Prologue to Ursula K. le Guin

Role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder aren’t just played in game shops or living rooms. They’re also very popular in prisons – if the prison officials haven’t banned them. I talk w...

25 Sep 202442min

In the second part of our retrospective on how Imaginary Worlds has covered sci-fi and fantasy since September 2014, we look at the world of gaming. I visit the game shop Sip & Play and talk with the ...

11 Sep 202440min

When I began my podcast in September 2014, I was mostly sticking with topics that I was familiar with like blockbuster movies and animation. I liked science fiction, but I was not as familiar with tra...

28 Aug 202444min

I used to think escape rooms were gimmicky activities where everyone scrambled to solve puzzles while I stood around feeling useless. On the other hand, I love immersive theater, where an interactive ...

14 Aug 202438min

The field of audiobooks has exploded since the introduction of mp3 players, and it continues to expand. But it takes a unique set of skills to voice audiobooks in sci-fi and fantasy genres. I talk wit...

31 Jul 202439min

In the years since my 2020 episode Fantasy and Fascism, I knew that I had to make a follow-up episode. The political landscape was changing in ways I didn’t expect while major sci-fi fantasy franchise...

17 Jul 202440min

Who really composed the scores of Dune, Interstellar, Blade Runner 2049, The Dark Knight, Man of Steel, Pirates of the Caribbean and The Lion King? Were they all written by Hans Zimmer? Or were those ...

3 Jul 202455min

The hottest trend in fantasy novels – in fact the hottest trend in publishing overall – is fantasy romance or romantasy. These stories take place in worlds with dragons, faeries, vampires and werewolv...

19 Jun 202443min