The Midst podcast (which can be found at http://www.midst.co) is a strange and compelling space western horror science fantasy. . . hmmm. Let me start again.

Midst is a planetoid revolving in a cosmos very unlike our own, one that contains strange creatures bred from The Fold, a supernatural phenomenon that. . . no that's not it either.

This module will be a discussion guide to one of the most compellingly weird podcasts I've run across ever. I'm talking Welcome to Nightvale weird. The story is told by three anonymous and quite probably unreliable narrators, does not stick to usual story structures, veers off on tangents, and lands everything in a series of climactic episodes that are simply stunning. What we will be doing is experiencing season 1 of this podcast together and looking at how they are using various tools to tell this story, and whether they really are abandoning a lot of conventional storytelling wisdom. (Spoiler alert, I don't think they are.)

You will listen to all nineteen episodes over the course of the class. In class, we will discuss the episodes you've heard, using the frame of questions I will give you ahead of time. Our goal will be to tease out the various storytelling tools the writers used in the creation of their remarkable story. Some of these will be familiar literary tools, others will involve how they use sound and effects to heighten their narration. As each episode is on the order of half an hour long, you will have heard nine to ten hours of audio by the time the class ends.

I love this story and the way the writers have chosen to tell it. I would love to share that with you.