Let The Cat In

The Cat gets personal in this lo-fi, bargain-bucket, guest-free and long-overdue episode of supernatural occurrences and generational egotism. And when we say 'the Cat', we mean two Gen Xers and an elder Millennial; and when we say 'personal', we mean 'persona' (the 'l' is silent). While Kaaron lives in the moment and Aaron embraces his own mortality, Joseph flaps his Kermit hands and says the C-word. The stories we tell about ourselves are discussed, the elevator pitch of yourself, and the narrow contexts of identification. Also BO on the bus. Updating books to fit the mores of the age. Using masks to build a wall between yourself and others. Being too posh to save a life. Aaron gets his head stuck in a table. Everyone stops for soup. Zips, buttons and other collectable doodads featured in this episode include: Douglas Coupland's Generation X Nick Cave and Sean O'Hagan's Faith, Hope & Carnage Kaaron's The Underhistory The story about Aaron's Grandad's diary is in Episode 31 – Bag Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets spoilerific in search of all things Arthurian with special guest, legendary New York Times bestselling author and award-winning comic book writer, Dan Abnett. While Aaron shepherds a coming out and Kaaron is betrayed by a cheap trick, Joseph ruins Lunar Park for everybody. Dan goes to Glastonbury on a quest for the holy grail. Fictional truths are discussed, as is reality as a device, the great conceit of modern literary fiction, and the amazing lie that everything is true (but is it permitted?). Also, autobiographical truths buried in fictions, the fictionalising of reality to make it readable, and the different ways we read stories knowing they're fiction versus assuming they are, in fact, true. The value of a sense of quest. The extraordinary adventure of observing the everyday. Dan chooses wisely. Librettos and Fisher Kings conceptualised in this episode include: Brett Easton Ellis's Lunar Park and The Shards The Coen Brothers' Fargo Daniel Petrie's Sybil M John Harrison's The Sunken Lands Begin To Rise Again and his 'anti-memoir' Wish I Was Here Jorge Luis Borges's The Aleph Michael Haneke's Funny Games Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets permissive in this latest episode with special guest, author and artist Nik Vincent-Abnett. While Joseph has an on-air fashion meltdown and Aaron DIYs his bootcuts into flares, Kaaron forgets her own name. Clothing is discussed, as an expression of character, as shorthand for a time, as a face to show the world, as skin. The cyclic nature of fashion. Each generation's possessiveness over the style of their time. Also Hussars, apportation, and the many people who died in Nik's house. Ghosts as camera obscura. Ugg boots as the great leveller. Selling books with boobies. Aaron wants to be buried in a clown jacket. Nik takes a terminal photograph.  Buttons and bow-ties in this episode include: Schitt's Creek Kaaron's The Underhistory Nik's The Wipe and Savant Check out the episode page for more pics and bits!

The Cat goes positively bonkers over an audience with the best-dressed man in speculative fiction, game designer, teacher and writer, the incontrovertible Rik Lagarto. While Joseph gets all the ups and Aaron clobbers a Hobbit, Kaaron is haunted by a butterfly cake. The ghosts at Bethnal Green are discussed, as is ham (again), Nazis (fuck 'em), and Russell Crowe's piss. Also scar trees, scars in time, and the awareness of historical time as a new angle from which to perceive or experience the present. The importance of The Ugly Duckling. David Hasselhoff's frozen poo. Aaron gives Rik some sensible advice. Scats and scent trails sniffed over in this episode include: Joseph's collection The Measure of Sorrow Michael McDowell's Blackwater Iain Banks' The Crow Road John Waters' A Dirty Shame Ottessa Moshfegh's My Year Of Rest And Relaxation Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets 'poetic and foul-mouthed' in a bewitching episode with award-winning author and academic, the incantatory Lisa L. Hannett. While Kaaron gets a Lacroix and Joseph gets lost in the nineties, Aaron dodges the post-con blues by calling from the toilet. William Hope Hodgson is discussed, as is the gathering of disasters. An extended riff on the mixtape follows: the mixtape as a labour of love; the mixtape as a time capsule; the emotional beats of a mixtape. Also, the secret language of couples, the execution of Agnes Magnúsdóttir, and the cultural etiquette of burial mounds. The emotional safety net of a selfie and the magical thinking of everyday life. Aaron makes a mixtape confession. Lisa is careful not to say völva. Runestones and philtres conjured in this episode include: Lisa's Viking Women Aaron's Dirty Heads M John Harrison's The Course of the Heart Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

