Escape to the country
This week, farmer Jimmy Doherty enjoys wild conversations with a variety of guests, there’s a serial killer thriller and a fascinating look at fabric
Rare pig breeder and conservationist Jimmy Doherty takes a break from running his farm and wildlife park to interview guests about living the good life.
He chats with wild swimmers, city-dwellers who have upped sticks to the countryside and the chairman of the world’s greenest football club.
Nature in abandoned places is the subject of the most recent episode, featuring writer Cal Flyn, whose award-winning book Islands of Abandonment was incidentally one of my favourite reads of last year.
Her outlook on the environment is refreshingly positive as she describes places she’s visited across the globe that have been reclaimed by nature after humanity has messed them up. If you’re looking for a lighter listen, there’s also an episode with Bez from the Happy Mondays extolling the virtues of bees.
WHERE TO START:
Eden Project founder Sir Tim Smit shares how he started out selling tickets from a portable toilet.
DEAD HAND
Greg’s dad disappeared in Northern Ireland more than 20 years ago and, ever since, the son has been obsessed with uncovering the identity of the man who claimed responsibility – the supposed serial killer Dead Hand.
In this fictional thriller, fans of Greg’s true crime podcast have been trying to crack the murderer’s so-far indecipherable code, left on a radio transmission broadcast in the victims’ voices.
A new voice appears on the transmission – the first in more than two decades – and Greg (Derry Girls shopkeeper Paul Mallon) teams up with the missing man’s fiancé to find him before it’s too late. But not before he has fallen under the suspicion of DS Murray, played by Michelle Fairley (Catelyn Stark in Game of Thrones).
Strong casting, a tight script and a genuinely scary story combine to make this a must-listen for fans of audio drama.
WHERE TO START:
Introducing Dead Hand – a two-minute trailer. It’s a Radio 4 production but available on all the usual podcast apps.