Poirot Pals
Join hosts Caitlin Morris and Chad Lind as they endeavor to read, research, and discuss all thirty-three Hercule Poirot mystery novels.
To get the most out of this audio book club, listen to the pre-read episodes before you read each book. Then, process your thoughts with Chad and Caitlin during each debrief episode.
Join us as we read in real-time, or listen and read at your leisure.
Poirot Pals
Poirot Pals: One Year Debrief
Absolutely ZERO spoilers! It’s bonus episode time with Caitlin, Chad, and Hercule Poirot’s egg-shaped head.
Curious about what keeps a passion project alive after more than a year of creating? So are we!
In this special 14-month anniversary episode of Poirot Pals, we reflect on our podcast journey and the key to keeping it fun and meaningful. By embracing creative freedom and flexible schedules, we’ve not only kept the process enjoyable but deepened our friendship along the way.
Tune in as we discuss our approach to producing episodes that balance academic depth with playful, off-the-wall conversations. From our favorite characters like Ariadne Oliver and Arthur Hastings to the careful note-taking that informs each discussion, we explore how adapting our style to various texts has enriched both our process and our perspectives.
Looking ahead, we’re excited about the possibility of live shows in cities like Chicago, Seattle, and Atlanta! Shout-out to our amazing listeners in Naples, the Orkney Islands, Australia, and the UK—we see you! Plus, we share our love for Hugh Fraser’s incredible audiobook narrations and hint at future plans to expand into movie and TV reviews, all while staying true to our book club roots.
Join the celebration and keep the Poirot Pals journey going strong with us!
Theme Music: The Black Cat by Aaron Kenny.
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Send us emails!
poirotpals@gmail.com
there it is okay, oh my goodness that that line is going. Sentences are happening, things are getting recorded.
Chad:Things are happening.
Caitlin:Things are happening. That's my alternative to here we are. Here we are, sort of. You had pointed out that this is actually a 14-month anniversary and not a year, but it's as close as we could get.
Caitlin:Yep, we're just on Poirot time, which means I'm 95 years old and you're 13, and it's the year 2012,. And it's fine, I think. For a long time, we've wanted this podcast to be timeless, and it is we're truly unbound from time.
Caitlin:No, basically what we wanted to do this episode is to say hello to everyone and to say like thank you for listening for a year. It's so cool and we have no plans to stop anytime soon. Like 33 books, here we come. And we also just kind of wanted to reflect on like what we've learned, what we've changed, how our vision has transformed.
Caitlin:And I think like I didn't expect to talk about this so soon in the episode, but you and I have had such cool conversations about what this podcast means to us, what it means as something that we a passion project that also we like share with the public, and like how do you keep that going in a way that keeps the energy and the tone and like the fun of it.
Caitlin:And you had said and so I'm just repeating it so I can sound cool but like you were like if we start giving ourselves deadlines which we had thought like oh yeah, we'll like have this done on this day every single time of the month, you were like it's gonna start to feel like a job and we are gonna start to resent it and the way we can keep this alive is to actually give it a lot of space. I have a hard time because I so much of what I do is deadline driven as, like a writer and also a teacher a college instructor on the quarter system every single day feels like I'm constantly trying to meet deadlines that it's been a really good exercise and a completely different worldview and mindset when it comes to producing something.
Chad:I'm not in the teaching boat, as I'm sure everyone calls it, but I work in audio all throughout the week.
Chad:And I have clients and people who have very demanding, exacting, rigid ways they want their audio to sound and by what time of day, what date all this stuff? Time of day, what date, all this stuff? And so it's really nice to have a project that I care about a lot, that I really enjoy doing, but it's not something where either of us are like this has got to be done on this date and if it's not, then we're just not doing it. No, that would be like I already have enough of that in my existence. Be like I already have enough of that in my existence.
Caitlin:Yes, it would start to slowly kill it. Poirot Pals makes me genuinely so happy. When I'm preparing to record or after we've recorded, I just have this sense of exuberance that it's really hard to replicate, and so I feel really grateful for that.
Chad:Yeah, me too, and thank you for that. I agree, I also would just like to say that the first thing we are doing, this podcast, like we have already thrown away the rules that we made in the first and we're just like, ah, we're doing it this way, so, and I, so I you know. Congratulations to both of us for being so consistent with that.
