12+ Episode 102 (6 February 2025): The terrace house door creaks open, and the women sitting in the converted front room glance at the newcomers: another nervous-looking young woman in her late teens or early twenties and an older woman, probably her mother, judging by their shared chubby features. The two women cross to the receptionist's desk.
Listen now on Acast
The Nine Lives of Leo Roberts—Prologue: The Clinic is a short story I wrote and narrated specifically for Season Five of Tall And True Short Reads. I released the episode in February 2025.
Please note: The story insight below contains spoilers!
Interconnected Stories
As I explained in the trailer Introducing Season Five, the first four seasons of Tall And True Short Reads featured the short stories, blog posts, and other writings I've shared on Tall And True. Most were standalone episodes, but I also released multipart episodes for longer stories and posts.
For Season Five, I'm doing something different. I'm writing and narrating a series of interconnected short stories titled The Nine Lives of Leo Roberts. Prologue: The Clinic is the first episode.
In the Season Five trailer, I quoted the Gotham Writers Workshop's definition of the interconnected or linked stories genre as "stories that are complete in that each story can stand alone, but when put together, they interrelate and create a larger whole."
My goal with Season Five is to explore "sliding doors" moments. Each episode will be a standalone story set at a different time in Leo's life, but his nine lives will interconnect to create a "larger whole".
Elements of AutoFiction
As with my other writing, I will draw on elements of autofiction in The Nine Lives of Leo Roberts. For example, while I don't specify a date for The Clinic episode, I wrote the prologue story with a 1960s or '70s setting in mind.
I was born in England in 1962, and researching the contraceptive and unplanned pregnancy options for women like Rita from my story at that time was a sobering insight into the predicament faced by my teenage mother. Thankfully, unlike Rita's Billy, my father kept his promises!
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Leo's First Life
I hope you enjoy listening to The Nine Lives of Leo Roberts—Prologue: The Clinic on the Acast player (above), the podcast website and all popular podcasting apps, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube.
You can read my short stories, blog posts, and other writings on Tall And True. You can also buy my short story and microfiction collections, including my latest collection, One Day in the Life of Alex's AI and Other Speculative Fiction, from the Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, and Kobo online bookstores.
The next episode for Season Five, and the first of Leo's nine lives, will be released shortly. In the meantime, search your feed or the podcast website, TallAndTrueShortReads.com, to listen to 101 episodes and trailers from the past four seasons, and follow or subscribe to the podcast and rate and review it via your favourite podcasting app — doing so helps share my storytelling.
Finally, please share this episode post with family and friends and spread the word about Tall And True Short Reads and the Tall And True writers' website.
© 2025 Robert Fairhead
N.B. This September 2020 post introduced the Tall And True Short Reads storytelling podcast.
Robert shares his writing on Tall And True and blogs on his eponymous website, RobertFairhead.com. He also writes and narrates episodes for the Tall And True Short Reads storytelling podcast, which features his short stories, blog posts, and other writing.
Robert's book reviews and other writing have appeared in print and online media. He has published three short story collections — Both Sides of the Story (2020), Twelve Furious Months (2021) and Twelve More Furious Months (2022) —, a microfiction anthology, Tall And True Microfiction (2023), and a collection of speculative fiction, One Day in the Life of Alex's AI and Other Speculative Fiction (2024).
In addition to writing, Robert's favourite pastimes include reading, watching the Sydney Swans Aussie Rules football team with his son, and walking his dog.
He has also enjoyed a one-night stand ... as a stand-up comic.
