Casting Lots is now on YouTube! Subscribe to us now and get ready to re-listen to all your Season 1 favourites, including the Franklin Expedition, the Donner Party, the Whaleship Essex and the Raft of the Medusa…

Subscribe here: https://www.youtube.com/@castinglotspodcast

Find out about Carmella’s books here:

UK – https://www.penguin.co.uk/authors/286178/carmella-lowkis

US – https://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Carmella-Lowkis/201665927

CREDITS

Written, hosted and produced by Alix Penn and Carmella Lowkis. 

Theme music by Daniel Wackett. Find him on Soundcloud as Daniel Wackett.

Logo by Ashley. Find her on Instagram @tallestfriend.

Casting Lots is part of the Morbid Audio Podcast Network. Network sting by Mikaela Moody. Find her on Bandcamp as mikaelamoody1.

TRANSCRIPT

Alix: Ahoy there!

Carmella: Did you miss us?

A: It’s been a few years since you last heard from us. How have you all been? We wanted to check back in to bring you all the latest breaking historical news of survival cannibalism. But there hasn’t been too much of that going on, sadly.

C: Sadly?!

A: They still haven’t found George Pollard’s account of the sinking of the Essex and I know it’s in Nantucket somewhere!

C: But they did find James Fitzjames’ cannibalised face!

A: And I did get really excited about those two astronauts when they got stuck on the International Space Centre.

C: So, in the absence of new content, and in the survival cannibalism spirit of reduce, reuse, recycle…

A: We are serving up a reheated dish of all of our previous episodes, uploaded to YouTube for the first time.

C: Go back for a relisten, and tell all your friends and family who aren’t cool enough to listen to podcasts in the normal way.

A: Season 1 is available now, with all your old favourites, including the Donner Party, the Raft of the Medusa, the Whaleship Essex, and, of course, the Franklin Expedition.

C: And Season 2 will drop later in the year, so make sure to subscribe.

A: And please be kind to us in the comment section on YouTube. It’s kind of scary.

C: And if you still haven’t had your fill of us, I have been a bit busy since the show ended, writing some books. No survival cannibalism, I’m afraid…

A: I’m really working on trying to convince her to write a survival cannibalism book, I promise you.

C: But if you’re into queer Gothic mysteries, which you probably are, then you may still enjoy them. My first book was called Spitting Gold, that’s out now wherever you get your books and audiobooks.

A: In this house we love and respect the audio medium.

C: And the latest is called A Slow and Secret Poison, out January 2026 in the UK and February 2026 in the US. We’ll put a link in the shownotes so you can check them out.

A: And I just realised that that was a pun about Spitting Gold and the ‘audio medium’.

C: Ohhh!

A: It’ll make sense once you read it. Now, I haven’t done anything quite so impressive, so I’m just going to round us off with a quick question for the road: have you ever been really, really hungry?

[Outro Music – Daniel Wackett]