Épisodes

  • We Read Watership Down
    Nov 19 2025
    Eleanor & Alasdair take you down to Watership City, where the grass is green and the girls are... hang on, where are all the girls? We read Watership Down, Richard Adams's 1972 epic. It's Brer Rabbit meets Mad Max, but does the novel live up to the movie's grisly reputation? Is it really a kids' book? And why do we keep singing the X-Men theme?
    Voir plus Voir moins
    38 min
  • We Read The Worst Witch
    Oct 19 2025

    A boarding school for witches? Imagine that! No, not Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Bigotry. We're talking about Miss Cackle's Academy, from Jill Murphy's 1974 bestseller The Worst Witch. In this episode, Alasdair discovers the ropey TV Movie from 1986 and Eleanor learns that it's possible to identify with Mildred Hubble a bit too much.

    Will the Worst Witch make the grade? Can we avoid talking about Harry Bloody Potter? And did Eleanor's childhood bullies have a point, actually?

    Buy us a coffee: ko-fi.com/readthat_podcast

    Voir plus Voir moins
    35 min
  • We Read The Railway Children (Live)
    Sep 19 2025

    The Railway Children is an Edwardian children's classic and health & safety nightmare. Edith "E" Nesbit's novel is packed with unforgettable characters, railway mishaps and an exiled Russian dissident who no one remembers. In this episode, recorded live at the Edinburgh Fringe, we learn that trespassing on a train line is OK, as long as you're a middle-class child.

    Will the book withstand the edgy, late-night comedy of Eleanor and Alasdair? What will we learn about the inevitable triumph of international socialism? And exactly how sexy was Bernard Cribbins in the film?

    We won't take no charity from no one, but if you enjoyed this episode you can buy us a coffee: ko-fi.com/readthat_podcast

    Voir plus Voir moins
    37 min
  • We Read The Story of Tracy Beaker
    Aug 19 2025

    Eleanor and Alasdair read The Story of Tracy Beaker. Jacqueline Wilson's 1991 hit has spawned numerous sequels and TV spin-offs, but Alasdair has missed out on all of them due to being a boy and man, in that order. The protagonist and narrator, Tracy Beaker, is an irrepressible kid in a care home and “the Millennial Holden Caulfield” (according to Eleanor).

    Will Eleanor's childhood nostalgia survive re-reading the book? Will Alasdair “get narked” at the weirdly 1970s dialogue? And WHEN will we start a spin-off podcast called Bed-wet Buddies?

    Buy us a coffee: ko-fi.com/readthat_podcast

    Voir plus Voir moins
    27 min
  • We Read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
    Jul 19 2025

    We're all mad here. Specifically, Eleanor is mad about people saying Lewis Carroll wrote Alice's Adventures in Wonderland on drugs and Alasdair is mad about the Tim Burton film being rubbish. For this episode, we read Carroll's enormously influential 1865 novel, and we asked: do books actually need plots? Or will some 160 year-old puns do?

    Content Warning: We make allusions to the controversy surrounding Carroll, without going into detail.

    Buy us a coffee: ko-fi.com/readthat_podcast

    Voir plus Voir moins
    36 min
  • We Read The Secret Garden
    Jun 19 2025

    Sickly, spoiled and terrified of the outside world, Eleanor and Alasdair read The Secret Garden. Frances Hodgson Burnett's kidlit classic is the story of an obnoxious little girl who goes to Yorkshire on her gap year and really finds herself. Is the book an ode to the healing powers of nature? Or is it a hippy-fascist self-help tract? And which film adaptation is best — the one Eleanor watched as a kid, or the steampunk Mormon version?

    Content Warning: References to ableism and British colonialism. And we inaccurately describe Yorkshire as "a big county" when it is, in fact, four counties.

    Voir plus Voir moins
    34 min
  • We Read The Weirdstone of Brisingamen
    May 19 2025

    Like a pair of creepy twins, Eleanor and Alasdair venture up Alderley Edge to meet the Wizard. We read The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, Alan Garner's 1960 folk horror classic. Is it too scary for kids, or just too scary for Alasdair? Did Eleanor really fall asleep at the end of the audiobook? And what, exactly, does a rustic Cheshire accent sound like?

    We simply don't know.

    Voir plus Voir moins
    34 min
  • We Read The Witches
    Apr 19 2025

    Eleanor and Alasdair read a Roald Dahl book about some absolutely horrid women. "Which one?" you quite reasonably ask. It's The Witches: a grotesquely funny revenge caper fuelled by 'stranger danger' anxiety. What do you do when a beloved children's author is a bit of a bigot? Which of Dahl's books scandalised nine-year-old Eleanor's schoolteacher? And exactly what accent was Anne Hathaway doing in the movie? Listen, and find out if The Witches really is a revolting classic or just a rotten stinker.

    Content Warning: References to antisemitism, misogyny & fatphobia. And we do impressions of the actor Bill Paterson.

    Voir plus Voir moins
    38 min