A Bit of Story

Where we share an original piece of fiction with our audience.

Episode 150 – Remember When…

Sometimes we look back at the stories that shaped us, at the memories of characters and fictional worlds that left their impression upon us. We can remember with fondness what we learned and experienced. Sometimes the memories are bittersweet, with the taste of loss mixed in. In this, our final episode of Derailed Trains of…

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Episode 145 – A Shadow on the Soul

Nearly everyone has a story about that one cartoon or movie they watched as a child that gave them nightmares, whether it was an “Elephants on Parade” acid trip or a “Why’d I’d watch this when I was seven?” childhood trauma. But even as adults, there are stories that lodge deep in the psyche, that…

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Episode 142 – Free For All

Every creative work is the product of someone’s hard work and imagination. That’s why there’s copyright laws. Storytellers of all kinds should be paid for their work and own their ideas. However, at some point, all stories enter the public domain. What is public domain? What’s the role of public domain in creativity? How does…

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Episode 135 – To Write, Perchance, a Dream

We’ve all woken from some strange, disorienting dream and wondered, “What was that all about?” In stories, we also sometimes encounter strange dream sequences, and sometimes we still ask, “What was that all about?” In this episode, hosts Timothy Deal and Nick Hayden examine these strange interludes to determine when a dream sequence is beneficial…

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Episode 131 – What’s a Storyteller Worth?

Imagine you’re part of a hunter-gatherer tribe. Who do you value most? That awesome hunter dude who brings home the boar bacon? The guy with the big muscles who tore apart a lion with his bare hands? Or is it the storyteller who tells the myths of your people? This episode, hosts Timothy Deal and…

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Episode 124 – Like the Lilies of the Field

Every story, whether long or short, written or visual, occupies a space of time–and then it’s over. Gone. Unless, of course, you can read or watch it again. Still, there is a transience to stories, a space they occupy in our lives that ends and can never

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Episode 120 – Looking Beneath the Surface

If you’ve ever read a plot summary, you’ve probably thought, “But that’s not what the story’s REALLY about.” There are ideas and connections within a story that don’t show up in a 100-word Netflix blurb. That’s why this episode hosts Timothy Deal and Nick

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Episode 116 – The Lie

“Did God really say…?” From the beginning, lies have been a central feature of the drama of mankind. Not surprisingly, they also fuel many of our stories. Hosts Timothy Deal and Nick Hayden dig into layers of deceit to determine why and how best to use

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Episode 111 – Brought to You by All the Numbers

Most people think they don’t want math in their mysteries, or numerals in Numenor. These people are wrong. Many times, numbers are integral to our enjoyment of stories. In the 1st half of episode 111, your favorite 2 podcasters, Timothy Deal and Nick Hayd

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Episode 103 – Double Troubles

So, the Internet says that there’s a 1 in a trillion chance of you having a doppelganger somewhere on the planet. But that must be wrong, because characters in stories run into their lookalikes all the time. And if not their doppelganger, than their clone

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