Soren Narnia patreon

harbingers

🕑 Added 2024-09-19 21:00:07 +0000 UTC

Comments

Jill E Merrill

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 ;-)

Nathan Michael Dufresne

Great 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

Violence Zack

Love this story. So good 🫨

Hilde Marciniak

If 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.

Jill E Merrill

Boring 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.

Christopher Helton

It 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.

Soren Narnia

Mmmmm, sweet sweet Neccos….

colin frasier

is 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!

Soren Narnia

Thank god I’m not a curious person!

Mike M.

Ok, 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.

Lori K.

Ohhh! That’s a good one

David

I think there’s not one, but TWO scenes of people behind the shower curtain in the first series of American Horror Story…

Rebecca R

Probably best for us that you haven't...

Soren Narnia

Swarming rats is something I’ve never seen, thank god…

Rebecca R

The 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

Connor Salanger

Hi 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!

Jill E Merrill

I'm asking Connor, not Soren!

Jill E Merrill

Huh? How did you figure out the connection? I'm baffled.

Molly S

The chills I got from, “Anders, my hand won’t come free.”

Jeanette DeMain

If 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.

buddhapugz

🙏 Screw your courage to the sticking-place, And we'll not fail.

Neha Lal

Wow 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.

Lori K.

Well here on Patreon you ARE the zeitgeist!

Soren Narnia

Ha, I lost the Zeitgeist sometime around 2003 and never found it again!

Lori K.

Jill, I think Soren is trying to tell you to get down with the zeitgeist in his own subtle way

Soren Narnia

CAVEMAN 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?

Lori K.

That’s okay, Jill…by their very nature, zeitgeists come and go ;)

Soren Narnia

Here's the full recording; her witch stories are at the very beginning: https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1982009_afs21526/

Kayley Grissom

The 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.

Jill E Merrill

Lori 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

Thank you! I have a fangirl fangirl! ;-)

Jill E Merrill

Wow. The lengths you go to for KPH! Can you post the entire recording, including the witch story?

Soren Narnia

Nailed it!

Connor Salanger

Was 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

Soren Narnia

Speaking 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!

Lori K.

Jill, your analyses are always compelling and interesting. Oh, to have such a fan.

Lori K.

I’d love to hear that story!

Soren Narnia

That 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!

Jill E Merrill

Storks, not stories.

Jill E Merrill

What 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.

Lisa

So beautiful and haunting. 💜

Mike M.

Once 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!

Soren Narnia

It may be the only one that truly does!

Soren Narnia

Yep, I believe I know exactly the one you have in mind…

Lori K.

This 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!