Overcast 158: Bridge Over the Cunene by Gustavo Bondoni

The Overcast

Published on Sep 22nd at 10:36pm

Bridge Over the Cunene by Gustavo Bondoni. Narrated by Theresa Bakken. Hosted by J.S. Arquin. #fantasy #zombies 

Botoso knew he was in trouble.He had no idea how in the world he was ever going to get back to the village.He had no idea where the village was.This was the first time he’d ever been outside the stockade without his mother or one of the other village adults to take care of him, and the sun was setting redly over the horizon.

But he wasn’t frightened.  He told himself that a future headman would never be frightened just because night was about to fall.  He would laugh the night off, and keep walking until he found the river.  He new the river was near his village.

He also knew that he would make a great headman someday.  He was smart and compassionate.  After Simao Zabobo had left the clearing far behind, Botoso had emerged from hiding and immediately noticed that the headman had forgotten the goat.  The boy knew how important goats were to the village – he was old enough to know that the village’s very survival depended on the supply of goats.

So he worked at the clasp tying the goat to the tree and began his walk back the way he’d come.  At some points, it was difficult to decide which way he had to go, since one patch of low grass or clump of trees looked just like the next, but he wasn’t worried.  A headman would never get lost.

But he had.  And now the sun was all the way down, and it was hard to see where he was going.

AUTHOR

Gustavo Bondoni is novelist and short story writer with over three hundred stories published in fifteen countries, in seven languages.  He is a member of Codex and an Active Member of SFWA. His latest novel is Test Site Horror (2020). He has also published two other monster books: Ice Station: Death (2019) and Jungle Lab Terror (2020), three science fiction novels: Incursion (2017), Outside (2017) and Siege (2016) and an ebook novella entitled Branch. His short fiction is collected in Pale Reflection (2020), Off the Beaten Path (2019) Tenth Orbit and Other Faraway Places (2010) and Virtuoso and Other Stories (2011).

In 2019, Gustavo was awarded second place in the Jim Baen Memorial Contest and in 2018 he received a Judges Commendation (and second place) in The James White Award.  He was also a 2019 finalist in the Writers of the Future Contest.

His website is at www.gustavobondoni.com

Twitter: @gbondoni

NARRATOR

Theresa loves immersing herself in the worlds that writers create.  She draws on her experience as an Emmy Award winning broadcast journalist, brings empathy to every character she voices and delivers professionalism in every project. She believes storytelling is essential and produces a podcast called the Desideratum Podcast celebrating and featuring the work of authors and narrators.

https://theresabakkennarrator.com/  Social Media link tree:

:https://linktr.ee/tbnarrator

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