Caitlin:Yeah, consistently rebellious against ourselves, um, but no, so let's. I guess we could go back to like what? Like what are some things that you're maybe pleasantly surprised by. From this year, slash 14 months.
Chad:You and I were on a group call with this wonderful poet and she was kind of asking us what Perot Pals was about. And I mean, at the core of it, you and I don't get to hang out, no. And so whenever we record, it's like oh yeah, I'm talking to my close friend Caitlin right, who's like oh yeah, I'm talking to my close friend Caitlin right, who's like awesome. And I'm not surprised by it, but I like the fact that the friendship is just growing. I think that that's awesome.
Caitlin:That's really true. The fun of the friendship and the fun of like talking with someone really silly, I think, mixed with Poro, is part of it. It's not just Poro, poor guy. The other piece of it that is really fun is that when we'll read and we can kind of, I guess, go a little bit into the behind the scenes, what we do is we usually will just read the book on our own. That's when we're thinking about experiencing the story for what it is, and then we'll go back and we'll take read the book on our own. That's when we're thinking about like experiencing the story for what it is, and then we'll go back and we'll take detailed notes.
Caitlin:We'll like listen to the audio book and I have so much fun engaging with the book like that and like kind of talking, like before you and I talk, kind of like talking to myself and having ideas and making observations and being like oh my God, I hadn't seen it that way, and like making dumb jokes to myself that I. Then I'm like nobody needs to hear that. Why did I say that? But it's just, it's a way of reading that I love and I think I've only done to that depth when it's been in like an academic or like a serious setting, and something that I love is to be able to do that, but with a sense of playfulness that I just haven't been able to get in other more professional arenas, and I just love reading that way.
Chad:Doing the work that you do, where you read the book and I also listen to them and I take my notes and I'm also thinking about how things are going to sound audio wise and all these other things and then to put that much effort into something and then, when it comes time to record, to feel that there are absolutely no stakes whatsoever is amazing.
Caitlin:Yeah, I hadn't thought about it that way. Yeah, I think a lot in like my role as an instructor I'm like trying really hard to at least sound a little bit like I know what I'm doing and it's nice to let go of that a little bit and also the freedom of a good edit man some of the half an hour episodes that we put together were like two hours to begin with and there's this freedom in being like say it, Just say the thing, and if it sounds really dumb you can take it out. I mean, it's just the highlights, it's just the funny stuff.
Chad:We both have a tendency to go off on tangents.
Caitlin:What.
Chad:But we always, yes, and each other's tangents, even when they're terrible, like when we have just gone completely off the rails, I'll say something that has no relation to what you've just said, and then you'd be like, exactly, and then you go somewhere, and then eventually we get back to what we talked about. You guys rarely hear that stuff because we take it all out.
Caitlin:If one of you is like, oh man, but I love this show, I'd love to hear it. No, no, you don't. No, no, yeah, just yeah. There's some magic in not knowing everything, and something that's been so cool, too is like I have learned through listening to us. It's just a really interesting opportunity to get a window into how you speak and like, how you want to sound and how you're like presenting yourself to the world, because sometimes you have this idea of like yes, I sounded really coherent and cohesive and you and I have been learning how to talk to each other, but in a way that is specific, interesting and also makes sense for someone else. There is a different way of having a conversation and even just like saying an idea, and you and I have worked on it To the point that we have re-recorded complete episodes. I think we completely redid Styles, right, yeah, because we listened to the first take and we had had fun and everything, but we were like, oh, we need to make some changes.
Chad:We also redid the pre-read of Links.
Caitlin:Oh yeah, I forgot that. And to kind of give people an idea of what we're talking about is oh yeah, I forgot that. And to kind of give people an idea of what we're talking about is sometimes you and I will speak in generalities or we'll be really excited about something and we'll all we'll say is that is so cool. I've had to really challenge myself to say something concrete about why it's cool, which I don't think I would have even caught on to, unless you're like listening for substance. I guess it's been a big challenge actually to be like well wait, why am I having this reaction to something? How can I make someone else connect to it?
Chad:Yeah, this is a brand new, in a way, like I've been recording and doing podcasts and comedy and all this other crap for a long time, but the thing I've never done is this type of show where there is something that you have read and now you're talking about it with someone and it should be entertaining, but also it should be illuminating. It should be all of these different things to people who want to listen to it. And the one thing that it took me the longest time to figure out was that when we would start talking about something and we both did this, but I did it more than you did, for sure we were having the conversation where we knew exactly what we were talking about, but we weren't being specific with the names of the people, the characters, and so we would say like, and then he did this and she did this and then, but then editing it, I was like no one is going to know who we're talking about here, and so it takes a while like it takes a little while to get this stuff ironed out.
