Tall And True Short Reads

Season One: Episode 26 (13 June 2021)

Both Sides of the Story is a collection of short stories from the Tall And True writers’ website, written and narrated by Robert Fairhead. The collection consists of four self-contained vignettes and a fifth piece that ties together and resolves the five stories. The podcast version is presented in six instalments with an introductory episode.

Copyright notice: Both Sides of the Story song written by Phil Collins from the Both Sides album (1993).

Read the Both Sides of the Story blog post: https://www.tallandtrue.com.au/blog/both-sides-of-the-story

Podcast website: https://www.tallandtrueshortreads.com

Support the podcast: https://supporter.acast.com/tall-and-true-short-reads

Buy Robert’s short story collections online:

• Amazon Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/Robert-Fairhead/e/B086HZ36NM
• Apple Books:     https://books.apple.com/us/author/robert-fairhead/id1436773436
• Rakuten Kobo:  https://www.kobo.com/au/en/author/robert-fairhead

Story Insight

Phil Collins released Both Sides of the Story in October 1993. It was a catchy song, but I remember it more for the music video. Scenes of homelessness, domestic violence, military patrols on streets and a ghetto kid mugging a white man, juxtaposed with Collins crooning, ‘We need to hear both sides of the story.’

In February 1994, I started working on a short story for the Ian St James Awards. It was my third submission to the then annual awards, at the time, the UK’s biggest fiction prize for unpublished writers.

The idea for the story came to me while working out in a gym. The news at the time was full of items about people for whom the public (including me) had little sympathy. I watched Collins’ Both Sides music video on MTV in the gym, and it set me thinking: Could I show both sides of the news in a short story?

In November 2019, I re-read the yellowed printout of the short story and still felt proud of it. The protagonists in the four vignettes remained unsympathetic, as the news would have portrayed them in 1994. And the fifth piece linked and resolved the story as I had planned, as well as paying homage to Collins’ song.

So, twenty-five-plus years after I wrote it, I decided to share and showcase Both Sides of the Story on the Tall And True writers’ website as a five-part series. Westminster, Bosnia, A Council Flat, and The Gym are the vignettes. And Bad News is the fifth and final part.

Having shared Both Sides of the Story as a series, I decided to publish it as an eBook and make it available online. One of the joys of publishing the final piece, Bad News, was reading all five parts of the short story on Tall And True. I hoped the reader would enjoy a similar experience with the eBook collection.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Tall And True Short Reads. You can read all my short stories, blog posts and other writing at TallAndTrue.com.

The next episode and first vignette from Both Sides of the Story, Westminster, will be in your podcast feed shortly. In the meantime, please check your feed for other short stories. And follow or subscribe to the podcast and rate and review it via your favourite listening app.

And finally, please tell your family and friends about Tall And True Short Reads and the Tall And True writers’ website.

Podcast Theme and Sound Effects

Royalty-free music from Pixabay.com: Beethoven Piano Sonata No. 15 in D major, Op. 28 ‘Pastorale’ – IV. Rondo. Allegro ma non-Troppo, performed by Karine Gilanyan.

Sound effects licensed under Creative Commons 0 from FreeSound.org:

• Clock Ticking: https://freesound.org/people/gecop/sounds/522119/
• Dot Matrix Printer: https://freesound.org/people/azumarill/sounds/345054/
• Pub and Glasses Chink: https://freesound.org/people/16FPanskaSoldat_Martin/sounds/505330/

Production Notes

Tall And True Short Reads produced using Audacity. Thanks to Josh (VoiceOverMaster) Meyer for Audacity recording tips and tricks.

Podcast episodes are recorded in Sydney, Australia, on the land of the traditional custodians of the Eora Nation.

Acast Podcast Supporter Page

Support this show https://supporter.acast.com/tall-and-true-short-reads.