4 Cents Halloween: Neil Gaiman's Coraline

 It's been nearly two months since the end of the first season of 4 Cents a Podcast. Since then, a couple of compilation episodes have followed, but the show won't restart until next May (I do intend to be around then, in spite of COVID-19). However, this is the week leading into the first of the trinity of year-end Holiday, Halloween, so I couldn't allow it to go unremarked in some way.

A lot of shows do Holiday specials of some kind. On television--given that most TV shows run from the fall to the end of spring, rather than running through the summer and stopping--there's almost always some kind of Holiday episode to mark the occasion. So, I decide that 4 Cents a Podcast should do its own special.

With that in mind, today marks the beginning of a week-long special mini-series: 4 Cents Halloween: Neil Gaiman's Coraline.

The most popular part of 4 Cents a Podcast is The Reader's Corner episode which starting airing on Wednesdays. On it, I discussed and read a piece by another author, usually a short story, an essay, a couple of poems, or some combination of the three. With the precedent set, I thought I do a variation of that and read the whole of a single book to you, beginning today and going all the way through to Halloween this coming Saturday.

Once I decided to do this, I kicked around for ideas as to which book. I figured, if it was going to be one single story as opposed to a string of individual stories, it had to be a short one, but it also had to be dark. What's the point of a Halloween Special if it isn't a little chilling? I considered doing a reading of Ray Bradbury's The Halloween Tree (the holiday is in the name), or even one of Stephen King's stories (but that seemed too obvious, and I happen to know that King hates Halloween).

So, I finally settled on Neil Gaiman's wonderful story Coraline.

Gaiman wasn't an author whose work I'd featured previously on the podcast, which is a rather big oversight on my part. However, I think this will more than make up for that. His work is, at times, just as eerie as Stephen King's, but he has the light, whimsical touch that the best fantasy writers have to their work.

I know what you're asking. How will this special work?

Well, it's quite simple. Each day, a new episode of the special will go live on the 4 Cents a Podcast anchor page. This of course will make it available on pretty much every podcasting platform on the web (Spotify, Apple Podcasts, iTunes, Google Podcasts, Podcast Addict, etc.). Each episode, with the exception of the first one airing today, will contain two chapters of Coraline, plus a brief preamble by yours truly. The final episode, consisting of the last two chapters, will go live on Halloween.

The first episode will go live in less than half an hour today. If you'd like quick access, simply follow this link, and it will take you to 4 Cents a Podcast page on Anchor. 

I hope you all enjoy this. It's been a joy to read Neil's work aloud, and I have to say, even my stammering, stumbling self can manage to get through it without screwing up too badly. Enjoy, dear listeners, and Happy Halloween.