Podcasts :: Recommendations, Part 2

I wrote a year or so ago about some podcast recommendations and how listening to them had cut into my time for audio books. This year I’ve been able to strike a better balance. Still, I’ve come upon two podcasts that I can highly recommend.

The first is Slow Burn. Self-described as “surprising subplots, strange details, and forgotten characters,” Slow Burn gives the story behind the story. Season One deals with Nixon and Watergate. Think you know everything there is to know? Think again. The producers at Slate have dug deep into characters and plot lines that have either been forgotten, ignored or unrealized altogether. Listening to how Watergate played out also had strange familiarity to what we’re living in today with media and politics. I haven’t (yet) listened to Season Two that deals with Clinton’s impeachment but I plan to. (After I listen to a book or two!)

The second podcast recommendation I’d make is In the Dark – this time, Season Two. It centers around a 20-year old murder case in Mississippi where the suspect, Curtis Flowers, has been tried six times. The podcast investigators look into the prosecutor’s case against Curtis and the evidence that keeps convicting him while also addressing why the verdict continues to be overturned by the State Supreme Court.

Like most documentaries, the producers here have an obvious agenda. I don’t know if they are right or wrong. I tend to be skeptical of stories that are too one sided, and this one definitely is.  That said, I think the more interesting story is what gets exposed about the DA on the case. Whatever happens to Curtis Flowers in his latest appeal, it seems that someone should open an investigation into Doug Evans. First up could be some of the family members of those killed by one of Evans’ star witnesses who, at that point, should have been locked up tight. I don’t want to get into too many spoilers, so I’ll leave it at that.

Two podcast recommendations that are worth the time they will cost you from making progress on your TBR pile – Slow Burn and In the Dark. Check them out. And, if you’ve already listened to them, let me know what you thought in the comments.