Caitlin:And something along those lines, too, that I found is that we, when we had our like journey through the rabbit hole that was Lynx, and we were coming out of it and we started doing Ackroyd, which we're still in the middle of Don't worry folks, we're going to finish it.
Caitlin:But it was really different than that like vibe, that improvisational, wacky vibe that we had kind of stumbled upon. That worked really well for Lynx. And I remember kind of coming to you and being a little nervous. I was like, is the magic gone? Like what's happening? And you're like, no, like each episode or each like kind of series now that we're doing, you're like it is us responding to a different text and so like the texts are going to change us. They're going to change the way we interact with each other, the way our episodes sound.
Caitlin:It's okay if Lynx was its own thing and then we have a different book, a different series and the format, the specific ways that our imaginations work. It's okay if it's completely different, because the book is different and I really appreciated that. I'm so glad that when we were both in our Poirot phases we made the connection, that we both liked it so much we could have a lot to say about it. Because I can, just because you know like I'll obsess about things I'm so glad I didn't just let that pass by, you know, and that we like kind of held on to it and we're like there could be something really fun in this and like keeping it going, because I can get really into these like intense obsessions where I'm like okay, I've read this one thing and now I have to know it all. I have to read every single book.
Caitlin:I have to know what's going to happen, and I'm glad that it's turned into something more than just that.
Chad:Yeah, me too. I know we've only done a few books, but what is your favorite Perrault character? So far.
Caitlin:Oh man, that's a really good question. I'll never forget Justice for Joyce, but I'd have to say I love and I'm excited to get more into Ariadne Oliver. She is always so fun when she shows up in books. I like that. She's that stand-in for Agatha Christie. I like any time that people are smart but their social-facing persona is kind of flippant or something that people easily dismiss, and I think she's such a good pairing for Poirot because they're both that way. How about you?
Chad:I thought about it a little bit and I came to the shocking conclusion that I really miss Hastings. I hear you, Because in Lynx and in style well, especially Lynx, especially well, styles also. Style well, especially links, especially well, styles also His consistency, his kind of like Dorcas Malorcas, Doof Maloof sort of thing is. It's so predictable and it leads to these wildly unpredictable things that like that he's all of a sudden dating an acrobat or in love with an acrobat and like and how that plays into the end of the book, whereas with acroid right now, without him there, and we know why he's not there, we're not giving anything away it's dark it's dark.
Caitlin:It's not as um as fun yeah, should we go to to like how, in the near future, things that we envision and in the far future, but also with a caveat that we may change our minds and we're very fluid.
Chad:Yeah, absolutely. I think so for sure. I think we have a pretty good doable and good plan for the rest of 2024.
Caitlin:Most of it is going to be seasonal. We really enjoy doing Halloween party during the Halloween season, and so we're kind of doing something in a similar vein, I think, in the sense that it's thematically tied. And then we're just going to ride that wave straight into the holiday season and we're going to give you a holiday themed Poirot experience, which I am so excited for.
Chad:This episode is what our podcast hosting people would call is called a bonus episode. Yeah, and also the Halloween episode. What we're doing this year will also be considered a bonus episode. While we're doing all of this other stuff, we will be finishing Ackroyd.
Caitlin:We are going to finish that book. What we keep doing is we're like we all know the ending, how long can it take? And then we look at how many chapters we have and all the layers of the onion that we have to unpeel and we're like, oh boy, this is going to be another couple episodes, which is fine, and that's actually something too. That we've learned is like it's okay if things take a really long time and we've kind of that expansiveness that we've allowed our schedule We've also just kind of allowed for like how much we feel like we want to talk about a book and really we're surprising ourselves every time. Every time we're wrong.
Caitlin:We're like this is going to be so fast and then we're like, but we want to talk about the gold ring in the pond and like the jackets and one was too short and we have to.
Caitlin:So like we're still kind of, we're also still learning, I guess, like how to read and how to read with with the podcast in mind, yeah, and we're going to continue figuring out what that even means.
Caitlin:I think this is a sign, like a testament to Agatha Christie too, who we really haven't talked about this much in the episode, but like the fact that her books can continue to be entertaining and fun and surprise us, even though we're on like the third or fourth pass is, I think, a testament to the quality of these books.
