Monday, November 19, 2018

American History Tellers Podcast

So I've gotten the opportunity to write a series for a podcast company called Wondery

I'll be honest: before this opportunity came up, I'd never listened to a podcast before. I actually recorded a podcast once, but I never heard the finished product. (That was when I was working for a friend's English language learning company as the resident writing expert and we did a podcast for the website on English writing tips.) 

Anyhoo, I am finishing up a series of scripts for a Wondery podcast called American History Tellers


This podcast tells stories of American history in a sort of documentary format, including lots of sound effects and re-enactments of historical events. I keep telling people it's sort of like a history documentary you'd see on TV, except it's for audio. It's also similar to an audio book - although unlike printed books, it's actually written for listening. 

The series I'm writing is on the history of party politics in the United States. It starts in the 1790s and goes up through the present day. It's a 6-part series. Each episode is about 40-45 minutes. 

Please understand, I'm writing the script for the series, I'm not narrating it. It's narrated by a podcaster named Lindsay Graham (no, not the douchey senator from South Carolina). It's not in the format of a lot of podcasts where you hear a couple of people talking back and forth or doing an interview. It's a narrative podcast - you're basically listening to a story. It's immersive in style, attempting to put you as the listener right down into the action as it takes place. 

For anyone who doesn't know how podcasts work, it's free. You just listen. There are commercials, like on TV. There are a number of ways to listen. You can go to the Wondery website and stream the shows from your computer. You can listen through smart devices like the Amazon echo (I read somewhere that you can just ask Alexa to play American History Tellers and she'll take care of it for you). You can subscribe to it on whatever app you use to listen to podcasts...Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, NPR-One, etc. 

The first episode drops on Wednesday, November 21, 2018. That's the day before Thanksgiving. The remainder drop each Wednesday thereafter. Of course, you can listen anytime, even if it's a year from now. 

I would be really, really happy if you listened. I'd be even happier if you'd leave a review saying how much you loved it. 



No comments: