaters; all the various voices performed by Russil Tamsen. Original text here.

It sounds like a medieval Persian fairy tale with a bit of Doctor Who stirred in (minus the time travel). The gal at the center of it all is like Merida from Pixar's Brave, except she escapes not into the forest but into a bizarre solitary sickness... 

All rights reserved. Russil Tamsen: narrator, comic improv actor, book editor, and author of 21 ebooks. Please visit my ebookstore at QuirkEbooks.com and follow audiobooknarrator. Know a piece of Tumblr fiction that deserves a great reader? Run it by me!

Chilly film noir, a monologue written by Eric Boyd that was published in issue nine of The Fourth River.  It's called Anything For Johnny. Performed by Russil Tamsen. 10 minutes. Original text here.

Today we have a serious drama, just in case you were thinking I could only do goofy! We follow an inmate through the last bitter moments of his incarceration, his release from jail, and his first disappointing moments of freedom. It's rough for a guy having to start over with empty pockets in the middle of winter, but he's got one thing going for him: at least one Jamaican thinks he looks like Johnny Depp. 

[Funny thing: my gf thinks I look like Depp also, but it 's probably her rose-colored classes talking.]  All rights reserved. Russil Tamsen: narrator, comic improv actor, book editor, and author of 21 ebooks. Please visit my ebookstore at QuirkEbooks.com and follow audiobooknarrator. Know a piece of Tumblr fiction that deserves a great reader? Run it by me!

I made Tom Robbins crack up! Score!

At the writers conference, famed novelist Tom Robbins had us do a writing exercise.

1. Write down your favorite word...  (Then we all read out our favorite words. Mine was Australopithecus. Say what?)

2. Write a first sentence of a story/novel/whatever, using that word... (Oh, if had known that's where he was heading!... So we read out our sentences. I had the class laughing.)  

3. Write a second sentence that connects to that first one and opens up the potential of the story.  (We all read our completed sentence pair.) Here's what I came up with:

"Most early hominids sported shaggy manes, but none had a more luxurious, enviable head of hair than Bob the Australopithecus. His sweaty female, Boo, however showed little interest in his chevelure and seemed far more jazzed by the rugged Javamen who had been beaching their sea canoes that morning." I didn't get a chance to explain away the time travel aspect... ;-)