Where the Bees Suck
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About this story
To most people, fairies exist only in fairy tales. Then one turns up dead on Trevor's front porch on a Friday evening, small and broken and unmistakably real, and the suburb he has lived in for years turns out to have been sharing its hedges with a world he could not see.
It is the last thing he wants to deal with after a long week at work. It is also not optional. Whoever — whatever — killed the fairy has noticed Trevor noticing, and the hidden world that has existed just past the edge of human perception has its own ideas about a man who now knows it is there.
Where the Bees Suck (the title is Ariel's song from The Tempest) is an original by John Sunseri, about ten minutes, directed for four voices inside a cozy-evening sound environment — porch light, crickets, and a kitchen that is about to get crowded. Light, quick and a little sinister. The text is on screen as it is spoken. Rated 13+.
The cast
- Narrator
- Trevor
- Bruno
- Boggie
How this was made
This is a full-cast production, not a single narrator reading a book. Each character has its own voice, the lines are directed for pace and emotion, and the story plays inside a live sound environment — a crackling hearth and a quiet cottage — that shifts as the scenes change. The voices are synthetic (high-quality text-to-speech, directed by people), and the words appear on screen as they are spoken, so you can read along or follow in a second language.
Questions
Is it scary or funny?
Mostly funny, with an edge. It is a ten-minute urban fantasy in which an ordinary man is very badly inconvenienced by the supernatural.
How much does it cost?
The opening is free to hear right now, no account needed. The full story is $2.99, a one-time purchase with a free account that stays in your library. Several stories on this site are free in full.
Do I need to install anything?
No. Press Play and it opens in your browser. It works on iPhone, iPad, Android and desktop.
Can I read along?
Yes. The text is highlighted word by word as it is spoken, and you can switch the on-screen text to Spanish while listening in English (or the other way round).
Source and rights
"Where the Bees Suck" © John Sunseri. All rights reserved. Audio production © Nightstand Labs LLC (ImmersivePage). Distributed under license; no part of this work may be reproduced without permission. Cover art created for this edition.
