Thread by @SFFAudio

yesterday we recorded a podcast on THE GODDESS OF ATVATABAR, an 1892 HOLLOW EARTH novel by William R. Bradshaw

I found it really cool, with lots of fun SCIENCE FICTION ideas, near the start and end, and also a tremendous wasteland of spiritualism masturbation in the middle

subtitled:

BEING THE
HISTORY OF THE DISCOVERY
OF THE
INTERIOR WORLD
AND
CONQUEST OF ATVATABAR

it clearly informs Edgar Rice Burroughs' AT THE EARTH'S CORE, but with sexually frustrated preistesses in place of psychic lesbian dinosaur ladies

it feels like it should be a satire, but the evidence for that is too scant

It is however very funny in places, and very much worth reading if u dig old books

There were too many banquets and ceremonies, not enough Hard SF

Its like a big dumb object book, but with the dumbness coming more from the lame spiritualism shit and not from the figuring out of the world

needed more RINGWORLD and less Council of Elrond & pre-kissing scenes

the novel also has an interesting intro by Julian Hawthorne who sounds like somebody I want to read

in the aftershow @PulpCovers talks about what happens in that recent @cirsova kickstarted novel that was in All-Story, and that sounded very fun

this podcast will be out in maybe 7 months or so

we've done a lot of podcasts about subterranean worlds

AT THE EARTH'S CORE by Edgar Rice Burroughs

JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH by Jules Verne

THE COMING RACE by Edward Bulwer Lytton

THE MOUND by H.P. Lovecraft

the latter two of which could b thot of as utopian novels

I don't think you could classify ATVATABAR as a utopian novel, but it is utopian adjacent

and now that I think about it, it has a kind of vibranium vibe, is kinda Wakanda-esque

I'm more of an adamantium guy, a scrith fellow, a General Products hull dude

You can find those listed podcasts here, btw:

sffaudio.herokuapp.com/podcast/mobile