Podcasts only really appeared on my radar when Serial was a huge hit a couple of years ago. The wonderful thing about podcasts is that although some are very professional, it’s a medium that almost anyone can create content for. Your podcast might be one person sitting in front of a microphone, or a group of people in a studio or based mostly on recordings made in the field. You need no permission, no significant budget, no fitting in with other people’s agenda.
I wrote a year or so ago about some of my favourites and those are still worth checking out, but there are some for writers that I’ve subscribed to and never miss. The writers among you might find them helpful too. I listen via Itunes but as far as I’m aware these are available in all the other podcast clients such as Sticher.
- Top of the list – although it’s in no particular order – is The Bestseller Experiment. Mark Stay and Mark Desvaux, already knowledgeable in the areas of fiction and publishing and screewriting, decided that in a year they would write, produce and publish a bestselling novel. Not just a novel, but a bestselling one. Each week they update on how that’s going and interview guests about the writing and publishing process. Well worth dipping into – the John Connolly interview was great as were the two more recent ones with bestselling self-published author Susan Kaye Quinn. The latter to even got me thinking about the viability of being a hybrid author – traditionally published for one series of books, but self-publishing a series of shorter novellas…
- Next up is The Creative Penn. Joanna Penn is a well-known and successful self-published author who manages to combine incredible productivity with a genuine passion for helping others to achieve their potential. Whether you want to go the indie author route or are seeking a contract with a Big Five publisher, there’s a lot to learn from Joanna, especially in terms of thinking of yourself as a creative entrepreneur and understanding the business of writing and being an author.
- Another favourite podcoast is The Worried Writer. Sarah Painter is a writer who shares her experiences of fear of failure, anxiety about her writing and how she’s managed to find strategies to shut her inner critic up and get on with the writing. While I’ve been agonising and procrastinating over the edits of Death Will Find Me, I have found this podcast an immense support and it’s really helped me to have a bit more confidence in my work. Sarah has also published a book – Stop Worrying; Start Writing – based on the podcast and I can highly recommend that too.
- How Story Works is new and excellent. Bite-sized podcasts from best-selling author and screenwriting teacher Lani Diane Rich which unpick the structure of writing – understanding the mechanics is vital to the process of writing a novel. The rules can guide you and understanding them makes breaking them more likely to be successful.
If there are writing podcasts that you think I should check out do leave a note in the comments. Likewise, if you produce a podcast that you think I should check out.