Caitlin:And why these books are standing out to us as ones that we want to talk about, ones that we want to dedicate ourselves to, is because there is something kind of intoxicating about them. I feel like, the more and more we go, these stories, are these like delicate structures, and we're like, well, we can't just look at one part, or else like it'll all fall apart, or else we're not really looking at this whole thing, and you and I are like trying to figure out how to like articulate this, like architecture that she's put together and it's challenging and it's really it's fun. But it is like, yeah, we're like just slowly trying to like I'm going to mix my metaphors but like kind of untangle this knot, but in a way that makes sense, is expedient and also that people want to listen to.
Chad:It's obvious that she also loves playing with the format of a mystery.
Caitlin:Oh yeah.
Chad:She seems like she probably gets pretty bored with just the straight up Sherlock Holmes, watson type of vibe, right, and so she's not just playing with characters and language, she's playing with the complete structure of what a mystery is, and that has been something that has really surprised me and is endlessly fascinating.
Caitlin:Maybe we could talk a little bit. Well, okay, I have two things. This is unplanned, but I do think listeners something that we were so pleasantly surprised by is how many people are listening. So thank you, that's so cool we're so I am shocked, yeah.
Chad:I am too.
Caitlin:So wow, wow, so, thank you. And also we've been hearing from some people who are just mostly, and it's been so great and also a little terrifying, because people are like when's the next episode coming out? And we're like, okay, let's we gotta do it.
Caitlin:we know it's coming or we're like in the middle of recording it, but I'm just curious to hear from listeners what they enjoy from this and what they want more of beyond. Maybe just like a million podcast episodes like we'll get, we'll get there, um right, yeah, just like what's working for them, or ideas that you have as much as you and I feed off of each other. I think that there's like an exciting next step of maybe like seeing what listeners are also doing and thinking and just yeah, so I think there's a chance to like open that up. I do think we have some like things that we're scheming that maybe if we say we can always cut it out, but also we can like manifest by saying them out loud. Yeah, you have been working on possibly doing some kind of YouTube with video. Do you want to talk about that?
Chad:We really want to use YouTube to like post some of the episodes or post the episodes, but the real thing we want to do is have special pro pal events on. Youtube like certain recordings. Maybe we'll have like a you know, I don't know who knows like a mid-January winter party or something.
Caitlin:A Poirot party? That sounds lovely.
Chad:And then we have to get those weird mustaches that are made of real human hair, like that type of thing, where there's so there's a visual aspect to it. Also, if you get a couple handfuls of people or 20 people in the chat room, you can answer questions. We can just have a lot of fun.
Caitlin:I like that. I think we're just looking for ways to, yeah, have more moments to interact. We are thinking about ways to, like, monetize special things that people could get. So if we could make Poro pals a larger chunk of our lives with some help from money basically we're thinking about ways to do that, but it's true, it's like it's the reality.
Chad:It is the reality. I also would love to do something with a live show at some point in the future in either Chicago or Seattle or Atlanta.
Caitlin:Those are the places.
Chad:Those are the places, and it could even be. It could be a live show. I don't know how our actual podcast translates to a live show, so we could also, instead of that, like do get people together that we want to perform with and do like a read of a short story or something, or like. I think that would be really fun, yeah.
Caitlin:So like tell us what you want to see, also like Seattle, atlanta, chicago, people. The more we hear from you, the more we can be like, yes, we can be like, yes, we can have a place that fits this many people. So that would be so awesome. Also, this reminds me of there are some consistent listens from just like very specific places, and I just want to say, like we notice you, so like hello listener in Naples, we have a listener like a lot of the Orkney Islands, what's up? Do you guys have like a little fan club, like book club meetup? I don't know, but there are a lot of you. Where are some of our other regulars? Australia?
Chad:Australia. I will also say that for good reason, without getting into too many specifics.
Caitlin:Our listens this past year in the UK went up. Yeah, thank you, thank you.
Chad:Now that a certain person is back, they're still up.
Caitlin:Oh, that's exciting, which is great yeah.
Chad:Yeah, so thank you for listening. It's always cool to see all of the different places in North America and all over the world that people are finding our podcast. It's great.