That Cat gets compulsive in an out-there episode with multi-award-winning author and associate professor, the incontestable Helen Marshall. While Kaaron investigates an autograph book and Joseph discovers a horror show in the guinea pig hutch, Aaron goes fungal and transforms into the Moth Boy. Helen works through her fixation with children and death. The dark and light sides of creative obsession are discussed, as are curiosity, boredom, and fandom – toxic and otherwise. The impact of parenthood on maintaining an obsession. Obsession as fuel to complete a project – and the importance of its ending. Also obsession as possession, romanticising obsession, and obsessive coincidence. Not forgetting mortality dump reads and struggling with smalltalk. Kaaron reveals what really happened to her ducks. Joseph bemoans the dearth of peppered mackerel. Aaron keeps a secret to seem more interesting. Helen invites everyone to visit her toilet. Paint-pots and palette-knives alluded to in this episode include: Emile Zola's The Masterpiece JG Ballard's Complete short stories Joyce Carol Oates's Night. Sleep. Death. The Stars. John Goodwin's The Cocoon CH Pearce's Jimmy Flip Brings His Little One to Work, and It Comes My Turn to Hold It Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets fibrous and transformative over afternoon tea with artist, paper maker and raconteur extraordinaire, the delightful Katharine Nix. While Joseph has an esoteric moment after two cups of tea and Kaaron rejects the popularly held contrivances of narrative convention, Aaron drops the bolognese and lets in the brown-snakes. Ancient alchemical processes are discussed, as are parallel evolution, the creative will, and carnivorous kelp. The urge to ask the big questions. Our quest for answers, forever on the border of a great mystery. The creative similarities between artists and scientists. The beauty of plant fibre paper making. The creative act as the thing in itself. Everyone listens as the rats in the cellar devour Katharine's Moomins. Aaron flips the table. Dingbats and wingdings impressed into this episode include: Arthur Koestler's The Act of Creation and The Sleepwalkers Dancer and choreographer Meryl Tankard Mark Rowlands' The Philosopher and the Wolf Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets mutable (and, frankly, saucy!) in this special episode with our very own Kaaron Warren. While Aaron goes to a disastrous small-town hypnotism show and Kaaron reaches for the white-out, Joseph opens a black magic door that should have been kept well closed. Rewriting the past is discussed, and our changing perspectives on our own past. Also the vanishment of old haunts, and nostalgia – or its lack. The random scraps of things we scribble on when needs must. Writing vs typing. The addictive machinery of writing on a phone. Aaron invests in a woodchipper. Joseph goes home for sad reasons. Kaaron discovers a bizarre corner and a magic space. Flipperts and gibbets discussed in this show include: Gore Vidal's Myra Breckenridge Weird: The Al Yankovic Story Brett Easton Ellis's Less Than Zero American Graffiti Ian McEwan's Sweet Tooth Tananarive Due's The Reformatory Call-back to the infamous wet string episode Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets performative in a barnstorming episode from the town of Beechworth, with a sensational special guest: actor, freeformer, poet and Bram Stoker Award nominated author, the preternatural Kyla Lee Ward. While Kaaron paces the women's ward of the asylum and Aaron loses his voice to Bon Jovi, Joseph mansplains a cat into a pigeon. Kyla immerses herself in phantasmal spaces. Voices are discussed, and accents, intonation and word choice. Feeling a character in the throat. The slippery strangeness of the voice. Also working your way into a character from the outside versus working your way out from within. Rebecca is revisited, as is Kaaron's 'hambone effect.' Mimicry as a stepping stone, the formation, fluidity or calcification of the self. The masks we all wear, and other matters of a deep and divers nature. Pretexts and semblances spoken of in this episode include: AsylumFest 2023 Bloodsongs magazine Richard Adams' Watership Down Robyn Cadwallader's The Anchoress Stanislavski's 'Method' Daphne Du Maurier's Rebecca Kyla's novella The Final Masque Photos courtesy of the incontestable Cat Sparks. See more of her AsylumFest 2023 snaps here. Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets spooky and kooky with a very special guest: author, screenwriter, living encyclopedia of all things Halloween, the one and only, the delightful, Lisa Morton. While Aaron dreams of Hal Bodner, and Kaaron writes about four hairdressers, Joseph drinks whisky, eats haggis, and invokes the spirit of the dead Rabbie Burns. Lisa brings a totem. Curses are discussed, and cursed objects, with an aside concerning the online cursed doll market. Also ritual as a language, the foundations of comedy, and the sadness of dead shopping malls. That terrible moment you realise you're part of a folk horror ritual you didn't consent to. Kaaron remembers Marilyn Monroe's grave. Aaron discovers a cursed cabinet. Joseph hurls his body out into the void. Lisa finds her old teacher's book. Everyone wonders about dread mechanisms. Snips and snails mentioned in this episode include: Lisa Morton's Life On The Edge (1988) The origins of Burns Night Donna Tartt's The Secret History Robin Hardy's The Wicker Man Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets cosy in the cubby house with special guest, author of All The Murmuring Bones, The Path of Thorns, Castle Full of Blackbirds, and more – so much more! – Angela Slatter. While Joseph reads another bogus biography and Aaron holds in a sneeze, Kaaron is delighted by a biscuit tin. Angela revisits the traumatising books of childhood. Solipsism is discussed, as is Nabokov's dream Russia, and the USA of his imagination. Places of the imagination with no real-world existence. The idealisation of a place that becomes more real than the place itself. A toothless man is the telling detail. Not to mention, all the reasons why children should – nay, must! – be traumatised with dark tales. Aaron and Angela resurrect the ghost of Myrtle. Joseph makes a misguided commitment. Kaaron loses a ham bone. Note: The story Joseph is thinking of is in fact The Happy Prince, which is a fairy tale written by Oscar Wilde – not Hans Christian Andersen at all. Grimaces and grimoires referenced in this episode include: Lila Azam Zanganeh's The Enchanter Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita Angela Slatter's Flight Struwwelpeter Encarta '95 Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets titular in the first episode of a brand new season, with special guest Jason Nahrung, Australia's number one vampire and author of Blood and Dust and The Big Smoke. While Kaaron takes a creepy clown as her plus one and Aaron gets unwholesomely into napkins, Joseph gets a lift with a stranger to knifey-town. Jason shares his abiding love of New Orleans, and everybody learns about the life of pirate Jean Lafitte. Titles are discussed: titles from nowhere; titles by consortium; titles as a story's guiding light. The comfort of titles on a bookshelf. The dangers of writing as a tourist. Everyone agrees you shouldn't be a wanker. Kaaron and Aaron fall out over Love Story. Jason wonders where you got dem shoes. Joseph gets into jazz—wankily. Everyone agrees on the Bloody Mary. Po-boys and beignets from this episode include: Harlan Ellison's I have no mouth and I must scream Yukio Mishima's The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea Anthony Burgess's A Clockwork Orange Thomas Harris's The Silence of the Lambs Spoon's Lafitte Don't Fail Me Now and The Agony of Lafitte Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets confessional in this last episode of Season 2, with the triumphant return of star special guest... Aaron Dries. While Kaaron looks beneath the surface and Joseph makes a snap judgment, Aaron touches his face thirty-two times. (Lah-de-dah!) Observations about strangers lead to an insight. Translation of quirks leads to obfuscation leads to ideas. Anxiety is processed into art. Also, Rebecca... again. The telling detail. The craft of observational comedy. Readers and the catalogue of reality. Aaron brings a bag of mystery. Kaaron and Joseph get literal chills. Imponderables and consumables in this episode include: Emmanuel Carrère's I Am Alive and You Are Dead Terence Mallick's Badlands Kaaron Warren's Slights Aaron Dries's House of Sighs and Damage Inc. J. Ashley-Smith's The Attic Tragedy Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets chimerical and discourses upon dreams with special guest Paul Mannering, award-winning author of the Drakeforth and Tankbread series, among many other fine stories. While Kaaron revisits some old dreams and Joseph gets obsessive, Aaron is scuttled sudsily by Shrek in his first Turkish bath. Paul puts his hand up for the teacher. Dreams are discussed, as is David Lynch, and that movie from the nineties where Steve Buscemi calls for more dwarves (only he doesn't – about which, more below). The potency of first images. Capturing the weirdness and emotional weight of those images, while ensuring they make sense in this world. "It's wearing your face!" Joseph, Kaaron and Paul appear in Aaron's nightmares. Paul heals himself with a lucid dream. Aaron performs a (classic) Driesian wrap-up. Figments and follies from this episode include: Joseph's story The Attic Tragedy David Lynch's actual story about the origins of the Red Room (in the opening paras of  this article) 'That movie with Steve Buscemi' is, of course, Tom DiCillo's Living in Oblivion, and the line is "Oh! Make it weird: put a dwarf in it!" excellently delivered by Peter Dinklage in this (extended) scene. Don't forget to check out the episode page for more pics and bits!

