Best Books for Podcasters
2 min readPodcasting is a tricky subject and to do well in it, you need to have a general understanding of how broadcast material is created. Whether you are a chat show or covering more tightly scripted journalism, the key is having a coherent line for the listener to follow. On top of this, you require an understanding of the recording and editing stages, without which, you could have all the content in the world, and nobody will want to listen as it sounds terrible. Here is a list of books which will help you through.
Before I get to the list, please feel free to comment any books or materials you found extra useful (leave your podcast link in the comment too) and I can add your recommendation to this list!
Mind Your Language – Writing with impact for broadcast news. Christina McIntyre
This book is essential for all hard journalism podcasters, radio producers, and even TV producers. While aimed more towards the professional industry, it provides detailed insight into how the best broadcasters do it, and so it is certainly worth reading.
This book contains guides to making radio packages, as well as important broadcast considerations – did you know that the tense used in a radio script must be present tense, while print news and articles should be in past tense?
It will show you all the words you are mixing up (affect/effect) so you don’t sound like a fool in people’s ears, and also give you insight into saying the most in the fewest words. All of this is essential for a podcaster especially considering the time limits your podcast follows.
Essential Radio Skills. Peter Stewart
If you know anyone interested in radio or podcasting, there is a good chance you have seen this book on their desk. Filled to the brim with useful tips and tricks, from industry standards, to learning what each role in a studio does.
It guides you through all the essentials and describes each show type, as well as providing insight into interviewing, how to present as a team, and the laws of laughter for those who want humour in their podcast.
Podcasting for Dummies. Tee Morris & Chuck Tomasi
You can’t really go wrong with the For Dummies series. This book is a much more direct look into podcasting itself. I would recommend you buy either this one or the Essential Radio skills book. Both would be overkill. This offers much the same content but if you are strictly looking to do an amateur to semi-professional podcast series, this may be more geared to you.
The big benefit of this book is that it covers topics such as promoting your podcast and getting visibility for it. While the other books may offer a deeper focus to the broadly transferable skills, this book will home in on exactly what you need to do for your podcast.
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