Box of Delights

Julia is joined by Scottish giant (often mistaken for hot Santa) Stephen Oswald who tells her all about filming the excessively festive Netflix movie, A Castle for Christmas.

It was lockdown, 2020, and an obsession with knitting was about to take a hold of the plucky thespian as he travelled back to his native Scotland for 3 months to film with a bunch of similarly confused actors and Brook Shields! This one is quite a (sleigh) ride.

If you're looking for a podcast episode to put you in a Christmas mood, step right up.

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The brilliant author, Hattie Williams, joins Julia to recount her early experiences watching The X Files on BBC Two.

No 9-year-old should see the things she's seen, but she finds the show's serial killer - Eugene Tooms - more funny than frightening now. Remember the yellow-eyed lurker who lived in nests made of his own lick and slithered through sewage pipes in search of his next victim?

Well, Hattie does in great, gratuitous detail.

Her gripping debut novel - Bitter Sweet - is out now in hardback and is totally unputdownable.

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Journalist and author Michael Hogan reminisces with Julia about the blink-and-you'll-miss-it BBC soap opera Eldorado. A costly experiment for the BBC which built a small village in which to shoot the sun-soaked Spanish saga that only ran for a year in the early nineties.

Julia's never really gotten over the cancellation of Wogan to make way for it and for what?

Michael's brilliantly witty and twisty debut cosy crime novel - The Dog Walkers' Detective Agency - is out now and available in paperback.

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The brilliant actor Liz Bower asks you to push away your dinner and join her in the offices of Sterling-Cooper advertising agency in New York as a feckless employee mounts a ride-on mower, after one too many wines, and causes bloody havoc.

A truly memorable moment from one of the greatest TV shows of all time. Is Jon Hamm still hot? How did production design get the blood to spatter so perfectly on the shocked faces of those extras? And a short Dave Grohl correction. Enjoy!

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The star of, among other things, Netflix's A Castle For Christmas, Stephen Oswald chats to Julia about being far too small to watch Hammer House of Horror in 1980 when it went out on ITV and the particular moment from his favourite episode which involved a children's birthday party and a lot of fake blood.

If you have yet to watch A Castle For Christmas, go and check it out. An absolute delight of a festive film and it'll be good homework for our festive special closer to Christmas!

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Actor and audio-book queen Liz Bower tells Julia (who is basically Zombie-phobic) about the time her favourite undead series killed off one of her favourite characters.

Full disclosure, we recorded Liz's episodes ages ago and The Walking Dead universe may have thrown up several new iterations since we sat down to chat about it almost TWO YEARS ago.

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Join author Kate Weston as she remembers watching in horror the episode of Byker Grove (CBBC) where young Gemma touched a dodgy plug and died of electric to the horror of us all.

Kate's latest novel - How to Make a Killing - is set in the sordid world of high-powered estate agency and has been described as "Selling Sunset with incident tape". And it's OUT NOW.

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Brilliant actor and voice of the Don't Make Me Laugh audiobook, Liz Bower tells Julia about the deep emotional scars left by watching Grange Hill's Zammo descend into heroin addiction.

And she remembers the TV moment which, for a while, she was most recognised for. Listen to the end for a nostalgic reminder.

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Journalist and author Michael Hogan talks about his love of duffle-coated, accidental detective Jonathan Creek and how his fondness for cosy crime went on to inspire his debut novel.

The Dogwalkers' Detective Agency is out now and follows the adventures of Charlie Boardman and his beloved Staffy, Ruby as they go on the trail of a killer after finding a body on their morning walk.

It's been hailed by the likes of Claudia Winkleman and Marian Keyes and is the perfect Autumnal read, full of twists, turns and Hogan's trademark humour.

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