The Cat gets intangible, discussing liminal spaces with special guest Sarah Read, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Bone Weaver's Orchard and Out of Water. While Joseph clambers through the brambles behind an old tyre yard, and Kaaron applies to be writer in residence at an all-night pub, Aaron looks up to find himself alone in a doctor's surgery waiting room. Sarah receives a warning from an empty room and unboxes a 200-year old bear pelt. Spaces are discussed, also places, and whether or not people or events leave a residue of energy in them. Also flower sack dresses, abandoned coal towns, and the eternal smouldering beneath the ground at Centralia. Aaron finds a pigeon in the ball pit. Everyone Frankensteins their locations. Uncanny valleys and other in-betweens whispered in this episode include: Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House John Hughes's The Breakfast Club Sarah Read's The Hope Chest Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets definitively morbid with special guest, multi-award-winning author and editor, the ever-unquiet Lee Murray. While Aaron obsesses over Elmore Leonard's first hundred pages and Joseph deconstructs the double-helical structure of DNA, Kaaron finds some postcards and investigates a death by shark. Lee loses her box of things and opens the door to an interactive mystery. Defining moments are discussed, as are agency, mythology, and the internal and external factors that determine whether a story or its characters resonate. Also death, funerals, and relationships defined by tragedy. Kaaron digs deep to find the point of interest. Lee tells her own story in her own voice. Aaron thinks about Olivia Newton-John and OnlyFans a lollipop. A few of the long polynucleotide chains untangled in this episode include: An article on the story of Rosalind Franklin. An article about the plagiarising of Zelda Fitzgerald. Jaws: The Revenge, both the movie and the novelization. Literally any book by Elmore Leonard. Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat wrestles with long projects and what it means to be an artist with special guest, award-winning author, photographer, graphic designer and activist, Cat Sparks. While Joseph lets a novel die (again) and Aaron lets the wrong one in, Kaaron makes like Tweetie-Pie (or maybe some kind of crab). Cat takes a journey back to a time before helicopter parenting. Motivation is discussed, as is authenticity, identity and the art life. Also, Billy Joel's Vienna. Recapturing the vibe of a work through music. Following the muse wherever it drags you. Also Frankenstein, Pet Sematary and the "Hemingway boner." Everyone exposes their structural underwear. Cat whips out her climate trumpet. Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat goes deep, DEEP into the illimitable expanses of negative space with special guest Nathan Ballingrud, incomparable author of The Strange, Wounds, and North American Lake Monsters. While Joseph gets nostalgic for Betamax and Aaron is thrown into existential crisis, Kaaron fills one minute's silence with entirely inappropriate thoughts. Nathan navigates a tightrope of what – and what not – to say. Silence is discussed, as are the divers mysteries of the beyond, and the liberation of just starting something and seeing where it will lead. Also considered: the void created by our inability to comprehend what lies beyond death, which we fill with the entirety of the human imagination. Aaron fixates on Jan Brady. Kaaron unveils her journal of lies. Nathan brings a book. Everyone discovers the Northwest Passage. Vacant lots and echoey multi-storey car parks discussed in this episode include: John Cage's 4'33" (Not "one minute silence", as Joseph erroneously named it.) John Le Carré's The Spy Who Came in From The Cold Daphne DuMaurier's Rebecca (as ultimate negative space) Marina Abramović's The Artist Is Present Mike Mignola's Hellboy in Hell Robert Kirkman's The Walking Dead comic series Stephen King's The Green Mile Eiji Yoshikawa's Musashi John Darnielle' Wolf in White Van Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

S02-25 AsylumFest 2022 The Cat gets unhinged at the second live recording from AsylumFest 2022, with special guests AJ Spedding, Kat Clay, and David Schembri. While Kaaron finds a book from the world's most haunted school, Aaron is haunted by a supernatural cow, and Joseph by the ghosts in crap plastic toys. (Yeah, thanks for nothing, Uncle Marty!) AJ brings a voodoo doll and makes a Black Beauty confession. Kat develops the killing name and mummifies a cucumber. David brings his toys and reminds everyone to play. Ennui is discussed. Also balloons, having fun with your art, and using imaginative play to take control of those situations in which you have none. Everyone crosses a line and sends Aaron back to his "other planet". Odds and bodkins discussed in this episode include: Dale Bamford, sculptor and special effects artist. Frances Jenkins Alcott's The Book of Nature's Marvels Robert Bloch's The Pin Spaceballs Check out the episode page for more pics and bits.

The Cat gets festive with an off-the-rails Season's Greetings special, with laconic superstar guest, Kaaron's Christmas tree! While Kaaron gives everyone presents from her personal Ground Zero of weird objects, Aaron slouches toward Bethlehem and Joseph wemembers Gweat Bwitain and the Xmases of yore. Pizza trees are discussed, also cursed paintings, holly, ivy, prawns and suncream. Lobster shells are deftly utilised as a metaphor for the stages in a life. Honour is restored in the Hunter S. Thompson universe. Kaaron exposes her most extraordinary fetish. Aaron longs for anarchy. Joseph is so horrified he loses the power of speech. Everyone wishes everyone a Merry Whatever and a Happy New Thing! Some of the baubles and other cheap decorations mentioned in this episode include: Jonathan Richman's That Summer Feeling Bruce Wagner's The Marvel Universe: Origin Stories L. Campbell Taylor's Serenity The Crying Boy painting Check out the episode page for more pics and seasonal bits.