Caitlin:Yeah, sometimes I'll be like someone my voice was just in someone's ear, like driving through Sydney, australia, and I'm just like what in the world? So thank you, that's so cool and I just feel there's so much that's grabbing our attention at all times, the fact that you want to put some of your attention towards us. It's incredible. I can't even understand it. I'm going to like get emotional, but like it's really cool. So, thank you, thank you, oh man. Anything else?
Chad:that we're forgetting. Um, I think that, oh, you know what, let's. Let's end it on this. I don't know how many different versions of Perrault you have seen in your life, but what is your favorite version? And this can also include the version of Perrault that's in your head when you're reading the books.
Caitlin:Yeah, that's true. Okay, I really like the who's, the guy who plays Hastings in the BBC Hugh something, yeah, better than David Suchet's. Like, when I think about the Poirot voice it's his and I think how interesting that he's like in the sidelines playing Hastings watching Poirot and then thinking this is how I'll do my Poirot, but I love his audiobooks. I get excited when it's his voice. I tolerate everyone else's but, yeah, I think he's my favorite portrayal of Poirot. And then just thinking about I am always fascinated by like if, thinking about the books, the first Poirot we see, the like refugee Poirot if I could do some kind of like side prequel movie in the future and not in the Kenneth Branagh way. I think he's too over dramatized and like too predictable in the way that we learn about Poirot and like heartbreak and war and whatever. No, there's like something more interesting going on and I like the mystery of it and I want to stay there. But now we're in the like kind of Poirot as international famous superstar and I like humble Poirot. How about you?
Chad:Yeah, that's really interesting. The actor's name is Hugh Frazier.
Caitlin:Hugh Frazier. Oh my God, yes, all hail Hugh Frazier.
Chad:I love David Suchet's, but I will say this like when we started doing this podcast, I really liked what you said, which was that you started and I might be wrong, maybe I misremembered- Tell me what I said.
Caitlin:I love this game.
Chad:You had started reading it before you had really seen any of the screen adaptations. So you're creating your Perrault in your head purely from what you're getting from Agatha Christie. And as much as I love David Suchet, I really wish I would have had that opportunity, Because when I read the books I see Suchet in my brain.
Caitlin:Yeah, that's so true, and I think that's why I've been a bit of a purist about not watching the adaptations, which is funny because so many people I know know Poirot through the TV show. But I don't want to sound snooty, it's just that I'm kind of holding onto it until and I think this, this is going to end, because I think you know we do want to do some like more movie reviews and TV reviews and things like that that are just kind of more fun and easy and like like fast and also a touchstone for many of our listeners too. I don't want to like break that dam yet and I know it'll happen, and I mean we've already. I mean we watched.
Chad:I've watched all the Kenny B ones, but maybe he looks so different though that I think it's when you get into Sushay, which he looks more like our beloved egghead that um yes that proximity it can kind of just blur yeah, that's, and I mean it's not like a tragedy that I can't picture for real, but but it is sometimes I'm like, oh, that would be, that would have been cool is suche your guy, then oh yeah, yeah, I like suche, because I also. He does that thing that I like, where it's not always the most positive portrayal of the man, and I like that.
Caitlin:Wow, okay, I'm really excited to see what happens when we talk to each other in a year slash, whatever many months, and what things have changed, what things we've done, what things we've let go of, what things we've done, what things we've let go of.
Chad:I'm going to put on my calendar that the two year anniversary Perot pals episode comes out in January of 2026.
Caitlin:Oh my God. No, I think I think we can do it. I think I think we can latch ourselves to time and space. Sure, I mean, we haven't yet and we, oh my, God, yet oh, my God, which I love, yeah, I love it yes, so happy one year that was amazing. Oh my God, I had the best, best, best time.
Chad:Also, thank you again to everyone who's listened and has been listening.
Caitlin:Thanks for liking the podcast so much that you're like I'm going to message them. It is so exciting to hear from people in a way that I'm like I don't want to share how exciting it is because I'll sound desperate. But no, it's just very cool to be like there are people out there. They're not just like a little number that we see in our stats, it's like people who are invested and who are excited, just as excited about this as we are. How cool.
Chad:Okay, well.
Caitlin:I'll see you. I guess I'll see you at the end of Ackroyd.
Chad:Yeah, end of Ackroyd and also our spooky October bonus episode. It's a departure.
Caitlin:Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a departure. It is, yeah, in more ways than one. Cool, Okay All right.
Chad:Talk in more ways than one.
Caitlin:Cool, okay, all right, talk to you soon. Bye, thank you.
