You're traveling through the Appalachian Mountains and suddenly your son goes missing. You're fishing on a wide southern lake, only to be taken underwater by a fish so powerful it must be a god. Your rifle is trained on an outhouse Easter morning as you wait for the hordes of hell to slither and explode forth, your prayers and aim the salvation for humanity. Your toes dangle in the water, languidly, as you bask in the sweet smells of summer, unaware that something is under the water, staring at you, hidden by the reflection of the trees and a perfect blue sky.

Experience all these and more in Bram Stoker award-winning author, Weston Ochse's first podcast short story collection. Titled Smokey Mountain Horrors, the collection features the best and favorite stories from his collections Scary Rednecks and Appalachian Galapagos.

"I'd never considered narrating my own stories until I was approached by Don Dehm at a convention in Tucson last year," Weston said. "He indicated to me that he'd heard a lot about my work and wanted to know if I'd be interested in podcasting. It didn't take much convincing. I thought it was a tremendous idea."

Don Dehm is the voice and mind behind Pulp Gamer, an audio and video advocate of the board game and roleplaying industry. He's recently branched out and included the Kangit brand, which was "founded out of a love for audio entertainment and the desire to connect. Countless great authors are left unheard while we spend hours every week on the road or on the job when we could be listening to something fun."

Weston relates, "An interesting side effect of being able to listen to a story anywhere is being the author and seeing the expression on someone's face when they're listening to your work. It would be called stalking if we were systematically able to watch readers read our works, but with podcasting, it's perfectly legal. I mentioned to an office mate about some free stories available on my website and from Kangit. He downloaded them and ended up listening to them while he was on the treadmill. I got a kick out of watching him slow the treadmill to a stop, as he stared openmouthed into the far distance of my podcast, and the gruesome events I was narrating. There's nothing like instant feedback!"

The stories are available for less then $2.00 at Audio.com . Free stories can be found at Weston's website or at Kangit Media .