Now Live: Jon and Stephen Recorded Readings Season 2

In case you don’t care so much for the song and dance, here’s the link to Season 2 Episode 1 of the podcast:

Not exclusive to Spotify: full list of platforms on the show page.

For the rest of you, join me as I journey back to June 2021. I was neck deep in code as month 5/6 of this full-stack development bootcamp charged on. And yet, one Saturday afternoon, I was scrolling through Facebook when an ad caught my eye.

Write a post-apocalyptic story that includes a locket, and you could win $20,000.

I hadn’t written anything of substance in months. I didn’t have the time or energy between working and the bootcamp. Yet, that eye-catching sum refused to shut up, and I found myself pulling up Word. What resulted was one of my Top 20 stories even after all this time, and a true validation that my fiction writing skills hadn’t deserted my brain to make room for all that JavaScript.

Still, the rose-colored goggles lowered a bit when I realized that I could only submit to the contest—which they called Challenges for some bizarre reason—if I published the story on their site (remember this was my first interaction with Vocal). But $20,000 would take the place of hundreds—if not thousands—of publish credits, so surrendering first publish rights to Vocal seemed a worthy sacrifice.

As is so often the case for us outside the Vocal big leagues, I did not win. But I stuck around and continued to write for challenges, and boy am I glad I did.

But back then, I felt a bit sad. Here was a story I really liked, that I would love to have for short story calls from magazines and anthologies. Instead it was “trapped” on this site to languish in obscurity. A failure on all counts.

Sidenote: I now know that is absolutely not the end of the road for the stories on this site. It’s a harder road than selling first publish rights, but you can absolutely sell them as reprints. There are less publishers to submit to, they pay less money (if any), and your stories tend to face even greater chances of rejection, but it is still possible. After all, what’s the alternative? Let all that work and passion go to waste? I’ve practiced what I’m preaching here. And I wrote a little guide on the process here: Author Talk: The Great Content Recycling Ecosystem

Even-More-Of-A-Sidenote: Still can’t get over the fact that you sold your first reprint before your first original piece, Lamar. Absolutely unheard of, and worthy of far more acclaim than I think a lot of people realize.

(I’ll pretend the sidenotes didn’t undercut the big emotional shift that’s coming below.)

So, I started to set my mind to what else I could do with “King of the World” and the other early Vocal stories I’d written. Somehow, I’d also bought a podcasting microphone around this time (I seriously don’t remember why) and decided to try and record a story one day under the always foolproof logic of “how hard could it be?”

Hard. Fucking hard.

I sent the incredibly amateur recording off to my two fellow author friends to get their thoughts. The level of notes I got back, however gently presented, convinced me that this fool’s errand was indeed more trouble than it was worth. The idea was dead.

Or was it?

One of those same author friends happened to mention that her husband was looking for voice acting experience and that I should see if he wanted to join in on this endeavor.

Me: But I’m not trying to put money into this side project.

That wasn’t a problem.

Me Again: But I’m not exactly a big name in the writing world, so I can’t offer that much exposure.

This would be his first-ever project for someone else, so it was better to start off small with someone easier to work with.

Every objection overcome, Jonathan Kilgore officially came on board.

I quickly settled on Spotify for Podcasters (formerly Anchor) as the most intuitive and, just as critical, free hosting service. That only left the conundrum of what to call this fledgling podcast.

That night, Jon and Stephen Recorded Readings was born with the immortal tagline: “Stephen writes them. Jon reads them. You listen to them?”

Back then, I only had published five stories on Vocal, so Season 1 was five episodes long. We both learned a lot, from how to work with each other on audio edits to the mechanics of Spotify for Podcasters to how to promote the podcast. Not that I’m claiming any kind of expertise on that last item.

At first, the greatest blocker to Season 2 was insufficient content.

Then some months passed, and now it was more a matter of Jon finding the time while working his 40 a week, acting in local theater shows, and spending time with his spouse and friends. Still a bit confused by that last one, but everyone has their priorities, I suppose.

Because, though I believe the product we offer is professional caliber, Jon is working for free. So who was I to mandate he reallocate precious free time for no immediate reward?

Who would have expected that the push would come from his wife of all people?

Not even her nudging Jon to get back into recording regularly, but Bri publishing her first book The Wailings.

This then ignited a new type of FOMO for me, spurring me to finally get serious and finish A Bloody Business. As I started to look toward the future, I knew who I’d be tapping as my voice actor for the audiobook if he’d sign onto the challenge.

But I wanted to get the rest of Season 2 recorded and done so he wasn’t then trying to do those stories in tandem. Especially because one of the episodes also happened to be Chapter 1 of A Bloody Business, and the cross-promotion opportunity was too good to pass up:

Enjoy listening to that story? Get a whole lot more where that came from in Stephen’s new book.

And so it was that Jon knocked out “The Rocks” and “Memoria” back-to-back as well as adding new promo messages onto “Sinking Prospects,” which was recorded way before I ever envisioned turning that series of stories into a book.

Dusting our hands off, we started right up on prep work for recording A Bloody Business, Jon’s first-ever audiobook and my first-ever book book.

Today, March 14th, as we stand just over two weeks from the official launch, I wanted to take a moment to lift our heads up from final touches on A Bloody Business and ensure this milestone didn’t end up overshadowed amid these pre-release motions.

Because I honestly never thought we’d make it to Season 2, purely from a content standpoint, never mind recording. But here I am, still throwing stories out to the Vocal Challenge wolves. And here Jon is, still helping me to give them a second life outside the site. It’s a testament to the ingenuity of the human spirit and how things can always change.

And let’s be real, it’s more a testament as to how Bri pushes us each forward. She wrote all about The Wailings here if you’re interested:

So to Jon, a heartfelt thanks for sticking with me on this project and always being receptive to my edits, spanning the whole range from nitpicky to incredibly nitpicky. I can’t think of a better partner in all things audio recording, whether it be our co-named podcast or A Bloody Business.

And for those who made it all the way to the end, here’s the link to Season 2 Episode 1 to save you from scrolling all the way back to the top. Don’t ever say I don’t look after my own:

Not exclusive to Spotify: full list of platforms on the show page.

New episodes release every Thursday! Follow so you never miss one. And stay tuned for “Sinking Prospects,” which will include the links to the then-live book A Bloody Business on both Amazon and Audible in the description. You know, in case recorded audio narration is your thing 😉