RISK!

One chilly Seattle night in February 2014, four storytellers on the RISK! stage said some things they probably wouldn’t have otherwise said out loud.

Dan Savage told the story of his early days writing Savage Love in Seattle, doing drag to hide his identity, and one late-night encounter that left him genuinely bewildered by his own desire.

(Content note: murder, sexual assault)

Kelleen Conway Blanchard grew up carrying fragments of a story no child should know: her cousin Pam was murdered in her apartment, and the man everyone suspected walked free. Twenty years later, a phone call changed what Kelleen knew, though not necessarily how it felt.

Summer Waldron was freshly divorced, newly medicated for depression, and committed to a long-planned threesome. Then the night itself unraveled, pulled apart by side effects, a panicked call from her mother, and a body that had simply stopped cooperating.

Emmett Montgomery nearly died of hypothermia on a high school survival trip in the Utah desert, hallucinating through every bad decision on the way there.

Full episode details and music credits at risk-show.com/podcast/live-from-seattle-cre518 

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It's summer 2014, and Bailey Swilley has a boyfriend she's been trying to leave for months and a father who is about to make that the least of her problems. When her dad goes into cardiac arrest, the family descends on his hospital room in Memphis, and her Taiwanese grandmother, who has never previously mentioned being a healer, begins issuing instructions from a witch she met on a Carnival cruise. The spells escalate. So does everything else.

Nick Hornedo has been falling for his girl best friends since he was a teenager, and he knows it's a problem. In high school, a girl named Chloe pulls him into corners to talk, says things that sound like promises, and kicks him in the groin. He keeps finding reasons to stay in the game. It does not go the way he imagined.

Between the two stories, JC Cassis drops in with a deathbed anecdote about a grandfather who wanted everyone to know they should be working harder.

Share your reactions and find music credits at risk-show.com/podcast/love-death-and-dads-pee 

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🎟 See RISK! live⁠ on Tuesday, June 9, 2026, in New York City

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This one goes deep. "Into the Mystic" first aired in February 2014, and it brings together three accounts of the uncanny from three storytellers who had no map for what they were experiencing.

Christine Lee, an Episcopal priest, has spent years navigating the gap between the faith she teaches and the faith she actually feels. When a parishioner with a seriously injured knee agrees to be prayed over, Christine finds herself in the stairwell of her church, watching something she cannot explain.

(Content note: emotional abuse, child psychological abuse)

Lulu grew up in 1970s Pittsburgh with a mother who was cruel and checked out. That summer, a neighbor's adult son with schizophrenia becomes her unlikely companion and proceeds to fill her head with detailed, terrifying visions of the Rapture, the Antichrist, and the Tribulation.

Jen Kwok is with her then-fiancé's family on Staten Island when his father collapses from a heart attack on Christmas Eve. The days that follow are brutal, and something extraordinary happens on the bus ride back to the city.

Full episode details and music credits at risk-show.com/podcast/into-the-mystic-cre517 

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Guest-host Taj Easton is in the chair this week, presenting these two stories on the long shadow of patriarchy with a particular attentiveness, repeatedly asking the same leading question: Are straight men okay?

Cassidy Krug arrives at Stanford a diver of moderate ambition, then spends nine years being screamed at by a coach whose legendarily ruthless style drives her to the Olympics. Fifteen years after retiring, she still isn't sure whether what got her there was abuse, or maybe exactly what she needed.

(Content note: domestic violence)

Thomas Brazzle grows up desperate for his ex-Marine father's approval, but the man abandons his family after Thomas intervenes on his mother's behalf during a vicious assault by his father. Thirty years later, at his mother's funeral, his father reappears, and Thomas is stunned to find he's still desperate for the approval of a man who brutalized his mother, abandoned them all, and is now a stranger to him.

Leave your reactions and find episode details and music credits at risk-show.com/podcast/brutal-authority 

Be Part of RISK!

🎟 See RISK! live⁠ in New York City on June 9, 2026

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💵 Make a one-time donation⁠⁠ via PayPal or Zelle to [email protected]

📚 Shop merch or the RISK! book⁠

🎓 Take storytelling classes with us⁠🎥 Hire Kevin as a coach or get personalized videos
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This one goes back to February 2014: a live RISK! episode built around the theme of fascination, meaning the things that get under your skin and won't let go.

Ryan Britt was a self-appointed porn expert at age 10, thanks to his father's very open magazine policy and to a darkroom box labeled "Do Not Open" that turned out to contain something far more interesting than photographic paper.

Adam Wade spent years nursing a Rick Moranis complex, right up until a chance encounter at a pharmaceutical convention gave him an unusual opportunity to put it to use.

(Content note: eating disorder)

Brad Lawrence was 15, overweight, and utterly transfixed by a softcore film called Felicity — until a different movie sent him down a dangerous path of self-reinvention over a single summer.

Lulu left a long, sexless marriage at 44 and spent the next several years making up for lost time, culminating in a nerve-racking attempt to fulfill a very specific fantasy at a kink convention class in Astoria.

Full episode details and music credits at risk-show.com/podcast/fascination-cre516 

Be Part of RISK!

🎟 See RISK! live⁠ in [CITY] ([MONTH & DAY]) or [CITY] ([MONTH & DAY])

✍️ Pitch your story⁠

❤️ Support us on Patreon⁠

💵 Make a one-time donation⁠⁠ via PayPal or Zelle to [email protected]

📚 Shop merch or the RISK! book⁠

🎓 Take storytelling classes with us⁠

🎥 Hire Kevin as a coach or get personalized videos
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices