Unexplained is a haunting story-based podcast in which host and creator Richard MacLean Smith explores a different unexplained mystery each week - often to terrifying effect. Richard MacLean Smith:A good friend of mine is a real heavy conspiracy theorist with a particular interest in UFOs and esoteric ideas and we had actually planned to make a show together. It was going to be a podcast, which I guess you could say for the time was a more traditional approach — essentially two guys talking about strange and weird things.But we couldn’t ever seem to find the time to get together and as the months went by I started to think on my own a bit more about the show and what it should be.At the time I was listening a lot to the usual suspects like This American Life, Serial, that sort of thing and then my girlfriend recommended Lore to me, and it was a bit of a game changer — aside from being an incredible show, it was the moment I realized I could actually do the thing on my own. I used to be a musician and know how to record a bit, I had all the equipment, basically everything I needed. But more than that, it made me see what the show could be, that it could in my own small way be a real piece of art. Because these are ten very different chapters, I'll review each one briefly on its own, to avoid this becoming a huge wall of text that doesn't make much sense: The stories of Annalise Michel and Elisa Lam, both now hugely famous because of their downright eeriness and video/tape recordings, deserve their places in the book, and are for sure chill inducing, But the story of the attempted murder of a girl committed by 2 of her young friends who purportedly did it for Slenderman, doesn’t belong in this book.

Into the Badlands: Skinwalker Ranch! I've been fascinated by this case for years, ever since I went down the rabbit hole to write a semi-popular blog post on the subject. I was excited to see it included here, and it did not disappoint. There were so many new details I'd never read about before, and it was more terrifying than I initially expected. This is probably one of my favourite paranormal accounts of all time, and I loved reading about it in all this detail. If you get this book only for this chapter and the previous one, you wouldn't be disappointed. This book has some really good thought provoking information, but sadly quite equally as much boring suppositions. Smith:As I mentioned above, I think partly it’s the way I have attempted,[when]possible, to reveal the story of the events as they unfolded in real time, but also that on the one hand I don’t approach the subject with any kind of hysteria, but then on the other I don’t dismiss anything out of hand either – I just tell the story with all the facts that we have to go on.The point being that many, if not all of the people who are featured in the episodes, I think, aren’t trying to mislead anyone; I think they saw what they saw, or heard what they heard, whether there is anything ‘unnatural’ or untoward about what has happened is not for me to decide. I think this tone is important to the show also. And then on top of that all, the music kind of brings it all together, and although neither of these elements are particularly novel in their own right, something about the way they all come together makes the show what it is. I tried. But verbosity to this extent would never have grabbed me, even if the proofs and voices were better, more authentic. Stringy and roundabout writing, filled with circling redundancies and asides. I have no idea what he means by "uncertain times" either. Regardless, that's a quirky slant to describe these episodes. Nor is it accurate, IMHO.As for the inspiration for the show, I am a huge fan of horror and science fiction, but also, like many people, unexplained mysteries — the more bizarre and impenetrable the better. Then, last year I was in a charity shop in Inverness and came across a book of magazines from the 80s called Unexplained. Someone had collected them and put them together and I just realised that was it right there! Weirdly, though, I’ve not used any of the stories from that series. I think many of them have been quite roundly debunked since…

The other element I think that people have responded to is trying to give the events a scientific context, and again, I’m not an academic nor a scientist, and I am weary of veering into Quantum mysticism — because despite some of the more wild theories, I am a believer and lover of the principles of science and value that as our only true chance of getting to the bottom of just what the hell is going on (in life and the universe generally!). BUT, that said, I do like to humormyself that there may be some crossover between what we traditionally thought as supernatural and what may in fact be a strange quirk of physics, but I try to bring the ideas in more as a way to provoke people’s imaginations and introduce them to some really incredible theories — as opposed to offering any genuine answer to the phenomena. I’ve really enjoyed doing the show how I‘ve done it so far, but I feel like it needs to evolve somewhat to keep me and the listeners interested; so, you may see something a bit more ambitious in the next season. I won’t say too much, but the basic premise will be [that] instead of doing tenshort individual stories, I’m going to take one and make that the whole season. I’m not quite sure if it will work, but that’s the plan for now[.] This book fell into neither trap. The selected stories were fascinating, covering both classic incidents and ones that even I hadn't heard of; even the ones I had heard of had lots of new information that I was reading about for the first time. As I've said previously, I'm not usually into UFOs as much as I am ghosts and cryptids and other paranormal elements -- this book had me absolutely hooked on a straight-up UFO story, because it was so engaging and such an interesting case. Following each meticulously researched story was a lot of really interesting information, speculation, and context. The incidents were put into their social context; there was a lot of philosophising that asked questions about the nature of such things, about why we might be drawn to them, about what could have potentially caused them and why we might be open to them. Especially fascinating was the discussion regarding the internet's role in such things; the book went into detail about creepypasta and the rise of internet folklore, and it's the first time I've seen this subject touched upon in a book like this and I was thrilled, considering that's one of the subjects I'm fascinated by. There were lots of interesting things to say about it. Because of how much I enjoyed the first season of Unexplained, I reached out to the podcast’s creator, Richard MacLean Smith, to talk about the series and its future.Unexplained, based on a successful podcast of the same name, is a feast of the supernatural, paranormal and just plain weird that is known to have happened at various periods throughout the UK and is practically perfect for those drawn-in Autumn nights as we head towards Halloween. I am a fan of these often creepy stories from all corners of the globe and read them no matter the dale they're published, but I must admit that these had a bigger impact on me being both from this country and released at an inspired time of the year! Apologies for going wanky, but there is a quote by philosopher Roger Scruton…which goes something like, “The consolation of imaginary things is not imaginary consolation,” and that’s one of the principles I’ve built the show on.

I really should read more ‘local’ books about my area. You often forget what a plethora of history and mythology can exist in an area you live in, and it was truely delightful to read some stories based solely around the region I have lived and grown up in for over 30 years (minus a year I spent living in Manchester). It’s made me fall in love with Teesside all over again. Smith:So as you may know, I just finished my first season and will look to bring season two out a little later in the year — partly for a breather, but also I think it’s better suited to the darker months of the year[.]Many of those vintage programs were stunningly effective for that reason, but I definitely wasn’t spoiled for choice—the art form was also pretty much dead until the emergence and subsequent explosion of podcasts as a medium for storytelling over the past decade-plus, providing artists a new venue to create horrors and pump them directly into our earholes.

The Introduction is 1 star. It was the most ridiculous and lengthy circumvent for modern "me" experience with podcast and other horror, occult, alien drama? Sincerely, I don't know. It was on par with watching a 1/2 hour of TMZ if you didn't know what media was or came from another planet. Or didn't know enough about Earth modern entertainment. As if you thought Snoop Dog might be an animal species. In other words, I couldn't even connote 2/3rds of what he was discussing at length about his career, life experience. A "non-fiction" collection of "real-life supernatural stories for uncertain times." The non-fiction adjective describes where this book can be found in a library or bookstore, and the "uncertain times" description on the front of the book hints that this author will be trying to explain how the spooky tales in this book can relate to our inner lives, technological advancements, scientific developments, ETC.The first history of the boy/man who remembered being shot down in combat and dying was the only 3 or 4 star in this book, IMHO.