*pulls plug on the TV*

(*whole room goes dark — inexplicably*)

*flashlight clicks onto face*

Yo.

I guess we're all gonna be stuck in this shelter for a minute, so disinfect a beanbag chair and let us read books.

In this thread, every day, until our present season of hiding has ended (and perhaps with some exceptions), I shall endeavor to publish yet another hour-or-so of narration from some book or another; eventually, we'll all be left with playlists full of audiobooks (or whatever-o-books) (or audio-whatevers) we can treasure as a meager social entertainment amidst our [surprising and newfound and definitely-virus-related] 'social distancing,' of late.

Know what else? You should read something for us, too. Don't have to. Don't have to finish anything you start. (Although, y'know, we'd definitely appreciate it if you at least tried to finish what you start — but, lord knows, I'm probably gonna drop out of this shit at some random point myself, so... let's establish an exit ramp, right?)

My main concern for this thread is that we play it reasonably safe with the copyright stuff; for instance, I plan to begin by reading from the sci-fi novel "Blindsight," which is fantastic — and certainly worth your money — but which also happens to be available in its entirety, right now, on the author's website. So. Eh. Fanfics; personal writings; personal essays being written and recorded especially for this thread (hey, why not?); these things are probably fair game. For all I know, maybe "Blindsight" isn't. Who knows. We must prepare for heartbreak.

That said, I don't expect too many people to post stories. I think we'll mostly just be doin' a book-club thing.

So let's do a book-club thing.

Encouragement is encouraged. Discouragement is discouraged.

#fuckyeahreadstuff

On Spoilers

We're all [presumably] going to be listening to these stories for the first time, 'in real time,' in this thread; this leaves us in a bit of a pickle as-relates the 'spoiler' problem. I think we should probably be assuming that all posts are likely to contain some non-critical semi-spoilery stuff — at least from recent episodes, if not the most recent one; we'll play it by ear — and as such, we'll just all be expecting to be gently spoiled here and there, and do our best to write posts which allow people to make that decision for themselves. As such, most posts will not need to use the 'spoiler' tag — but also, as such, when serious spoilers are at play, we still have the 'spoiler' tag to turn to. When in doubt, use the tag.

On Episodes

As conversation continues for nine million pages, I intend to update this first post and maintain it as a source for all of the as-yet-posted recordings in the thread, organized nicely; this way, anybody can jump to most-recent for chit-chat, or thread-OP for listening. (I'm not gonna mess with that stuff right at this instant, but sometime later, this sentence will be removed and a new section will be added.) If, for whatever reason, you want to post stuff in the thread but don't want me to transclude it in the first post, kindly include a '#notOP' at the beginning of your post, and lo shall it remain behidden! ('Less-un-hidden,' anyway.)

On Sharing These Readings, or This Thread

Until further notice:

Whatevs.

(Subject to change.)

On How-Much-Of-A-Dick-Teague-Constantly-Is

[still typing]